How to Tile Bathroom Floor Surfaces…12 x 48 Porcelain

Prep, Waterproof, and Set Tile

by Jeff Patterson in How to Tile a Floor

Learning how to tile bathroom floor surfaces is an art.

This tutorial shares how to prep, waterproof, and set 12″ x 48″ porcelain floors.

The same tips apply over wood or concrete and will be a huge help.

Let’s dive in!

How to Tile Floor Surfaces the Right Way

Basement bathrooms are typically over concrete. If the surface isn’t prepped correctly, tile will look terrible.

This basement bathroom’s concrete floor needed to be self-leveled. Laticrete’s NXT self-leveler was applied over the primed concrete. Our other tutorial shows step-by-step how this was done.

Once the basement bathroom floor was level, the bathtub was installed.

Next, concrete was waterproofed using Hydro Ban, which also served as the uncoupling membrane.

Hydro Ban was allowed to cure overnight.  And the tile floor layout was done the next day. Tiles were cut to size and dry fitted to ensure they’d work with the bathroom dimensions.

It’s critical to have at least 1/4″ expansion and contraction joints between tiles and drywall. In addition, a 1/16″ to 1/8″ expansion and contraction joint was left between tile and the tub.

Tiles in this bathroom were large (12″ x 48″). So a 1/2″ x 1/2″ square notch trowel was used. Furthermore, Laticrete’s 4XLT modified thin-set and back buttering tiles ensured tiles would bond properly to the concrete.

Watch our video to see all the details of how to tile basement bathroom floors

What’s Next

Prep is incredibly important when tiling any surface.

Get the prep right and you’ll be set up for success when setting bathroom floor tiles.

All the detailed videos showing how build this basement bathroom are now available inside Bathroom Repair Tutor’s Video Library

Thanks for reading and watching our tutorial. Hopefully the tips help with your project.

Cheers,