Tile Discolouration?

[biffa69]

Can anyone offer any advice on this one.

A customer has come back to me complaining of tiles becoming progressively discoloured in her new bathroom. It is the course above the bath (the wettest area). They are an 'off white' ceramic tile and have been on the wall for about 10 weeks. The wall is internal brick, dry-lined with plasterboard, tanked with BAL WP1, adhesive is Granfix Flexi-wall (AA), and the grout is BAL Micro-ban (all the same as I usually use for wet areas).

I was shocked when I saw them, they have definately darkened in appearance since they were fixed, but there is no point in re-doing them until I get to the root cause.

Any help/comments most welcome.

 

[L & R CERAMICS]

have they been sealed to the bath properley or has the bath moved or has she just not washed them or is it grout scum thats gotten dirtier with their dirty bath water

 

[Concept PHT]

Read my reply in the other thread you have put.

I think we are thinking along the same lines L & R 🙂

 

[L & R CERAMICS]

well it cant be nothing else can it kiddo

 

[Dan]

Sounds like the tiles are soaking in and retaining water due to the tanking system. If you have sealed the bottom of the last row with Silicon, you'll find it doesn't let the water out the bottom of the tile. All good for protecting you wall etc but not good when it's stopping your tiles to dry out.

Remove the run of Silicon and then try a bath strip that can still let water out of the bottom of the tile.

You can say to the customer it's only the type of tile it is that is letting this happen, as it sort of is.

Lucky it's on plasterboard and tanked as this could have been "I can see a tinge of orange in the last run of tiles" = plaster soaking in the tile as the water is not being let out!

 

[biffa69]

Thanks admin (and everyone else who has replied),

Yeah, I get your meaning but how is the water getting in behind the tile in the first place. Because of the profile of the old cast iron bath, I had to fit a bath seal to bridge the gap and then I ran a bead of sealant along the bottom of the tiles onto the bath seal.

Could it be that the tiles are absorbing water through the glazed surface or is that unheard of?

Its looks like a couple of days unpaid work for me but just worried that the same will occur afterwards.

 

[Dan]

The grout will be soaking in the water. Even though grouts are water resistant, they are not water PROOF! The grouts can allow water to pass through them and not weaken or de-bond. But they still allow water to pass through them. It's a little like your watch say. If it's water proof, it will be sealed and shouldn't allow water in, if it's water resistant it means everything can pretty much get wet and still work and will usually be unsealed.

Don't stress too much about it and certainly don't spend 2 days fixing it. Do what you can in a few hours mate. Say to the custoemr as a test you want to take off the seal for a couple of days to allow the tiles to dry to see if they go back the normal color. Then nip back and prividing they are fine or getting much better. Just run a small beed of Silicon down the edge of the bath and avoid the bath sealers. Or use a new bath sealer but don't Silicon it fully.

A glaze can't pass water through though, just to answer that question.

If you imagine the kids splashing the wall all the way up, the tiles carry the water on the surface, then it runs down the tile and where does it end up? The grout. Then it will soak in the tiles all the way from as high as the water went, then eventually run down the wall and will be let out at the bottom. Most baths and certainly power showers have this problem it's just that on yours it's obvious as the water is being let out from the last row upwards due to it being able to leak out of the grout joint. It's just your last tile can't get dry as quick as the ones above it sort of thing.

 

[biffa69]

Thanks for that admin, that explanation makes perfect sense. I did know that all grouts were porous but I didn't realise just how much water they allow through.

In view of what you say, I think my plan will be to take out the silicon sealant, leave the bath seal in situ (because it would mean taking off the tiles and hence, damaging the tanking system), let the tiles dry out and if they return to their original colour, then put grout in between the the bottom of the tile and the bath seal. I know it is less than ideal and I know it may crack in time but I can't think of anything else and in my favour, there is virtually no movement of the bath itself.

Once again, thanks. Things don't feel quite as gloomy as they did yesterday.

Long Live Tilers-Forum 🙂

 

[Dan]

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