Fitting zamora, what's best for cutting?

[Statia]

Hi guys,
I'm going to be stripping out our shower cubicle soon and refitting with new tray and enclosure. We went to Topps yesterday and came back with 4m2 of zamora beige 14.8 x 60 tiles for the enclosure. I also came out with a bag of Bal pro adhesive:


I've been onto eBay just this minute and ordered a set of 365 drills for porcelain. The only thing I don't have is a tile cutter, and I've never worked with porcelain before, and these tiles are pretty thick. I have a friend who's happy to loan me a powered wet tile cutter (diamond blade job), but it's only cheap and I doubt the blade would last with these tiles. I'm only going to be doing straight cuts.

Would I be best borrowing the wet tile saw and buying a decent blade wheel, if so which are best for these tiles? Or should I buy or hire a cutter? What do you recommend for these bad boy tiles? I noticed Topps advertised they hire out cutters. Is this worth considering?

Thanks in advance!

 

[diamondtiling]

Hi Statia, you would be better with a dry cutter, you will have lots of cuts and this will be the quickest way to do them. If Topps have a cutter that will manage then hire one from them, there is no point buying one for a one off job. What are the walls made up of and are you going to tank the shower area?

 

[Statia]

Hi DT,

Thanks for your response.

The walls are currently plasterboard on stud walls. I am going to rip off the existing board and tiles together and replace with aquapanel from wickes. I was going to pass on tanking with using the aquapanel, but I'm not 100% sure. What do you think?

Also, if you do think tanking is worth doing, is this any good?:

Dunlop Shower Waterproofing Kit

Thanks!

 

[diamondtiling]

I have never used the Dunlop tanking kit although I have used a similar paint on system which worked fine, tanking is for your piece of mind, if installed correctly then you should have no leaks. The aqua panels from wickes are what I use although I do tape all joints and corners and apply a paint on tanking system, either Granfix or Ardex systems, you could use a membrane type tanking kit which are readily available at most good tile shops and are easy to apply. Some tilers stick with the aqua panels on their own, I prefer to be safe rather than sorry later.

 

[Statia]

If I fitted the aquapanel, taped the joints (including upstands) then applied a paint on tanking system would that be a good job done? Could I then put adhesive straight on top of tanking and fit porcelain tiles?

Thanks!

 

[White Room]

Let tanking dry and tile using a powdered adhesive