sonofabitch!

[Mikey P]

Cleaned this floor with a Turbo 8 days ago.


Yesterday afternoon it decided to "tent" five minutes after she walked right over the same area, she claims. 8 feet b the 3.5 walkway area you see all sounded hollow but only the 8 tiles shown lifted.
I went out to inspect it today in the AM and returned in the PM with a tile setter bud of mine. he is going to replace the 8 tiles and use a flexible grout to help it from getting worse. The owner is selling and wants to fix it for le$$.

While the humidity and pressure from our cleaning may have lead to this, it was obvious that the problem already existed. When we removed a few tiles not a smidgen of Thinset was stuck to the concrete sub floor.

No clues what so ever that this could have happened.


Let this be a lesson to you guys who charge .30 a foot to clean tile.
You better be able to get your butt out of stuff like this once in a while.


not as easy as fixing a wick back of brown out.

 

[dgardner]

From the lack of thinset it's pretty obvious the installation was faulty. Are you footing the bill for the repair? Timely topic for me, I just finished installing the tile in my hallway a couple days ago.

 

[damion68]

Mike, what kind of chems are you using??? Thats 2 in as many months that have buckled after you clean them.... try checking your dillution ratio. :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll:

Seriously, that sux. did they sound hollow when doing the inspection?

 

[Mikey P]

the other job that buckled had not been cleaned yet. I was over 50 feet away for the tented area.


I'm innocent so no$$


I did offer to come back and seal the grout though after its been repaired.

 

[Becker]

A lot of time guys installing tile won't wet the slab, or tile backer.
Also the wrong trowel size. Or the wrong thin set.

Heck I've seen tile installed over plywood., No tile backer.

Looks like a poor install.


I properly installed floor will require a lot of force to remove it.

 

[damion68]

Sure, Sure, Mikey.....bobby explained how u r.......How he had to show u t&g 5 times......don't worry, i understand.....puttin down chems and rinsing off can be complicated.......I understand.....anything can happen....sure sure, I understand.......peace & love......and J.W. or whatever that was....

 

[joe harper]

Ok Big Boy ....!

Here is YOUR problem...I didn't want to post untill your your Dealership deal was resolved...
You need to turn the HEAT DOWN on the "V"....Make sure you are using a BRUSH RING
on your tile tool...!!!!!

When the HEAVING TILE is removed..? Is the thinset still attached to the tile..? But not
stuck to the SUBFLOOR...!!!

250 degree plus temps + 1200 psi pressures & 17 HG vacuum is going to cause the tile to
HEAVE.!!!!!! The THINSET will release its BOND under those CONDITIONS.....!!!!!

Expansion from the HEAT + HIGH PRESSURE + EXTREEME VACUUM.....Will find any area
that has NOT cured or bonded to the subfloor properly .... :shock:

I Have had Heaving PROBLEMS arise for floors that were installed in January.."COLD"..
Then when the concrete subfloor HEATS up in "JUNE" + our Fl. HUMIDITY..the Heaving occurs..

SO....Imagine the STRESS you are applying to the floor... :idea:


Ps..Thinset is NOT designed to TOLERATE the style of cleaning we perform with todays
machines...I am suprised this is NOT more common...!!! Everyone should have a DISCLAIMER
on there invoice ..providing protection from the liability...!

Pss..Yes, This is considered an installation defect.."FOR NOW"... :wink:

 

[Mikey P]

Uh, Harper, I hate to tell you this but we cleaned that whole dealership floor with a TI wand and early morning Vortex water which means COLD!



try again.

 

[joe harper]

Uh GooBer..... :roll:

I don't GOOGLE my answers...... :shock:

Even though the tile in the dealership is commercial grade #4 "Minimum"....

No one will warranty an install...with 3200 lb. vehicals driving on IT..... :roll:

The "HEAVING" is the PROFESSIONAL term for the problem...!!!

It can OCCUR ...without the cleaning process.... :!:


SO lets see...You didn't use "sTripper"...
You didn't use a 175 or some aggitation...
And you cleaned with COLD water.....
*************hAcK**************

Did you have the "V" towed to the jobsite on a "Roll-Back"... :?:
They DO...HEAT...The water on the way to the job......"right".... :?

It has happen to you TWICE...Just be Carful...And make the cleint aware that it can HAPPEN..
They SURE AS HELL...Would be more understanding...If it was PRE-QUALIFIED as a possibility.

Hugs & Kisses...
Harper... :mrgreen:

 

[Mikey P]

You're senile mind is working over time.



It did not happen to me twice.

The first indecent I showed pics of was 50 feet from any area I had worked on.


A five minute drive in the V is enough to get the water to 80º




and I did use stripper there

 

[MikeS]

No one will warranty an install...with 3200 lb. vehicals driving on IT..... :roll:

I am not getting into the middle of this cat fight, but wanted to question this one comment. Assuming a commercial grade tile is installed over a sound concrete slab, why wouldn't you warrant it? A 3200 lb truck has a lower point load on the tile than most refrigerators, file cabinets and vending machines, among other things.

What am I missing?

 

[daniel@procarpet]

This isn't related to this topic, but man it sucks when you clean a carpet and it buckles like the red sea. I did one the other day and it buckled pretty bad. The owner said the carpet was down for 10 years and they had it cleaned twice. I told them it was never stretched properly to begin with and I could return and power stretch it. I also told them it had never been cleaned properly. Please tell me I am not the only one with this problem. I mean a beautiful pile carpet that buckles after cleaning looks unprofessional, but what are you going to do?

 

[joe harper]

Hello Mr. Skala,

The term "sound slab" is a key factor...Concrete slabs are "By code" to have expansion joints..

And in any subfloor you can expect a normal amount of settling and movement...

The tile manufacturer will warranty their products in commercial settings...

However....The operating of a vehicle can crack,chip, or dis-lodge the tile from the substrate..
The items you mentioned are STATIONARY...not rolling back & forth...or turning on the floor..
The vehicle produces pressures...similar to a boats wake...over time this weakens the bond
between thinset & subfloor...

Most ALL installation warranties .... are for a period of 1 year...

We "personally" would not warranty the installation for this type of application....

Please..."remember"...our installs were in FL...Lots of very POOR concrete slabs in our state...
Codes & standards ...have changed over the years...Many slabs here were poured with wire
only...and NO RE-BAR... :shock: ....a four inch slab was with-in code for many years... :roll:

ANYWAY....This was our policy....and we AVOIDED ....any later problems this way...



NOW ....mIkEy...Please enlighten us how you were able to clean all that tile & keep the
MIGHTY V...water temp at 80 degrees..... :mrgreen: and how many glides did you go
through... :?: Why did you use your wand.... :roll: No turbo tools...

 

[TimP]

When my in-laws first started installing tile they had some come up like that, the cause was bad/cheap thinset. It's a good idea to always use latex modified thinset for all jobs.

But there can be many issues causing tile not to attach to the sub floor. 1 could be some type of sealer on the subfloor. Another could be movement of subfloor. Even with crack suppressant a verticle shift will cause problems. Crack suppressant is for horizontal shifts. Moisture could be a problem. However I'd lean towards cheap thinset and improper trowel notches and coverage of thinset on the tile. There could be intentionally less thinset under the tiles in an attempt to float out a rise in the sub floor. Anyways hollow tiles are a good sign of trouble and it's not a bad idea to test for them by tapping on the tiles. As long as 80% of the tile is not hollow you should be fine. Luckily if that happened to me I'd be able to fix it myself since I've installed tile for a short period before finding out that my knees couldn't take crawling around for a living.

 

[Mikey P]

The floor was six months old and barley soiled.

No need to scrub or use anything other than week stripper.
We ran the truck on low rpms to keep the noise down so maybe the ware got to 160 atm at best by the time we were done with an area.


I have all the tile tools and can tell you that a Glided wand is way faster then any of the specialty tools.

 

[daniel@procarpet]

The floor was six months old and barley soiled.

No need to scrub or use anything other than week stripper.
We ran the truck on low rpms to keep the noise down so maybe the ware got to 160 atm at best by the time we were done with an area.


I have all the tile tools and can tell you that a Glided wand is way faster then any of the specialty tools.

How well does the glide hold up and what psi are you running?

 

[Mikey P]

700 psi or so and after 6000 feet the worn glide was even worn-er.

 

[Hoody]

I have been hacking out some tile with a glided quad jet wand myself, works great. I haven't done any restorative cleanings with it, just little stuff that'll do better than a mop will, and people have been pleased.

 

[Chris A]

what do ya do with the 5 gallons of pooled water after every stroke?

 

[-JB-]

zing!

 

[Hoody]

what do ya do with the 5 gallons of pooled water after every stroke?

Suck it up, duh.

 

[Chris A]

[quote="Chris Adkins":3bmdemwc]what do ya do with the 5 gallons of pooled water after every stroke?

Suck it up, duh.[/quote:3bmdemwc]

I know, duh... shiteatinggrin just seems like a PITA.