Wednesday, March 30, 2005

Bathroom update - two steps forward ...

Just this morning I was excited about posting a major update on our master bathroom floor tiling project. I had pictures of our work, and was just debating which milestone I should post about.

We spent much of Monday buying all the small odds and ends that we would need to complete the job, including self-leveling compound, mortar, trowels, and even a new heavy-duty drill to mix our mortars. Then, yesterday, we spent almost all day cleaning and preparing the floor for the tiling work. We scraped, ground, wire-brushed, blew with compressed air, swept, vacuumed, and damp-mopped the floor, and then in the evening primed the floor for the self-leveling compound. Self-leveling compound is cement-like material that is watery enough when poured that it seeks its own level, thus eliminating much of the work of manually leveling a floor.

Then, today, we poured the self-leveling compound, and all our progress evaporated. Cracks and bumps appeared in the self-leveling compound shortly after it started drying, and the surface is anything but level.

So much for tiling on Friday.

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