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Hi all

I am thinking of tiling the walls of an upstairs bathroom with ceramic
tiles, from floor to ceiling. The tiles that I have in mind are 8mm
thick, and hence weigh about 20 kg/m2. I'm wondering if I might run
into issues with:

(i) The tiles being too heavy for the walls. For example, could the
tiles pull away from the wall, or could the wall buckle under the
weight of tiles? About two-thirds of the wall-area comprises Paramount
partitions (i.e. a cardboard honeycomb core sandwiched between ~11mm
plasterboard). The rest of the wall area is the external wall of the
house (i.e. plasterboard with dot-and-dab).

(ii) Floor loading. The wall area is about 20 m2, hence there would be
400 kg of tiles. Presumably much of this weight would bear on the
timber floor joists underneath the bathroom.

Any advice appreciated!

thanks,

Julian

[The Natural Philosopher[_2_]]

wrote:
Hi all

I am thinking of tiling the walls of an upstairs bathroom with ceramic
tiles, from floor to ceiling. The tiles that I have in mind are 8mm
thick, and hence weigh about 20 kg/m2. I'm wondering if I might run
into issues with:

(i) The tiles being too heavy for the walls. For example, could the
tiles pull away from the wall, or could the wall buckle under the
weight of tiles? About two-thirds of the wall-area comprises Paramount
partitions (i.e. a cardboard honeycomb core sandwiched between ~11mm
plasterboard). The rest of the wall area is the external wall of the
house (i.e. plasterboard with dot-and-dab).

Think of a tiled wall as a wall built out of tiles, which is prevented
from buckling by some slender studwork behind it.

There is almost no load at all transverse to the tiles.

(ii) Floor loading. The wall area is about 20 m2, hence there would be
400 kg of tiles. Presumably much of this weight would bear on the
timber floor joists underneath the bathroom.


Really? Are they made of depleted uranium? 8mm means what, 125 tiles to
the meter? so you are saying the stone is 125 x 20 k=5 tonnes per cu m?
seems high.

Even granite is only about 2.75 tonnes per cu m. The heaviest quarry
tiles only just make that...

Still 400kg is not very much. about 5 adults. get the whole family into
the bathroom and see if it flexes..

remember a tiled wall is rigid..it won't distribute the load evenly, and
may be regarded as a beam it its own right supported by whichever pints
of load bearing structure it crosses.

And something must be holding the bathroom up. A bath full of water
weighs in the region of 100kg+





Any advice appreciated!

thanks,

Julian