Reader question: Loose floor tiles

Leo moisten the floor ..before you put tile adhesive on it.
Glue does not adhere well if it dries too quickly!
2 use a trowel with longer teeth so that the tiles close vacuum better.

Dear Leo,

also had this problem and after having re-glued the tiles (60×60) a few times, it continued to take longer. Next to the re-glued tile, another one came loose. So we renewed the entire floor and had the tiles fixed with cement and no more glue.

Gr Sven

So far only tiles have been seen here at various addresses, which were not laid in glue, but in cement.
At 1 address 2 tiles were not placed properly, you heard it when you walked over it. Solution:
joints carefully scraped out with thin, sharp knife, then aqueous cement solution vibrated into joints (gently tap tile with wooden or rubber backed hammer while cement solution is poured into joint). Don't walk on the tile until cement has dried, problem solved.

I have seen it several times, both in apartments in Hua Hin and in Jomtien. There is then a whole row in a point upwards, as if the tiles are too big. I think it has to do with expansion/contraction of the building due to heat/cold.

We live in an apartment in Bang Khun Thian (BKK) that my wife bought 10 years ago. She then also had the floor and shower/balcony walls tiled. 3 years ago, the tiles of the balcony wall first started to come loose, clearly due to shrinkage of the underlying wall. Shortly afterwards, tiles in the bedroom also started to loosen due to shrinkage stresses. When I heard that some other apartments also had this problem, I started replacing the tiles last year. So far everything is going well.
But how this shrinkage was caused is still a mystery to me (and others). As a technical damage expert, I have experienced sometimes bizarre construction damage for decades, but never this.

Hi Leo.
I have laid/put more than 550m3 tiles in my house.
And there is not one loose now I also looked for front glue and could not find it.
But I bought big buckets of white old fashioned wood glue from Thai watsado.
And that mixed with water and then poured over the concrete floor and that worked great.
When I was almost done I even put it through the tile glue and it worked even better the glue became smooth and easy to work with.
You should also dampen the tiles on the underside.
It prevents the surface from drying up too quickly and the adhesion is much better.
And make sure that the full sun is not on the newly laid floor.
You have to use good tile adhesive I used Weber cost almost nothing about 200 bath.
This way it can not go wrong if the concrete floor is good .
Gr Rob

Always use a primer, otherwise the moisture will disappear into the surface too quickly. For large tiles, use glue spreader 10 or rub both the substrate and the tile.