My kitchen tile flooring was subject to water infusion when it was submerged in several inches of water for six hours, due to a leak in our plumbing. Now the 2' by 2' tile and mortared joints are cracking and lifting. It is possible that the water damaged the integrity and adhesive hold or shrunk the thin set under the tile? Is the only solution to replace the whole tile floor? the installation is a first floor concrete slab construction with concrete thin set used to set and level the two foot square tiles and concrete mortared joints on 1/4 inch spacing. I have never had this problem before and the areas of the water infusion are where the problems are. The insurance company says there is no way that the water is the cause of this problem.
Flooring – What could cause the Kitchen tile flooring to come loose and start lifting
ceramic-tileflooring
Related Solutions
Like Greebo says, you want to get back down to the concrete, but I'd suggest that more to have a flat surface to build on top of. To make the job go faster, you can use a power tool. Several would get the job done:
Power Chisel (best fit for the job):
Air Hammer (you'd need a high capacity air compressor):
Demo Hammer (more power than you need, but it could be useful for other jobs in the future):
MC Hammer (don't touch this):
I have repaired the issue I had with this tile. I did not take the advice given above and looked around for an alternative as the risk of damaging the tile-warmer element was too high (and expensive). I spent a few hours and carefully dug out the grout around the tile and surrounding tiles - this was very tedious as I didn't want to damage the heating element. I vacuumed and cleaned thoroughly. I then mixed up some epoxy grout and with a putty knife pushed the grout as far as possible into the gaps. Since I had used grooved trowel to lay the tiles, the epoxy grout filled under the tile into the gaps. After 2 days I tested the tile and it does not move at all. The epoxy grout is INCREDIBLY strong and hopefully stabilized the tile. I am glad I didn't resort to breaking up the tiles.
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Best Answer
It could involve the thinset you used. Generally a latex modified thinset will give a stronger bond, especially in a high foot traffic are like the kitchen. If your thinset was not latex modified it's possible that the water degraded the integrity of the bond.