I used to think those cheap plastic spacers were fine for tile jobs

I mean, I saved maybe twenty bucks a job using the no name ones from the big box store. Then last week on a big kitchen floor, a whole section shifted overnight because the spacers just bent under the weight. I had to pull up about forty square feet of tile, clean off all the thinset, and start over. Lost a full day of work, which is like six hundred bucks for me, plus the cost of the new tile. The client was not happy, obviously. Now I only use the heavy duty ones, even though they cost more. Has anyone else had a spacer fail like that, or is it just me?

4 comments

4 Comments

grant4132mo ago

Tell me about it, I learned that lesson the hard way too. Tried to save a few bucks and ended up with a wavy floor that looked like a funhouse mirror. Now I treat cheap spacers like a bad gamble.

spencerross2mo ago

Seriously, a funhouse mirror floor? I get that cheap spacers can be bad, but that sounds like a major install problem, not just the spacers. I've used the basic plastic ones on a couple DIY jobs and the floors turned out fine. Maybe some people are just expecting too much from a tiny piece of plastic.

milalewis2mo ago

Forty square feet shifted overnight? That's a nightmare.

abby_fisher5d ago

@grant413 I'm with you on that, but forty feet in one night does sound like they either used the wrong size spacers or didn't let the thinset cure before walking all over it. Cheap spacers snap if you step on them wrong, sure, but they don't make the whole floor shift unless something else was seriously off in the install. A bad subfloor or not backbuttering could cause way more movement than any spacer would.