Drummy Tiles: What is it and why does it happen?

What are drummy tiles and what causes it? drummy tile refers to the phenomenon of loose tiles. When you walk on or hit loose tiles, the tiles make a hollow sound. There are eight main reasons for tile hollowing, such as: tile adhesive not used or improperly used, heat exposure, humid environment, etc. And then we will tell you how to fix drummy tile.

Today we're going to talk about some problems you may come across during your lifetime or when you are carrying on the work site.

Have you ever gone through such moment? when you are walking through your floor or concrete or cement render or even direct stick timber, there will be a hollow drum-like sound emitted from the floor or the wall.

So what happened?

If your tile floor feels unstable and make a hollow sound in the spot when you are walking, most likely a few tiles have not bounded properly with your screed underneath. Building professionals also call this drummy tile.

This type of floor defect can be truly annoying we really agree, but what causes it? Well, this video will figure out exactly what causes drumming tiles and what exactly drummy tiles are. And in the next video we'll talk about how to fix them in our daily life.

1. What are drummy tiles?

Drummy tiles are loose tile, which if tapped with a renaissance testing tool, it will produce a drummy type of sound. They are typically detected with ease on a floor surface as the floor are subjected to the frequent food traffic right. You can also get the drummy tiles on the wall, too broadly speaking, the tiles are not being glued correctly during the installation, but there may be various more specific reasons behind the flaws of the flooring no matter it is ceramic or porcelain or terracotta. So next let's look at these in more details.

2. What causes drummy tiles?

This is a good question. most often drummy tile are caused by poor tile fitting structural problems of the floor or even using the tile area too early. There could be different causes for tiles to become too loose, sound drummy or lift all together over time, these may be related to a structural issue with your property for workmanship or other events. The following is more reason for a drummy tile.

1, Lacking adhesive originally used by the tiler in the laying process, resulting in the creation of the hollow voids.

2, Incorrect adhesive used by the tile.

3, Tiles not laid onto the tiled adhesive quick enough effecting the strength of the finished bound.

4, Incorrect preparation of the substrate prior to the laying out of the tiles, examples include not allowing a concrete slab to fully cure or not sufficiently cleaning the substrate of the dust or the particles.

5, Thermal exposure.

6, Lack of control or expansion joints faults created in individual tiles in the manufacturing process.

7, Including the timber past attacking or the substrate moisture exposure such as the burst pipe causing the flooding right.

8, The last one is that the tiled floors receiving traffic prior to a full bonding strength being achieved.

For more questions, like what problems can cause drummy and how to fix it. You're welcome to watch our next video.