Marking a staff

[Musivarius]

I'm writing a paper on a theory about how the Roman mosaicists worked centering on using a staff to measure out and need to ask a question of you peeps.


If you know what I'm talking about when I say using/marking a staff can you please reply here about how you do it, and why? It doesn't need to be much, even a couple of sentences would be great. I'm just trying to get some idea if it is used now.


The paper would be completed in about 4 weeks time and I would be listing anyone's contribution. In the first instance I would publish on academia.edu but would then see if any of the journals pick it up.


Thanks

 

[Concrete guy]

I used to set out flooring using an 8ft baton.

I'd lay a row of the chosen tiles down with spacers, set the baton alongside and mark the grouts joints on the batten.

You could quickly use that to centre a room and then use the baton to check where the full tiles fell to work out setting out. It's how I was taught.

Of course, it's quicker and easier to centre by using a tape and pinging a chalk line down, then I'd make the batten and set out with it.

 

[Houston]

The chap who taught me would put level around with water level Im above finished floor level then check every cut etc with staff. From that datumn line we would drop or increase it to get our tile line with chalk line.

 

[The Legend; Phil Hobson RIP]

Lawrence I use a staff for every job from a small geometric floor to a 3,000 m2 floor, walls too. I never fix my first tile until I know where my last will go.

Before I start I can tell you what cut will go where and the size of it, from mosaic to 1m x 1m. A staff has a few names depending on locality, guaging stick, pinch rod etc

 

[White Room]

If it's a big enough floor I tend to centre and square off with a red chalk line, then with a staff check out the lay out for tile fit..if I find there needs to be a different line then use another colour chalk line to follow the tile fit.

 

[AliGage]

This is how i was taught. Using a baton of 2"x1" mark out from one end tiles including your spacing.
Then using the baton from the centre of the floor or wall you can mark out where your joints will be. Once cut size is established, mark out your first course of full tiles. Draw a level line and begin fixing your first tiles doing cuts as you go.

I now use lasers and baton stands.

 

[Musivarius]

Brilliant! Thanks that is very helpful.

One other question, when you look at a floor that you're about to do, (no fixtures going in the room, you'd see all the floor) do you mentally picture it from the centre out and allow for your cuts to equally go at the edges?

 

[TJ Smiler]

In an ideal world you would get a full tile from the centre out to the corners with no cuts around the edges, this rarely happens though.... So i tend to centre the room i'm in and if cuts are needed i like to (as best as possible) keep all the cuts roughly to a similar size, from the boarder cuts to the cuts i may have going through doorways i like them to be similar in size. Takes a lot of fiddling with the setting out process but end result is worth it. If i find it's impossible to get all the cuts similar then i will at least try to get the room to look symmetrical around all four walls and the cuts that will be seen the most try and work it so the cut is of a decent size.

 

[TJ Smiler]

Also, sometimes if a floor is big enough and there are plenty of rows going inn from one side to the other, in order to make my cut on one side of the room the same as the opposite side i my need to gain 10, 20 or 30mm etc across the floor to make this happen so the cuts to the side are the same. I will open up the grout lines by half a mm or 1mm through the centre rows so that by the time i am at the other side i have gained said amount of mm to make it work.

When you stand back and look accross a whole floor the eye cannot see any difference from 2mm joins to 2 and hallf mm joins. But like i say the floor has to big enough to acheive this without the joint size difference being noticed.

 

[White Room]

If it's a small floor I'll try and pick features in the room where the eye will pick out the cuts and the layout and adjust for that.