How to Use a Ceramic Tile Cutter

Fired clay ceramic tiles with a thin porcelain coating can be neatly cut with a straight ceramic tile cutter. However, a ceramic tile cutter may not be able to correctly cut stone, fully vitrified porcelain tiles and some types of unglazed clay tiles. For those types of tiles, a wet saw is required instead. Before starting your project, it is always a good idea to practice cutting a few times with some scrap tile.

Scoring and Cutting

For directly cutting tiles in half or in pieces, a tile cutter is the ideal tool to use. Tile cutters not only make cutting tiles easier, they also keep the cut lines straight and square. Cutting the tile is as easy as aligning it with the arrow on the tile cutter then positioning the guide and tightening it firmly to hold the tile in place. If you need to make multiple cuts of the same size, you can always keep the guide in place.

The cutter first scores the surface of the glazed tile, and when you pull the handles towards the top edge of the tile and press down, the tile should break exactly along the scored marking. A glass harvester can also be used to score the tiles, with a large nail placed under the tile to break them, but keep it mind that scoring and snapping tiles using this method requires a lot of work, and results in higher breakage.

Tile cutters are available at hardware, home specialty and flooring stores. These places can also rent or let you borrow the cutters if you purchase the tiles and other materials from them.

Cleaning and Maintenance

Cleaning the tiles is easy, but can be tedious. It is important to note that you should never clean tiles parallel to the grout joints; always clean them at a 45 degree angle to prevent the grout from being gradually removed. To remove haze from the tile surface, a sponge or clean cloth like an old white T-shirt can also be used to wipe the tiles.

, Using Ceramic Tiles.com
All rights reserved worldwide. Always consult a professional. The content on this site is the authors opinion only and should not be considered professional advice.

Home Page

How to

About tiles

Where To Buy Ceramic Tools

Disclaimers