My wife has been doing tile mosiacs for the past 4 years and has tiled
anything that didn't move. Her pieces include picture frames, creamic
planters, oranmental fountains, patio table tops ( plastic and wood),
cement stepping stones, 300 lb. cement cylinders used as public trash
cans, wall plaques as well as designs on cementacious backerboard.
After trying lots of adhesives including thinset and epoxy, her
overwhelming favorite is Liquid Nails. She finishes her work with
colored grout applied in the traditional way. On the cement cylinders
which were too heavy to turn horizontal, she had to work her way up
from the bottom one row at a time shimming each piece against the one
below it to mantain the gap until the Liquid Nails set.

This has sood the test of time and weather.

Good luck.

John
trbo20 wrote:
Jack wrote:
It seems to me that any deviation from thinset would be an invitation
for trouble.. not sure what the problem with using thinset would be..
if you find it hard to apply maybe you could try a "mortar bag",
basically like a chef's pastry tube.. you load it in then squeeze it
out in small amounts.. they are on the shelf at Home Depot ect.


Interesting, I hadn't thought to try that. My concern with thinset is
that I have a hard time spreading it without stepping all over my
lines, and I need to ensure my spacing doesn't drift as I move out to
the edges. Traditional laying methods involve spreading it out and
portioning it off with a notch trowel. Doing this would leave me
completely unable to see the underlying design.

My other worry is that it's easy to accidentally squeeze thinset up
between the pieces. There are enough small pieces that I wouldn't want
to try to chase all the grout lines out with a q-tip before it sets. I
had hoped liquid nails would be more forgiving in these respects. I
know it's not uncommon to use mastic in tile applications and thought
that liquid nails would also do the job.

I suppose with a pastry bag, I can just back butter the pieces and
carefully press them into place like I would have with glue. Thanks
for the tip.