Ceramic Floor Tile Grouting
When your tiled floor has completely set in mortar after a minimum waiting period of at least 24 hours, it is only then that you should re-enter the room and inspect your handiwork close-up in order to proceed with the next stage. Once you're happy that your floor tiles are all sitting even and aligned to perfection, and none require any unnecessary and painstaking removal due to neglect of the previous stages of level subfloor installation and the laying of floor tiles, then your next step is to begin grouting.
Before you actually do apply tile grout to your grout lines though, you must prepare the lines so that they are ready to be filled. First of all, do the obvious and remove all your floor tile spacers from the grout lines. Next, you'll want to inspect every single grout line carefully for points of excessive mortar, and prepare to clean them out before the application of tile grout.
The general rule with grout lines is to have them all at a consistent depth of at least halfway down the thickness of the floor tiles installed, or better still a minimum of 1/4" inch deep. There will more than likely be raised spots of mortar at certain points in your grout lines that were missed during the floor tile installation process, and to achieve the perfect grout finish these must be removed.
If high spots of mortar were left in the grout lines when you apply the tile grout, these can either show through the formed grout when finished, or even if they are not seen after grouting they can eventually cause cracking in the grout given time. Cracked grout means that your floor is no longer sealed and waterproof, and even if the depth or width of the grout is inconsistently less than the required minimum, the lack of a solid quantity of grout can cause this problem all the same.
Therefore, it is very important to clean grout lines properly before applying tile grout, and to do this you can use a variety of tools. Dried mortar is similar to concrete and grout lines are quite narrow, so obviously you are going to need a thin tipped tool solid enough for chipping and scraping purposes.
A flat head screwdriver is the most common of tools to be found around the home, so instantly it becomes a good option, but not entirely the best. You can also use your 6-in-1 all purpose painters tool for only scraping or popping out chunks of mortar, but if you need to actually chip out a piece using a hammer also, then it becomes a poor choice.
You can actually buy grout cleaner tools which are a fine blade embedded in a plastic housing. Again ideal for scraping, but not actual chipping, the blades on these can tend to be a little on the narrow side. This can add extra time to your job in order to clean out wider 3/16" or 1/4" inch grout lines found in ceramic floor tiling, and not to mention be sharp enough to scratch a tile, but they can be ideal for grout lines if 1/8" inch wide if used carefully.
Chisels however are normally the best choice for cleaning grout lines. Whether it is a narrow tipped cold chisel or a blunt wood chisel, these can be the perfect tools for scraping out wide lines, as well as being able to take some punishment from a hammer.
Cold chisels though which are ideal for taking a beating, can sometimes tend to be a little on the wide side for a nice deep clean, without causing damage to your tile edges. They also don't posses a grip handle, which makes them a little on the short side to work with resulting in less control. This process of elimination has therefore left us with one ideal candidate for the job of cleaning grout lines. The tool which I personally prefer to use and recommend for this task, has to be that of the humble wood chisel with a blunt and well used tip.
Matt is a proud husband and father of a 2 1/2 year old daughter, with another little one on the way. He and his wife live in a 60 year old home that he was able to fix up over a few years in his "spare time". With a love for floor tiling and extreme sports, the two don't necessarily mix, but help to add to his outgoing personality and ability to tackle almost any problem.
It took Matt almost 3 years to perfect his book "A Unique Step-By-Step Guide: Making Floor Tiling Easier". He wanted to make it as accessible as possible for people of all varying degrees of experience.
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