Tile Adhesives

Tile Adhesive is a ready mixed polymer modified cement based bonding material used for tile fixing in floors and walls.
We generally use Cement Mortar and Cement slurry / Cement paste for fixing tiles in conventional method. Using Tile Adhesive is little advanced system and have few advantages over the cement.
Advantages:
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Tile Adhesives have higher tensile strength than normal Cement paste. So these will not de-bond from substrate easily.
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Tile Adhesives have better bonding with various substrates, like Cementitious, Metal, Ceramic & Wooden surfaces.
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Setting time and Curing requirements are very low when compared with Cement. So further works can be taken up much faster.
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No need to worry about the mix ratio like Cement & Sand proportion. Just add water and mix it to required consistency.
Disadvantages:
There are few known disadvantages also present in using the Tile Adhesives; those are,
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This may not be suitable for larger size tiles (higher than 1m X 1m); because of the higher & quicker bonding this will not permit us to lift / adjust the tile easily
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Slightly expensive than normal Cement
Prerequisites:
1. Pre-prepared level surface:
Level of the tile finish is totally depend on the substrate. The floor has to be prepared with a proper screed and walls to be pre-plastered before starting the tile works.
2. Need to use Notched Trowel:
A special trowel named ‘Notched Trowel’ has to be used for applying the tile adhesives (refer the below picture). The Notched Trowels come in various sizes, typically 6mm, 8mm, 10mm, etc.,
If we use 8mm trowel we can achieve the bed thickness of 4mm. The bed thickness usually varies from 3mm to 6mm based on the size of the tiles. Smaller the tiles lesser the bed thickness.
Grades:
There are basically 3 grades of Tile Adhesives are available in the market currently,
Grade-1. For normal Areas: Walls & Floors of Living, Bed Room, Kitchen, Dining related areas where very less water usage will be there
Grade-2. For Low water-pressure areas: Walls & floors of Toilets, Utilities & Balconies(TUB) related areas.
Grade-3: For High water-pressure areas: Walls and floors of water bodies & Swimming pools.