Porcelain Tile Flooring

The highest priced flooring available is porcelain tile flooring. It is the base product used in glazed tiles and the best quality is called porcelain thru-body. This is also the most cost effective. There are four types of porcelain thru-body tiles:

* Graniti and monochrome. Graniti is also known as small particle or speckled porcelain. Monochrome is all the same color without any speckles.
* Large particle. Slightly larger speckles and particles provide more color.
* Double Loaded. In the manufacturing process, several different clay and pigments are blended to create a mixture of colors in the tile.
* Enhanced through the absorption of mineral oxides. Dry powders are applied during the manufacturing process after pressing to make the porcelain look just like natural stone.

You do need to have expert installation of porcelain tiles. The main method is through thinset installation. This involves applying a latex modified cement and sand adhesive to the subfloor using a notched trowel. The tiles are set into this adhesive, leveled and allowed to set. Then the grout joins are filled with sand/cement mixture. When this is dry the finished floor is cleaned.

There is also another method of installing porcelain tiles, but it is not used very often. This is the mudset method and it involves recessing the concrete substrate to make a bed for the sand/cement mixture. This bed is the leveled before the tiles are put in place. The problem with this method is that the mixture does not bond to the substrate so that any movement could cause the tiles to crack.

To maintain a porcelain tile floor, you do have to sweep and clean on a regular basis. You can wash the floor with a neutral cleaning solution and rinse with clean water.