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Discuss Marble sealant advice required in the Tiling News; Tile News area at TilersForums. USA and UK Tiling Forum

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Last year I tiled a bathroom with marble tiles. The client wanted a marble bath top. The suppliers took my template and returned with 4 strips. I siliconed them to the top of the bath and then sealed them with the water based sealant that the customer supplied (I did express concerns about using a waterbased sealant but the customer insisted). I then used dow corning sanitary to finish off.

6 Months later the client rang to tell me that when ever they showered they had a torrent of water in the room below.

On closer inspection it seemed that the silicone was failing, I guess because the waterbased stone sealant was allowing the tiles to soak up water. I applied a white spirit based sealant and resiliconed. Some months later the clients had the same problem.

This time I removed the marble from the top of the bath and discovered that the undersides of the marble were "slimy" and that that whilst my silicone was stuck fast to the bath it easily pealed off the underside of the marble.

I have now sealed all sides of the marble the whitespirit based sealant and glued the marble down with Dow and Plumbers Gold.

Although the WS sealant is better than the WB it still allows the tiles to adsorb water and I am concerned that I will be back there in a few months.

Can anyone recommend a truly water proof alternative?

Many thanks
 
OP
D

Deleted member 9966

usually when tiles darken after being subject to a water showering, as you point out, this is cause by water being absorbed. my own experience is only of ceramic tiles which are glazed to prevent water absorbing into the biscuit.

I cannot see how sealing travertine tiles is going to stop them from absorbing water. However I am not a professional tiler and somebody out there might know of some cure that will help your situation. And as for the marble, I wouldn't expect should a tough stone to be absorbant. Are you sure the tiles are marble and not just marble effect?
 

Tony73

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hi Dan,

Thanks for the reply.

The client wanted the bath to sit about 60mm away from the wall on the long side so I hot melt glued/CT1'd 3x2" PAR to the long side of the bath. Other than that the two short lengths are buried in the wall.

The bath is pressed steel so I figured that silicone would allow for greater movement than the cement based https://www.tilersforums.com/forums/tile-adhesive/ that I used on the walls.

The client wanted the gaps between the bath top marble to be as inconspicuous as possible so I used silicone between the joints and then coloured styrene resin filler.

I then finished the last row of the wall tiles down to the bath top, grouted and then ran a silicone seal.



TBH removing the marble top is a real pain in the rear. The marble top has a pull out shower. To remove the pull out shower head I have to remove the solid slab bath panel to get to the fittings. Removing the bath panel involves removing the adjacent vanity unit with its plumbing and electrical fittings. Then I have to use a very long knife to cut through the silicone holding the marble top down and the silicone seals where it meets the wall tiles.



I am more than happy to accept that I may have used the wrong products. What would you recommend for the bathtop marble given that 90% of it is fixed to enameled steel?


Even if the underside silicone had not failed I suspect that the wall tile to bathtop silicone would have failed in time, it came away much easier than it should. This I put down to the fact that the tiles are absorbing too much water when the main showerhead is being used. Regardless I still need a decent stone sealant. leaks aside, the client doesn't want the tiles to darken each time he showers. The waterbased stuff was expensive and crap the White Spirit based stuff from the local tile shop was only £25 f0r 1L and is better but after 4 coats it is still not waterproof.

Tnx
Hi, I have fitted alot of bath tops, vanity tops etc. allways on clear silicone and never had a problem. first silicone between bath and wall, than fit bath top, tiles on top( with 2mm gap between bath top and tiles) and silicone again. Do you have any pictures?
 
OP
H

hungover

Hi, I have fitted alot of bath tops, vanity tops etc. allways on clear silicone and never had a problem. first silicone between bath and wall, than fit bath top, tiles on top( with 2mm gap between bath top and tiles) and silicone again. Do you have any pictures?

Hi Tony

I don't have photos at the moment but will see I can swing by on saturday.

The marble suppliers recommended silicone and (evidently) I too assumed that it would be ok.

I am confused, you say that it is ok but the general consensus here thus far is that you should never use silicone as an "https://www.tilersforums.com/forums/tile-adhesive/" and that you should never apply directly to the top of the bath.

Incidentally have you ever experienced the underside of marble becoming "slimy"? I assumed that it was a result of the amount of water being absorbed by the marble "sweating" out.

When I removed the marble i could see that there was a tiny gap under one of the joins where the baton on the edge of the bath was. The failure of the silicone at the butted faces and the small hole directly beneath allowed the water through. I used the same techniques as you.

After removing the marble I siliconed the whole length of baton. I then dot and dabbed with both silicone and plumbers gold (working on the assumption that the latter might act as a failsafe if the former fails).

Until my original post here, I had hoped that preventing the marble faces from absorbing so much water would prevent the silicone from failing.
 

Tony73

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Did you do silicone inside the bath, between bath and marble top all the way round? And i know silicone is ok to use, just google , shipshape construction 95% of tile stone fitting etc. is my work, also worked as sub. for Ideal Stone Interiors for about 7 years, fitting bath tops, vanity tops, kitchen worktops etc. :smilewinkgrin: . Pictures would be realy helpfull
 

oraprt

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Hi everyone,

Recently I had the same problem as the homeowner. However, I did not act as your client. In my case, the water was gitting in through the grout lines in the marble shower floor. After researching how I can avoid this kind of problem, I found a blog that talks specifically about this kind of problem. If you guys are interested, check it out to future issues you might have in your home or, in this case, your clients.

 

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