Tiling Under Cabinets

19 years ago

I've read through many of the posts about this topic about whether to put the floor in first all the way to the walls or to install the cabinets and put the floor up to the edges of the cabinets.

I'm installing 12" square Porcelain tiles and decided to put the floor in first, and install the cabinets on top of it. However as I proceded to lay the tile I determined that I was going to run short. The tile store guy computed the wrong amount of tiles (he determined it would take ~190 tiles counting a 10% overage), I comsulted the drawing I gave him and corrected him saying no its clearly at least 215 to 220. He looked up the number of tiles per box, somehow came up with 13 (which seemed odd) and ordered 17 boxes of tile. Which would be 221.

The tiles arrived, and I started installing them, and 12 tiles into the first box, it was empty. D'oh. I consulted the final layout repeatedly and determined that 216 tiles would be needed assuming no breakage and no mis-cuts.

I decided to use full tiles to the point that they would be completely beneath the cabinets, and then stop, leaving the remaining 12 to 16 inches un-tiled. (I did make sure to tile to the wall beneath the sink, the dishwasher, and the fridge.)

So my question is what (if anything) should I put on the portion of the floor (that will be beneath the cabinets) that is covered with Hardibacker, but will not have tile?

-Bob

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Comments (5)

dopeonplastic
19 years ago
I'm assuming you can't order more tile... Even if it's a different dye lot, who cares? It will be under the cabinet. I guess as a worse case scenario, you could use a completely different tile in the places where the cabinets will cover. Just make sure that the tile is the same size and thickness as the tile you are using. But I think the best option by far is to order more of the original tile. Even if you have to push back the install date for the cabinets, it would be worth it. You would hate to move a cabinet later and find different tile underneath....
floorman67
19 years ago
dont worry about it if its hidden under a cabinet.

it makes no difference.
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clg7067
19 years ago
I wouldn't even install tile under cabinets. Just more stuff to demo during the next remodel. Use plywood.
bob_cville
Original Author
19 years ago
Thanks for your answers.

I can get more of the exact same tile, but since it's kind of expensive (~$8.50/sq ft + $35 shipping, so ordering one more box of tile would be about $150) I wanted to find out whether there was any compelling reason to not simply leave a portion of the floor that would not be seen un-tiled.

Based on the responses here, I've decided to not order the extra tile and actually leave larger part of the area beneath the cabinets as bare hardibacker. This will leave me with two full boxes of tiles left, that I can use in the adjacent powder room.

-Bob
bud_wi
19 years ago
Ah, are you SURE you are not going to have the same problem with the powder room?