Question from Lyndal

Hello Brett – thank you for your very informative site.

My holiday project is a 70cm diameter “”faux pond”” which will eventually be put onto a reinforced concrete slab and set in a fairly sheltered spot in the garden.

Problem No 1. – I couldn’t get pink tiles for the water lilies so I used glass (which turned out really well), however they are lower than the rest of the work. (I am working on the jigsaw principle, on contact; fingers crossed that I can match the water swirls up when I go to put it all together). I flipped the water lily section thinking that I could bulk it up from underneath somehow – grout it from behind to bring it up to the level of the tiles? (but this may not stick) – or could I glue a slab of glass underneath the pink glass – if so what would I use? – silicon, liquid nails, thin-set?

Problem No 2. – After the project was well underway I learnt about fibreglass mesh – and I wish I had started off with this. Is it too late to arrange all the pieces onto the mesh – what glue is needed – and finish off the water swirls on the dining room table, before transporting the whole lot to the slab?

Thank you for your advice. I wish the holidays were longer so I could get about a dozen more pieces underway!

Reply from Brett

Hi Lyndal

Thanks for your question – it’s a good one!

Now I’m assuming that where you state it will be “”going into a concrete slab”” that you are working with a recess, or that other tiles or some form of covering will be surrounding your work – so that the finish will be level.

This is a situation where I would use an indirect method which I’ve covered in a couple of tutorials here

If you’re using contact, your best bet would be to lay your tiles face down, back butter adhesive prior to installation, and then instal from there. I don’t think there’s any way you’ll get a perfectly flat surface by laying your tiles face up unfortunately.

If you are going to have a problem matching the colour of your grout with the colour of your adhesive, then you might want to pregrout the project prior to backbuttering the adhesive. If you do this, make sure all the grout is removed from the back of the tiles – the adhesive needs to make contact with all the tiles to work effectively (grout won’t do the job of adhesives).

I use an adhesive that can be used to grout too, so haven’t really struck this issue before and have never needed to pregrout.

As to using mesh, I’ve never really been able to conceive an idea that would work when using different thickness tesserae. You’d still need to lay your tiles face down, and then when you backbuttered with adhesive, parts would push through the mesh making an awful mess of installation.

I’d love to be corrected there, as mesh would be great to work with.

I hope that gives you something to work with, but if you have more questions, please let me know.

Good luck with your project!

Cheers

Brett

Reply from Lyndal

Thanks Brett – I’ll do it the way you have suggested. I really like the brown paper/wallpaper paste method and will do it this way for the next project.

Can you tell me the name of the adhesive/grout you use, and does it come in colours, or can it be coloured? I’ll stick with safe grey this time.

Regards
Lyndal

Reply from Brett

Hi Lyndal

Yes, I use RLA polymers – the product name is RLA7. It’s the same stuff I sell on the website. You can add cement oxides to colour it.

Make sure you read the tutorial on grout colours too! It’s a great idea to think your grout colour through early in your project.

Cheers good luck.

Brett