Tiling News

Trading Places

Riley's — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 22:46:48 +0000

Buy or sell here at place 4 trades

Anything owning trades status can be bought or sold here at

www.place4trades.co.uk

Trades people

Riley's — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 21:40:11 +0000

Please note that place 4 trades has now operated as a trade advertising site for well over 3 years.

If you would like to advertise your business, email us sales@place4.co.uk the place to find your skilled trade’s people and trade suppliers.

Less than £1 per week will place your business in front of thousands of customers every week, in any one county.

We are committed to placing you at the forefront of quality customers.

Be found today and every day at place 4 Find trades people and trade suppliers here

Find at place 4

Trade training courses
Tilers
Plumbers
plasterers
All trades
Trade suppliers
Kitchen suppliers
Bathroom suppliers
Trade forums
Decorators
Handymen
Restoration specialists
And so on

Find all your trade requirements at place 4

Call us on 01782 566166

Attached Image

www.place4trades.co.uk

Builders

Riley's — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 10:33:15 +0000

Builders, trades people and trade suppliers can advertise here for just £50 per year.

www.place4trades.co.uk

Place4trades is an advertising space for trades people and trade suppliers.

You can advertise your company large or small in less than 30 minutes, just email your contact details to sales@place4.co.uk

We will contact you by return mail; your company information will then be added to place4trades it’s as simple as that.

The cost is just £50 plus vat for a full year.

Changes to you advert can be made as often as required during your advertising period by simply emailing us for fast changes of phone number areas of work etc

Place4trades is operated by the PITT group so your advert is safe in our hands.

We have set up advertising space for suppliers, the cost is the same £50 + vat per county you choose to advertise your business in, therefore is you have 200 shops and four of them are in the county of Staffordshire you would be able to advertise all four in Staffordshire for just £50 + vat

Please mail any questions to paul@professional-itt.com

Place 4 Trades is advertised by us to ensure customers find you.

Arrange your advert by phone between 8-00am and 9-00pm 7 days by calling

01782 566166

www.place4trades.co.uk

Tiling Adhesive

Riley's — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 19:22:46 +0000

Question sent in to Riley’s Tiling Tips

Question

I am interested in tiling but am not a not a professional tiler. I have seen the adhesives used and most include a “polymer”. What is a polymer and what does it do?

Riley’s Answer

Hi hope you are well and thank you for asking your question here at Riley’s Tiling Tips.

A polymer is a long, repeating organic chain, formed through the linkage of
many identical smaller molecules called monomers.

The term polymer covers a large, diverse group of molecules, including
substances from proteins to high-strength kevlar fibres. A key feature that
distinguishes polymers from other large molecules is the repetition of units
of atoms (monomers) in their chains. This occurs during polymerization, in
which many identical monomer molecules link to each other. For example, the
formation of polyethene involves thousands of ethene molecules bonding
together to form a chain of repeating -CH2- units.

Because polymers are distinguished by their constituent monomers, polymer
chains within a substance are often not of equal length. This is unlike
other molecules in which every atom is acounted for, each molecule having a
set molecular mass. Differing chain lengths occur because polymer chains
terminate during polymerization after random intervals of chain lengthening
(propagation).

Proteins are polymers of amino acids. From a dozen to some hundred of the
(about) 20 different monomers form the chain, the sequence of monomers
determining the shape and activity of the final protein. But there are
active regions, surrounded by, as it believed now (Aug 2003), structural
regions, whose sole role is to expose the active region(s) (there may be
more than one on a given protein). So the absolute sequence of amino acids
is not important, as long as the active regions are expressed (being
accessible from the outside) properly. Also, whereas the formation of
polyethylene occurs spontaneously given the right conditions, the
manufacture of biopolymers such as proteins and nucleic acids requires the
help of catalysts (substances that facilitate or accelerate reactions.)
Since the 1950s, catalysts have also revolutionised the development of
synthetic polymers. By allowing more careful control over polymerization
reactions, polymers with new properties, such as the ability to emit
coloured light, have been manufactured.

Therefore for a tiling adhesive or grout the polymer will surround the cement ball in plastic reducing water permeability, allowing the rigid cement to flex and also increasing the overall adhesion when bonding ceramics to none porous surfaces etc so polymer is such an important player in many industries but very much in need where ceramics are involved.
www.trades-direct.co.uk

Tilers Tiling Tool Kit

Riley's — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 18:14:46 +0000

Tilers Tool Kit, tiling tool kit

Starting out in the tiling world?

Riley’s Top Tiling Tips

Tools to get you started

Round notch trowel

Thin bed solid bed trowel

Thick bed solid bed trowel

Gauging trowel

Mosaic trowel

Wall & floor nippers

Scriber

Rubbing block

Spirit level

Hacksaw

Chalk line

Tape measure

Pencil

Marker pen

Grouting squeegee

Sponge

Tile cutter

Wet tile cutter

The list above should be enough tools to get you started in ceramic tiling.

All above are available form good tile shops, or visit the web site below for next day delivery

www.trades-direct.co.uk

Tiling Walls, Background Preparation

Riley's — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 15:23:03 +0000

Tiling Walls

Background Preparation

Walls to be tiled

After many years running tiling training courses “well 22 years as a matter of fact” I have heard many delegates say I am attending a plastering course soon to help out with background preparation when I’m tiling.

This is not a necessary skill for a tile fixer, there is nothing wrong with multi-skilled trade’s people but as I said it is not an “absolute” to your skill base.

The reason plastering is no great benefit to a practising tile fixer is the overall weakness of plaster finishes and slow dry/cure times.

If the wall you are about to tile is both un-even with lumps, bumps and hollows the fastest route would be to make good using a rapid setting tile adhesive, thus allowing tiling to proceed in just a few hours rather than the normal four week wait for plaster to cure and be sufficiently strong enough to carry the weight of the tiles.

Bearing in mind that fully cured plaster will only support 20 kg per square metre in weight where plasterboard will carry 32 kg, however modern building techniques still adopt the dry lining (dot & dab) method using plasterboard then skim finishing the boards with plaster before tiling takes place.

Plaster finish and weight of tiles was never such an issue in this country when your British tile shops stocked 150 mm x 150 mm tiles in the main, these tiles would only weigh some 15 kg including the weight of adhesive & grout. These days wall & floor tiles are leaving tile shop doors with only four tiles to the box weighing in at 30 kg before we even get them in the car boot “holding on to your aching back” therefore we really do need look hard at how we prepare our bathroom walls before hanging a potential disaster over the family’s naked body soaking in the bath.

Back to the preparation if walls are un-even and assuming the plaster background is a finish plaster and NOT bonding plaster. We can first prime the plaster using a product with properties like BALs (APD prime) but never PVA, “why you may ask” PVA will break down in water and as the tiling products are all water based we do not want a built in disaster.

Once primed and dry after 30 minutes (approx) we can take a suitable length straight edge “ideally an aluminium one” and place it against the wall to be prepared in all directions vertically, horizontally and diagonally you will start to see lumps and hollows that are better corrected at the preparation stage rather than using lashings of adhesive during the tiling project.

I always think that the removal of bumps makes sense rather than building out the rest of the wall to meet the point of the bumps in the wall.

If you choose to remove these humps and bumps by taking your hammer and chisel to the wall think what could be the outcome, the finish plaster and the newly applied primer will be chopped away leaving a dusty un-primed plaster backing maybe even the bonding plaster could present itself to you, and as mentioned earlier this is not a good background for tiles.

That said you may opt for the building out process, bringing the hollows level with the tip of the humps and bumps, if this is the case start by holding the straight edge in all directions and marking the low areas using a pencil draw circles to show where the hollows are, once you have identified these areas it’s now time to mix a small quantity of rapid setting tile adhesive and apply with a flat trowel inside the circles you marked and fill the area out by the depth required.

Once all areas have been filled sufficiently take the straight edge and moving it back and forth across the filled areas you may take some of the filling off if you have applied more than was necessary, don’t worry if this is the case as even a professional would apply more, then allow the straight edge guide the flatness your looking for.

You may need to follow this procedure two or three times to give you a flat background to receive your tiles.

Once you feel happy with your efforts allow the rapid set adhesive to dry (normally two to three hours) now the wall is ready for tiling, trowel adhesive either a dispersion adhesive (ready mixed) or continue using a cement based as the wall was protected with primer allowing you to use the adhesive of your choice without risk of ettringite formation in other words the growth of crystals this occurs when un-primed plaster and cement based adhesive meet.

If the tiles to be fixed are large tiles say 300mm x 300mm or greater these fall in to the category of large format tiles and will require a thick bed of adhesive this means that the adhesive choice must only be a cement based adhesive, cement based adhesive can dry and cure even at bed depths of 12 mm in isolated areas where your ready mixed bucket adhesives are restricted to a maximum bad depth of 3 mm thus not allowing us this option.

If Riley’s tiling tips service can help your tiling project further please feel free in asking your questions by email paul@professional-itt.com.

The products mentioned in this edition of Riley’s tiling tips are available by clicking the web site below.

www.trades-direct.co.uk

Trades direct offers you a helpline before you buy your tiling products, call between 8-00 am and 9-00 pm 7 days for professional help on 01782 566166

Visit Tiling News again soon for more of Riley’s Tiling Tips.

Tiling Courses & NVQs

Riley's — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 14:05:51 +0000

Tiling courses & NVQs

Tile Industry Training

What The Tile Association say:

The Tile Association Training Plan was created in collaboration with Construction Skills. It was launched to implement training in the wall and floor tiling industry in Britain in order to provide a qualified wall and floor tiling workforce.

The qualifications are based on the nationally recognised NVQs/SVQs and training is based on on-site training utilising existing informal training provision alongside more formal training from colleges and training centres to fill training gaps. Training grants will be available to participating companies.

The Construction Skills National Specialists Centre at East Leake, Leicestershire, has been accredited by City & Guilds as an Assessment Centre to deliver wall and floor tiling NVQ’s at levels 2 and 3. This centre forms the hub of the training programme and although the majority of training and assessing takes place on site there are 25 other Associated Training Centres across the UK. To find your nearest centre click here.

The Numbers are Growing

Currently there are over 700 tiling trainees on various TTA/CITB training schemes. They are mostly training on-site but are linked to the 25 colleges across the UK. There is also an Intermediate Construction Award for the unemployed or those on Government initiatives. Unlike the NVQ’s these people are training in college rather than on site.

The Tile Association Training Plan delivers value to customers in quality of workmanship and it delivers value to employers by reducing waste, limiting the effect of unqualified competition and avoiding complaints and litigation. A clear training and skills standard gives building professionals and householders another reason to prefer a TTA fixer and forms an effective barrier to the “cowboys”.

Our veiw point

Never be taken in by private training providers offing short training courses with qualifications at the end! This just will not happen.

Let’s be clear, the ONLY tiling qualification that is recognised by the industry is the NVQ, agree or not it’s there, and for now we are stuck with it.

Our view point is any training provider should not be allowed to offer NVQ as there is always a risk of corruption when a company is paid on pass results of students, better it is separate like driving schools, you learn with BSM once you have learned the underpinning knowledge you are advised to put in for a test via a qualified registered test centre.

I like to take my car for MOT at a centre that don’t carry out repairs, “why you may ask” well you are less likely to have a vehicle fail if there is no benefit to the test centre, however if a garage that repairs and MOTs and they are short of work they just might fail one or two to fulfil their diary don’t you think.

Training centres should only be allowed to offer either training in the underpinning knowledge or testing people via the experienced worker route or sending out assessors to carry out on site assessments.

Allowing one company to do both jobs could lead to NVQ qualifications that are not deserved; this will do nothing towards improving tiling standards in our growing tiling industry.

At PITT we offer the best in tiling training and we will arrange and help anyone through their NVQ once they have worked in the real world and demonstrated their experience working for some two years, but we will not assess you we will put you in touch with a registered assessor.

For more information call us on 01782 566166 or The Tile Association (TTA) on 020 8663 0946

Please don’t fall for misleading qualifications.

Our tip is copy and paste website content from any private training centres, in to a word document and see how some cover up what they say by misspelling many words, try it and see.

www.professional-itt.com for quality not fiction

BAL Glass Block Adhesive

Riley's — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 13:03:52 +0000

BAL Glass Block Adhesive

Adhesive Mortar

USE FOR:

construction of glass block walls
bed depths from 3-25mm
domestic and communal showers
dry/wet - interior/exterior

POT LIFE AT 20°C: 4 hours

GROUT AFTER: 16 hours

COLOUR: White

High density compactability

Cures in 24 hours

Water/frost-resistant

with JOINTS:	5mm	10mm	15mm
SIZE: 20kg	1.25m²	0.9m²	0.7m²
Using 190×190x80mm glass blocks

Call our technical help line for more information on 01782 566166

www.trades-direct.co.uk

BAL epoxy LV

Riley's — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 12:57:51 +0000

BAL epoxy LV

RG1 Hygienic Waterproof Tile Grout for Floors

JOINTS: up to 20mm

USE FOR:

most tile types - dry/wet - interior/exterior
large installations including: supermarkets/malls/swimming pools/sports centres/food preparation plants/hospitals/industrial plants

POT LIFE AT 20°C: 60 minutes

CURES IN: 24 hours

COLOUR: Grey

Hygienic

Chemical-resistant

Also suitable as high performance adhesive for ceramic tiles

TILE SIZES:		200×200x9mm	300×300x9mm
with JOINT WIDTH:		3mm	3mm
SIZE:	10kg	22.9m²	34.0m²

Next day delivery

www.trades-direct.co.uk

Call our FREE technical help line from 8-00 am to 9-00 pm 7 days on 01782 566166

BAL acousti-bond

Riley's — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 12:52:49 +0000

BAL acousti-bond

C1FS2 Tile Adhesive for Floors

USE FOR:

improving tiled floor sound-reduction
most tile types, including porcelain
dry - interior

POT LIFE AT 20°C: 35 minutes

GROUT AFTER: 5 hours

COLOUR: Grey

Contributes to Building Regulations Part E compliance
Highly flexible
Use with approved matting system

TROWEL TYPE:		Solid bed tipped
SIZE:		7.5kg	2.5m²

Find the product here at

www.trades-direct.co.uk

Next day delivery and FREE technical help line open from 8-00 am to 9-00 pm 7 days on 01782 566166