Laying of large-format tiles in wall and floor areas

Substrate preparation

1. Check floor surfaces for evenness by using an electric hose level or laser device. For better orientation, fixed points might be defined, if in order to indicate the necessary thickness for levelling and to ensure optimal evenness.

3. In the wall area, small-surface unevenness can be levelled with appropriate adhesive mortar, such as the multi-use flexible tile adhesive weber.xerm 861. For larger levelling jobs, it is recommended to use the quick-setting levelling and repair mortar weber.plan 818.

4. For levelling surfaces, it is absolutely necessary to apply an additional coat of the floor self-levelling compounds weber.plan 813-10 (1 - 10 mm) or weber.plan 813-25 (1 - 25 mm). Refer to the application tip "Application chart of weber.plan 813" for full information about specific primer and leveling thickness in accordance with each substrate.

Priming

1. Apply the primer weber.prim 801 on absorbent substrates or the primer weber.prim 803 on non-absorbent substrates. The quick-drying multi-use primer weber.prim 804 can also be used for pre-treatment of all substrates.

Preliminary works

1. For drilling or cutting installation holes, etc. the use of special diamond core bits and cutting discs in the appropriate sizes is strongly recommended as a real relief. If necessary, appropriate templates should be prefabricated from cardboard or similar beforehand.

2. With increasing format sizes, it is becoming more and more difficult to achieve full-surface contact with thin-bed tile adhesives. Therefore, it is imperative to choose the combined laying method (floating-buttering method). Larger formats require an increasing consumption of adhesive mortar.

Application on walls

After the tile adhesive has been combed over the entire surface of the wall area and on the backside of the tiles, the ceramic covering can be laid onto the fresh mortar bed of weber.xerm 861. A slight knocking or sliding motions will achieve the best possible contact (i.e. full-surface between tile and adhesive).

Application on floors

Large-format, thin tiles must be covered with a fabric backing on the reverse side in order to be used on floors. In this case, such tiles are also installed with the temperature-independent setting flexible adhesive weber.xerm 859 F in the floating-buttering method.

Resumption

The contact between the tile and mortar bed must be cut with an appropriate wire. Only then the already laid tiles can be picked up from the fresh adhesive bed.

Joints

1. The joint width should not be undersized due to the ever-decreasing joint proportions in the covering and should not fall below 3 mm in the entire cross-section. If necessary, movement joints can be formed with appropriate joint expansion profiles for visual reasons.

2. Work the premium grout weber.fug 875 BlueComfort into the joints flush and deep with a hard rubber float on walls and floors. After a few minutes, apply a very small quantity of the grout. Smooth down the surface with soft diagonal movements and remove excess material.

3. Clean the grouted joints with a latex sponge or a felt float.  Eventually, a supplementary cleaning operation with clean water is necessary in order to avoid any eventual dried mortar haze or residues.

Supplementary service

For levelling work on larger-size surfaces, we offer you a special service: the mini pump truck. For more information, ask our Export Department or our Technical Department for Applications.