We are almost done
Ok, so we had a lot of fun … well once we got the main rails up things were pretty quick but now comes the part that may leave you thinking why did you even try to do this yourself. Actually its not that bad but what we need to do now is cut all the tiles to fit into the areas around our room.
If you are instaling a plain tile or a fiberglass flexible tile your life is going to be a lot easier. All you need to do is measure the openings that need to be filled and then add the overlap so they will stay in position in the grid and you are done.
If you are installing a special recessed tile that drops down below the grid your job is going to be a little bit harder so we will get to that after we handle everyone else.
If you have a plain fiberboard or fiberglass tile you should follow these steps.
first measure the opening you are going to fill. You will need to add about an inch to the length and width so the tile will sit securely on the ledge provided by our track grid.
Since we know that the 2 foot dimension is always the same we will need to cut tiles that will fill our 16-1/2″ space. Make sure you actually measure the opening because shifts in the grid will require your tiles to be cut on a slight angle. Once you have the right measurment just pop your tile into place and move to the next one.
For the rest of us that decided that it would look nice if we had recessed tiles that actually drop about a quarter inch below the grid system our life is going to be a little harder.
First we need to cut our tile so it will fit in the opening. Just take your measurements and remember that you need to add extra overlap on the side where we will need to cut in our recess.
Place the tile in the hole and you will want the factory recess on the uncut side to drop into place.
Now with a pencil mark the tile using our grid as a guide. This will give you the measurement for the tile to drop down into position.
Now remove the tile and using the manufacturers special cutter cut along the line you just made. This will cut an angle into the face of the tile that matches the factory angle.
The outside part of the tile face that we don’t need has to be removed with your box cutter.
Try to do this as neatly as you can by using your box cutter in the same way as you would fillet a fish.
Once you are done test fit your cut tile and then you will want to remove it and paint the corner that you just cut with some latex wall paint. If you find that the the white that you have does not match your tile correctly you can bring a tile and your paint to the paint store and match it to the tile.