Any Tilers?

[pjgtech]

As a plumber years ago, we also had to do the "multi trade" bit, so if fitting a bath, we also had to retile the splashback, fit a bath frame, fit the bath panel, etc also did the splashbacks for basins and sinks, and also tiled a few floors too.
So I am reasonably good at tiling, and you get better the more you do it, and I have done quite a few over the years, but I am not a pro tiler by any stretch.
I never used an angle grinder, I always just used a straight cutter and then some "Nibblers" to make shapes, tidy up edges, etc.
When I bought my first house and redid the bathroom and kitchen, I bought one of the wet tiler machines and used it a lot, certainly makes cutting fiddly things easy. They are still relatively cheap, and as above, if it saves you from having to buy another box of tiles cos you broke a few by accident, then the actual cost is reduced even further, and of course, it can then be used again, or sold on....
I liked the static nature of a wet cutter, on the floor, on a worktop, less likely to slip/move, etc, whereas using an actual angle grinder, freehand, is bit harder to get right IMHO and more likely to slip, or move, etc.
Good luck with it whichever method you go with buddy...
Cheers

 

[DarrenB]

DIY as you say. The proper tiler probably lives at the same address as a unicorn
The tiling jobs that really P me off are when you go to a house and look in the kitchen or bathroom
1. The tiles aren’t symmetrical left and right around the main focal point on a wall like a window.
2. Some of the cuts are as wide as your finger
I tiled the kitchen floor with hexagonal ones I spent a few hours before I started just putting them up and down making sure of the above.
I know if your doing it for a living time is money hence DIY

Exactly, bud
Another gripe of mine, is when you pay someone good money to do a job and then you see the finished product and literally could have (and have done) better yourself.

 

[DarrenB]

I've done a fair bit of tiling and only used a sliding cutter and a cheap little wet diamond saw for the awkward shapes. One point about porcelain tiles; they are non-slip for the floor, so great for that, but are very hard and will need special drills if you want to put holes in them. I used plasticine to create a water well and then drilled in the centre. Buy proper tile adhesive and anti-mould grout, not the 'one does both' stuff, which does neither well. The difficult thing about tiling is planning the cutting. You don't just start in one corner. It is important that you don't have any tiles less than half width otherwise they look unprofessional and stand out as a cheap job. Good luck.

Thanks for the tips.
A you say, proper, cement based adhesive all the way. I'm not into the tub stuff. Probably going to go S1 with it being in the bathroom.
I am going to look into grouts before picking one. I was intrigued by the epoxy grouts, but i'm not keen on the plasticy look.

 

[Craigybbz]

Plumber here but we do an abundance of tiling at the same time. If you’re just using ceramic tiles any tile disc will be fine as any chips on the edges can be easily sanded to a bevel with 120 sandpaper.
If porcelain on the other hand all we use is a Rubi porcelain blade and they are so much neater and strangely we’ve found the cut gets neater the more the blade is worn.

 

[DarrenB]

Second all this, for ceramic you dont need to spend much, a £12 bosch one from screwfix will be fine, depending how steady a hand you have ceramic is easy to use some abrasive on the edge to ‘sand’ the cut down also.
porcelain is a different issue, can be done with a small grinder but if youve got alot of cuts it can be a nightmare, not so much for straight cuts but if you need to do any holes for plumbing etc you really do need a decent hole cutter.

This one particular wall, that is likely to be porcelain is just a flat wall, no service protrusions and the edges will have some other tile butted up in the corners. So, a bit forgiving in the corners. As easy as it gets really. The other walls are more likely to be ceramic. This one is the feature wall, so to speak.

Cheers

 

[DarrenB]

Plumber here but we do an abundance of tiling at the same time. If you’re just using ceramic tiles any tile disc will be fine as any chips on the edges can be easily sanded to a bevel with 120 sandpaper.
If porcelain on the other hand all we use is a Rubi porcelain blade and they are so much neater and strangely we’ve found the cut gets neater the more the blade is worn.

A bit like core bits then, they seem to get better with age, usually.

 

[DarrenB]

As a plumber years ago, we also had to do the "multi trade" bit, so if fitting a bath, we also had to retile the splashback, fit a bath frame, fit the bath panel, etc also did the splashbacks for basins and sinks, and also tiled a few floors too.
So I am reasonably good at tiling, and you get better the more you do it, and I have done quite a few over the years, but I am not a pro tiler by any stretch.
I never used an angle grinder, I always just used a straight cutter and then some "Nibblers" to make shapes, tidy up edges, etc.
When I bought my first house and redid the bathroom and kitchen, I bought one of the wet tiler machines and used it a lot, certainly makes cutting fiddly things easy. They are still relatively cheap, and as above, if it saves you from having to buy another box of tiles cos you broke a few by accident, then the actual cost is reduced even further, and of course, it can then be used again, or sold on....
I liked the static nature of a wet cutter, on the floor, on a worktop, less likely to slip/move, etc, whereas using an actual angle grinder, freehand, is bit harder to get right IMHO and more likely to slip, or move, etc.
Good luck with it whichever method you go with buddy...
Cheers

Cheers, Peter

 

[Craigybbz]

A bit like core bits then, they seem to get better with age, usually.

Yeah pretty much the same really. And just don’t go too deep with the disc as that usually chips it. If it’s straight cuts mainly you can pick up a straight cutter of decent quality for pretty cheap and get a porcelain wheel for that.

 

[Matt@Nearfield]

I do probably 5 or 6 bathrooms each year. All porcelain these days. Multi-point breaking sliders all day long. A grinder or wet cutter will get very boring very quickly and take for ever. You still need a 4in grinder with a Bihui or Rubi disk. Bosch disks are too fat and take to long.

As a heads up grab some Bihui spinning levelers- they are great.

 

[Matt@Nearfield]

Side note - I recently sold a Rubi TR-600 slider on Ebay for £150. I'd suggest buying similar 2nd hand and a new wheel and sell after the job.

I dont like wet cutters, unless you are talking the big buggers for 20mm outside tiles, the little ones are messy.

 

[Matt@Nearfield]

Finally....watch this blokes videos. He is super super helpful, answers questions really quickly and is generally just brilliant-

https://m.youtube.com/@thebespokebloke

 

[DarrenB]

...Multi-point breaking sliders all day long....

That's a term I've not heard before. Sounds expensive

What makes a snapper "multi-point"? Is it to do with the shape of the pressure plate that bears down on the tile to snap/cut?

 

[Matt@Nearfield]

That's a term I've not heard before. Sounds expensive

What makes a snapper "multi-point"? Is it to do with the shape of the pressure plate that bears down on the tile to snap/cut?

Some, like the orange TS Rubi series only have a breaker at the end. These wont break porcelain cleanly- it's too strong. Multi point breakers have the foot thing on the scoring arm. You score, drop the foot, and apply pressure in multiple places to break all along the score line to get a clean cut.

 

[Craigybbz]

I do probably 5 or 6 bathrooms each year. All porcelain these days. Multi-point breaking sliders all day long. A grinder or wet cutter will get very boring very quickly and take for ever. You still need a 4in grinder with a Bihui or Rubi disk. Bosch disks are too fat and take to long.

As a heads up grab some Bihui spinning levelers- they are great.

We’ve got a beast of a sigma for porcelain it breaks so cleanly. What are the bihui discs like? We’ve had amazing results with the grinder hole cutters.

 

[Matt@Nearfield]

We’ve got a beast of a sigma for porcelain it breaks so cleanly. What are the bihui discs like? We’ve had amazing results with the grinder hole cutters.

I've just sold my Rubi to buy a Sigma . I like the Buhui disks, all their stuff I rate actually. I was surprised the other day after forgetting a diamond hole cutter I had to grab a cheapy from Topps and tried their DEX one - really quite good for the money.

 

[Craigybbz]

I've just sold my Rubi to buy a Sigma . I like the Buhui disks, all their stuff I rate actually. I was surprised the other day after forgetting a diamond hole cutter I had to grab a cheapy from Topps and tried their DEX one - really quite good for the money.

Sigmas are great cutters were managing to cut 10mm off a 9mm rock hard porcelain tile with ease, you won’t be disappointed

 

[Matt@Nearfield]

Sigmas are great cutters were managing to cut 10mm off a 9mm rock hard porcelain tile with ease, you won’t be disappointed

Amazing. I got fed up with the wobbly wheels on the rubi!

 

[SJC]

I had one of those wet saws and remember the 'soggy belly' after reading above!

I killed mine by forgetting to rinse out the silt when I'd finished with it so yeah, do that!

Using a grinder disc for a little kitchen splashback more recently, I was astonished at the amount of dust produced by just the few small cuts I had to do. The wet saw is a massive help in that regard.

Clean after use good point
I normal drain it scrape the heavy crude out then use the hose on it.

 

[SJC]

Thanks for the tips.
A you say, proper, cement based adhesive all the way. I'm not into the tub stuff. Probably going to go S1 with it being in the bathroom.
I am going to look into grouts before picking one. I was intrigued by the epoxy grouts, but i'm not keen on the plasticy look.

Let me know how you go if you use epoxy grout. A mate of mine used it and cleaning off was hard work really sticky