12" Square linoleum Tiles

[John(videodoc)]

Please learn from our experience. Yes the 12" squares are nice, easy to put in, and cheap. Easy to install. and even look nice for awhile. However after a short period of time, they will begin to lift, dirt will gather in the cracks, and if you install as per the directions, you may end up with 1-2" pieces on the ends, which carry a lot of weight and variation. which will cause them to rip up. as illustrated by the pics. with teh wife being anal about clean floors, it had to go. in the pics you should see the poor quality product, mentioned. i through in a final pic as well. (i need to clean my camera lense evidently (oops it was the computer screen - not camera), as the new floor sparkles) The new floor is in, may not be perfect, but much better than the old.
before - this was as clean as it would get

close up inside door

close up outside door


final pic

[Steve Butram]

Vidiodoc, On my days off at the Fire Department I insall Floor tile. I can honestly tell you that you get what you pay for in floor tile. I can't count how many times I have done jobs in Rental units that the owner wanted to put down the peal and stick tiles. And the job looked like a cheap tile job. Some people want a professional job with second rate material. For the money spend the $ and buy the best grade of material you can afford and you won't be disappointed. I have found that in some of the cheap tile grades that the tiles may not be square causing the installer real headaches. Just my 2 Cents The floor looks good. Steve

[beaconlight]

When laying tile squares you over all measure the room or space and put in center lines. you the make a dry run to each wall from the center either using tiles or a story pole. You then move your center guide lines so that at each major wall or traffic lane you never have less than 1/2 of a tile. In other words you never have less than 6 inches with 12 x 12 tiles. This stops the lifting in most cases. This is the way it is done in commercial buildings including Radio City in New York. I worked on the construction of the Time and life building, Prudential insurance building. Sperry Rand building, Americana Hotel, The NY hilton and CBS building in NY as well as others. That is the way all these jobs were laid out. Many of the buildings are over 50 stories tall so that was on heck of a lot of tile. True the lawyers and executive offices had wood or carpet but the majority was tile.
As far as self stick tiles they are good but smoky as fire starters.

Bill