4 key points on wood-look planks and large format tile

There are some things that neither the customer, their contractor or even you, the salesperson, may not know about large format wood-plank tiles. This article points out some key issues you should inform customers and contractors of when they are shopping for large format tiles, especially wood-look plank shaped tiles.

1. They’re not flat

They might look flat at first glance, but if you look closely, they probably aren’t. This is not to say they don't conform to the international standards, they probably do, but the very shape of these tiles makes their flatness all the more critical. Basically with these tiles, the center is higher, in other words, they are crowned in the middle. Some brands and types are worse than others. This becomes more of a problem when you offset (overlap) them. Variation should not exceed 2mm over the length but this is still enough to cause problems.

2. Don’t plan on doing a full offset with wood plank tile

By doing a 50% offset, where the middle of a tile is exactly in line with the grout joint of the next row, you maximize the amount of unevenness, or lippage, between the tiles. In fact, unless the tile manufacturers say otherwise, the American National Standards Specifications for the Installation of Ceramic Tile sets the limit at 33% maximum offset (ANSI A108.02 Section 4.3.8). This means that on a 60cm long tile the maximum offset is 20cm as in the photo above.

3. The floor has to be very flat

If your floor isn’t flat this will accentuate the problems with the crown of the tiles. For large format tile, any tile longer than 45cm, the maximum allowable variation is 3,2mm in 3m Floors are just not that flat nowadays.

4. Use the correct thinset - medium bed adhesive

Porcelain or ceramic plank floors can look good but the biggest problems with them can be avoided by simply knowing what to watch out for and planning accordingly. You’ll find that they should last a lot longer than their wood counterparts as well.With large format tiles you want to use the best medium bed mortar and the correct trowel. With these types of mortars a 12mm x 12mm notch trowel would be the smallest size that you will want to try. Yes, this uses more thinset and, yes, these types of mortars are more expensive, but this isn’t the time to skimp if you want well laid plank floors, 

Contact us with any enquiries about tiles.