Tiling the kitchen and rumpus

Hi All,

We are tiling the kitchen and rumpus which is lino and carpet at the moment. The floor under the rumpus is concrete (hopefully fairly true) and the floor in kitchen is wood.

I realise that you have to use a underlay of some sort, but what should I use? Theres great deal of price difference between "Ceramic tile underlay" and "CSR Compressed Fibro"
http://www.barrenjoeytimber.com.au/price.cfm?CatID=21

If I want the tiles from the rumpus and kitchen to meet up squarely and flat, do I have to use underlay in the rumpus also?

thanks all!
Mowy

believe it or not, many years ago due to space constraints in my old jallopy and lack of money, I used eaves lining sheets for all my tiling at home - it is all still down and working a treat according to the new owners whom I spoke with yesterday.

Anyway, to answer your question, I would be reluctant to place tiles over the joining point as the movement in the two subfloors will be very different I imagine. I imagine you want the two areas to work as a single unit and don't want there to be an obvious transition, but is it just a door way or is it an entire wall to wall area?

Meeting the tiles up invisibly can be a real challenge, though it is very do-able. You just need to ensure the two surfaces are pefectly even I guess. The right flexible tile adhesive can help to marry in slight discrepencies but that still doesnt address the issue with the two subfloors. The most critical will be where the two subfloors join so if there's a way to get the timber side VERY secure, do it I reckon.

not much help I know, but there's my thoughts -

Got any pics???

Gday Mowy, I'd recommend getting DTA's tiling video from Bunnings in the tile section. Only $8 and shows a variety of techniques that you will find useful reference. Only trouble is the final year apprentice on the vid makes it all look too easy, which filled me with false confidence .

I'm with Steve, have an expansion joint between the two substrates, the vid shows this. I imagine you would then tile both sides back from that joint line.

If you are set on having just a grout line over the join, use a flexible caulking compound like Caulk in Colours that matches your grout.

The Ceramic Tile Underlay is 6.0 mm thick so as to be strong enough to handle foot traffic when laid over uneven surfaces. Villaboard is also 6.0 thick, apart from the nailing points being printed on the c/tile u/lay and the V/board having recessed edges I'm not sure if there are any other relevent differences. James Hardie have a cusomer service 13 typ number that should answer this for you. From memory, both 6mm sheets worked out to a similar price per sq m so the difference was irrelevant to me.

You can tile straight over concrete using the right adhesive, something like Resaflex trade or Ultraflex can be used for a variety of substrates including concrete and cement sheet. It is possible but not typically recommended to tile straight over timber floors.

If the rumpus (concrete) floor is lower than the kitchen floor after putting down the underlay over the timber, you would use a levelling compound to bring up the rumpus floor height to suit, then the flexible tile adhesive would take up any remaining height difference.

One final suggestion, I only did a loungroom hearth but swore to never tile again! I'd do all the homework, the preparation, and buy the materials, then get a tradesman to just lay the tiles. You could then do the grouting and cleanup.

Good luck with it........cheers.........Sean

Hello all,
A couple of brief thoughts, the only kind gnus have.
Versulux is the same thickness as villaboard, without the rebate for plastering, and suits wet area work. Glue and double nail/screw it to the timber as you would underlay, 3 corners meeting, not 4.
On the join line depends which is higher but feather finish will build up the timber floor, dries hard and will let you level the join.
Covering dissimilar materials is likely to be a problem later on, maybe you could work to a finished edge, brass strip or whatever, and live with a fractional difference in heights, like you often see in shopping centres etc.( 1 mm or so)......
Poly carbonate jointing can be got in grout colors, varing widths and chamfered to get a neat joint, grouted with flexible sealant.
If the cement floors lower put more adhesive on. Some types are rated for this, if you need brand names I can walk down to the shed and get them, I think.

Thank you all for your reply. The rooms are separated at the moment by a archway, no doors.

Ideally, I would like to have just the grout between the 2 rooms so that we get an flow on effect. If this is too difficult to do, what are the best methods to "hide" the joints? ie slight height difference.