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Discuss Hairline cracks on floor tiles over under floor heating in the Canada Tile Advice area at TilersForums.com.

H

hutchi

Hi,
Not sure if this is in the right section, but here goes.
I had to visit a customers house yesterday, 50 x 50cm porc floor tiles supplied by us, fitted by tiler (not connected to us). Tiles fitted in May 2011, problem became apparent after a few months.
Tiles on floor in what was understairs cupboard with adjacent toilet, that builders knocked through into one room. It is a small floor area, each area no more than 1.5m wide x 2.5m deep.
As I am looking at the tiles only, I dont know what lies underneath: I am told it is original floor boards, overboarded with 22mm ply.
Warmup loose wire over the top of this, taped down. Flexi adhesive over top followed by straight away by tiles (no self leveller first over cable).
In the doorway (coincidentally), which is the centre of the first area (old understairs cupboard), the first two tiles have a hairline crack running through (away from the door). Crack actually isnt visible on edge of tile, it stops about 20 - 25mm from the edge. There is no evidence of cracking though the (flexi) grout joint either.
The other visible crack is found on the other section of floor (old toilet floor), again middle of the floor, one tile on its own this time and the crack runs not quite to the edge of the tile: the crack runs in the same direction as the crack in the other area.
The Warmup floor temp is only used up to 20 deg C: I dont know what initial operating temps were adhered to. i.e was it brought up to temp in a controlled manner. I was not told which direction on the floor the cabling runs either (i.e. in line with the cracks or not).
This is a 1930's house, built on a slope where there is an underfloor void of between 60cm and 120cm underneath the area mentioned (cracks under the 120cm end) and by the back of the house, this increases to about 200cm.
Any suggestions would be appreciated, I cant detect enough movement on the small areas being the cause of the cracking but am trying to work out if/how the ufh can be the root cause in some way.
Thanks.
 

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