How To Lay Floor Tile Over Plywood

Concrete subfloors move shift and crack over time.

How to lay floor tile over plywood.

But a number of precautions must be taken to ensure a successful installation. Laying tile over a plywood subfloor can be tricky but if you prepare the sub floor properly your tile floor will last for a lifetime. The plywood will expand and contract at a different rate as the tile causing cracks to develop in the grout lines or tiles over time. Laying tile over a plywood subfloor can be a bit tricky but if you take the time to prepare the sub floor properly you can enjoy a new tile floor that will last for a lifetime.

Plywood and osb frequently have imperfect joints and surface textures. To prevent that movement from creating cracks in your grout and tile install a crack prevention membrane after the concrete subfloor is clean flat and free of cracks larger than 1 8 inch. There are two materials commonly used for laying ceramic on plywood or osb that are applied before the tile. If you re installing new plywood use galvanized screws to fasten it and countersink the screw heads.

While most floor tile these days is installed onto a layer of cement board or similar backerboard it is possible to lay tile directly over plywood. While these could be smoothed over with thinset they are much harder to manage than the correct solution. While you can lay tile directly over a concrete slab using thin set adhesive don t make the mistake of applying tile directly to a plywood subfloor. A number of different types of substrate are used for tile including plywood.

Proper way to lay ceramic on plywood or osb.