How long until the mortar drys to the floor tile?

Question

It's been 4 days and my new bathroom floor tile is still not dry. It's still "quishy" when walked on. It's 8x8 tile in a 25 sq ft bathroom with a cement backerboard underneath. I thought it should have dryed by now, but now I'm starting to worry.

Addition: It was a pre-mixed mortar that the guy at HomeDepot said I should use. I installed the tile myself.

Answer 1

Normally it's 24 hours to harden and then you can grout. Something is really wrong here. Take the product to a home improvement store and see what they say.

You will wind up removing the tile and cleaning the cement board and doing it all over. Sorry to hear that. Good luck.

Answer 2

I did 12 X 12 tiles in thin set mortar in my bath. The tile was down at about 5 PM on day one. On the morning of day three I did the grout. The morning of day four we sealed the grout and about hours later I scrubbed it with a dry buffer. We started using it on the fifth day.

The kitchen took eight or nine days because I couldn't lay all the tile at once. I think I used three days to put the tile in.

The delay was because we were living in the house and had two bathrooms but only one kitchen. You should have seem my wife trying to work in a place where she could only step on half of the tiles.

Well that's my experience with tiling a floor. I think, based on my doing it, that there is something wrong somewhere. If you had it installed call who ever did it. If you did it yourself talk to the people where you got the mortar. If they can't or won't help, try the tile person at Home Depot or Lowe's. It seems like I can always get help at either place.

Answer 3

50 square feet isn't alot. You could either use a hammer, or, this works really good, go down to home depot, and get a axle rod (its a six foot tall iron rod that is pointed at one end and has a wedge at the other). Pick one tile, and hold the axle rod vertically, and smash down on the thing as hard as you can witht he pointed end. That should completely destroy that one tile. Then take the wedge end, and simply ram it under all the other tiles, they come up in big easy to clean up pieces. And keep in mind, either method WILL produce lots of sharp flying objects, put on jeans, boots, a long sleeve shirt, gloves, saftey glasses, and if you want, a hat. I've personally done this to tile, and have had very sharp pieces of tile that some how bounced its way around the room, and lodged itself very nicely in my fore arm.

Answer 4

You have reason to worry... this is not right at all. I have questions for you:

- did you do it yourself, or hire an installer?
- did you use thinset, or a pre-mix adhesive (Mastic)?
- have you grouted the tile? If so, what happens on the grout joints when you "squish" down on the tile?
- is it everywhere, or just in certain spots?
- have you been using the bathroom, and running water fixtures, during these 4 days?

I need more detail before I can try to help, but it sure sounds like you have a tile-rip-up party in your future.

Answer 5

Mortar or thinset should be dry within 24 hours. This is the recommended dry time before walking on the floor. Did you mix this mortar yourself or was it premixed in a container? If premix, I would return the remainder to the store. If you mixed it, it may have too much water in it. After 4 days, I am afraid it is not going to dry or set up.

Answer 6

Either you've been given the wrong adhesive or you have used the wrong trowel or you didn't use the trowel correctly. It takes elbow grease to trowel out the thin set adhesive and a sized v-notch trowel specified by the manufacturer of that adhesive. Follow directions on the packaging.

I'm sorry.
It doesn't sound good either way,

Jen

Answer 7

if you mixed the mortar yourself it should have been dry within 24 hours, might be a bad batch, If it was the premixed it can take several days.

Answer 8

12-14 hours