LESLIE: We’re going to talk to Jeff in South Carolina and give him a hand with a tiling project. How can we help?
JEFF: What I’m trying to find out is I have helped people do tile on a professional basis as well as personal and doing it with the professionals, any time they put tile on a wall they normally took the sheetrock out and used like a wire mesh that they put the mud against.
TOM: Right.
JEFF: The people that are doing it at home are putting the tile directly on the sheetrock. And I’m wanting to do it and I’m not sure if I can just put it on the sheetrock and depend on it staying there.
TOM: Well, you can. You’d have to use a mastic. But Leslie and I actually had a chance to work with a brand new product that’s going to be out this year. I’m not sure when you’re planning on doing this project but it’s called Bondera and it’s a tile mastic that comes in a sheet form. It’s like on a roll.
LESLIE: It’s like a giant sticker.
TOM: Yeah.
JEFF: Uh-huh.
TOM: It’s sort of like contact paper. You peel the adhesive off one side, put it down – put it on the wall and then you peel the adhesive off the other side and apply the tiles to it. So it’s a really cool way of applying tiles to walls.
LESLIE: And the nice part about it is that you don’t have to deal with the mess of putting, you know, an even, smooth mastic base so you don’t have to worry about, you know, any unevenness. And it’s so thick it almost likes like a water barrier because it is like a plastic-y membrane.
The other thing is, you know, especially if it’s going to be sort of in a bath situation behind a sink, I would definitely say remove that drywall and go with like a greenboard or some sort of cement backer just because you’re dealing with a lot of moisture. If it’s for a kitchen backsplash, then you can go ahead and put it right over the drywall.
JEFF: OK. See, my biggest fear was the weight of the tile on that sheetrock. I didn’t know if it was going to be able to hold it from the sides (ph) very well.
TOM: No, it will adhere to it, Jeff, and using either the Bondera or using a mastic would work. But the point is that the Bondera is just a heck of a lot easier. Leslie and I did – I don’t know. What did we do? How many square feet of countertop?
LESLIE: I would say about 100 – well, we did about 60 feet of counter and, you know, linear feet.
TOM: Yeah, about 60 linear feet of counter plus backsplash with this product and we were tiling and grouting in one day.
JEFF: Thanks very much for your help.
TOM: You’re welcome, Jeff. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.
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