cracked wall tiles in en-suite

[Mr T]

Grouted corners... how could he walk away from the job without grouting the corners... or should they have been syliconed?... and shouldnt there be a trim on the window reveal?

 

[andy8758]

Tile adhesive manufacturers recommend that tiles are fixed to plasterboard using a flexible tile adhesive (BS EN 12004 Class S1 usually) or use additives that make a standard adhesive flexible (BAL usually recommend their AD1 additive is used to mix adhesive). The reason for this advice is that some flex and expansion can be expected with drywall boards. To reduce flex the boards should be screwed at 300mm intervals and additional noggins (cross batons on backing frame). I can only recommend removing all the fixed tiles, adding extra fixings to the plasterboard and re-tiling with flexible adhesive. A lot of builders suffer from "I done it like this before" experience and qualifications. Get a second and third opinion. Then make the builder re-do the work or pay for it to be re-done. That's what we all have Public Liability Insurance for.... rofl!

 

[axel]

Should the corners not be grouted? Should they be siliconed instead? I am not sure what you mean about the window reveals? The window frames are PVC. When I find out what the internal walls are made of I will post back.

 

[Peter]

Was the plasterboard scrim taped over the joints? Corners should have been siliconed to allow for expansion and prevent the grout cracking.

 

[axel]

I will ask. Is scrim taping like Ames taping? If this is not done can it lead to the kind of cracking we have? So, to prevent it recurring, once tiles taken off, could someone tell me, ideally, what ought to be done?

 

[axel]

Thanks to everyone so far for your input.

 

[seph]

Looks like the tile cut around the window has cracked when the tiler installed. Also no trim which is bad. The inernal corners of the shower should be sealed aswell.

 

[SJPurdy]

As the tiles are cracking and not falling off then it implies to me that the adhesive is doing its job and sticking the tiles to the wall. I suspect that the walls are "moving" and causing the tiles to crack at the points of greatest stress - the substrate is trying to bend or a crack is opening; the adhesive holds the tile firmly and so the tile cracks! As you indicate the internal wall is most affected and there has been more heat the other side of this to cause drying out of timbers etc. and so shrinkage and twisting. I know this doesn't help you but i'm just putting forward a different opinion ( and remember we are all guessing from a brief description and a few (not very clear on my pc) photos).I agree that the corner joints should have been "filled" with a flexible sealant rather than grout and this would have stopped the grout falling out corner crack and may have allowed some movement which would have reduced the stresses in the rest of the wall.

 

[axel]

This is the explanation that I understand and what I thought the man from the insurance company was saying. On the bedroom side there are 3 long straight fine vertical lines exactly a metre apart which I assume to be boards of some kind. I don't know if this could be avoided or minimised by any other means in addition to Silicon at the corners. is the something to be expected in houses or is it quite a rare occurrence?

 

[SJPurdy]

This should not be expected - the walls should be prepared correctly and they should not move after tiling to such an extent that the tiles crack. Non of the boards that I am familiar with come in 1m widths so the spacing of the cracks is unexpected. It is difficult to help/comment further without more info on the structure of the wall which I suspect you will only really find out when the tiles are removed.

I have seen such cracks in the past on a large contract where the tiles were fitted (using highly flexible BAL Flex adhesive) to wood based sheets and the tiles cracked floor to ceiling, every 1.2m, at each joint in the wood (probably the reason BS now states not to tile on wood sheets unless a flex movement joint is incorporated over all sheet joints). similar cracks occur on incorrectly prepared wood floors again straight lines along each board joint.
The crack that is shown in a tile that has been cut into an L shape at the corner of a window is slightly more common, it's a higher stress location - years ago I tiled a bathroom in a house close to a railway line and the vibrations from the trains caused repeated failures.

 

[axel]

hello, I asked about what the partition walls are made of... Structure of wall which was tiled - original solid 6'x2' timber partition ..plasterboards have been fitted by wood screws on to....plasterboard sealed by PVA.. Tile adhesive used - mapei wall tile adhesive..ad flexible grout...


I measured the distances of the fine vertical lines on the bedroom wall and they are .. 98 cm, 102 cm, 99 cm and 100cm apart.