The decision had been taken to try and solve the water pressure issues for the barn and the cottage by installing a Mainsboost system consisting of pressurised tanks and a pump (see the Barn post from DD/MM/YYYY). The logical place for this was in the garage as the water was fed from here to both the cottage and the barn. However, it was considered by the supplier as inadvisable to install the system on a non-permanent and flexible floor and the notion of trying to cut large holes in the interlocking floor (so that tanks could sit on the concrete underneath) did not appeal as it would be very difficult to get it to look neat. Furthermore two other problems had arisen with the interlocking floor. Firstly the expansion was greater than expected in summer and it was tending to buckle slightly in places. Secondly, the joint across the main door had never really worked and it looked very messy two years on.
Therefore, the decision was taken to remove the interlocking floor (for redeployment elsewhere) and replace it with porcelain tiles. The tiles chosen were the grey Dotti commercial tiles that were reasonably priced and came with overwhelmingly positive reviews from other users. The concrete floor was primed with Mapei G-Primer and Mapei Keraquick flexible adhesive used to anchor the tiles with Mapei Ultracolour grey grout used to finish them off. One issue was that the floor was not as even as hoped so a certain amount of levelling had to be undertaken in-situ and even then the end result wasn’t quite perfect, but is fine in the context of it being a garage.
The brick and flag step built inside the side door was filled in with backer board and tiled/trimmed to match the floor. The opening across the main door was finished with a RENO-Ramp tile threshold which gives a much more elegant solution than the interlocking tiles. Ultimately this was definitely a good upgrade to the floor even without the Mainsboost issue as it gave the whole interior a cleaner and lighter feel.
The tiled floor being installed.
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