When you carefully set up your ceramic tile job, it will ultimately reduce the number of tiles you need to cut, but no matter how much attention you pay to the planning you won’t be able to completely eradicate the need to cut parts of the tile while the tiled surface butts up against cabinet or walls. Therefore knowing how to effectively cut tile is very important when it comes to tiling. When tiling the edges are always the part that seems to pose a problem for most people that does not know how to cut tile, while nice, precise, smooth edges will make the tile job look overly professional and well done a rough, cuts around the edges will rather make the job look unprofessional and untidy notwithstanding how good the rest of the timing was.
Most professionals make use of a power wet saw to cut both, ceramic, porcelain, and stone tiles for either wall, floor or showers, but when dealing in an unprofessional level a simple snap tile cutter can do the job.
Limitations to using a snap tile cutter
A snap tile cutter can cut a standard ceramic tile of about 3/8 inch but provided the ceramic tile is above 3/8 inch then a snap cutter cannot be used rather a power wet saw is applied, with its diamond blade it can be able to cut through such think inched tiles with great ease, be it ceramic, porcelain or a natural stone tile.
Instruments and materials required while using a snap cutter to cut tile
- Snap tile cutter
- Eye protection
- Pencil
- Sanding sponge
- Ceramic tile
Instructions to follow while using a snap cutter to cut tiles
- Set Up The Cut
With a pencil mark the point at the top and at the bottom edges to specify the areas you want to cut. Now place the tile glazed side up onto the cutter which is below the cutting wheel and the pressure pad, using the guideline on the bed of the tool align the cutting marks. Apply great pressure against the end stop on the cutter, not all but some tool have a specialized edge guide to hold the side of the tile in a constant position. Continue moving the cutting wheel along the rails until it finally rests against the close edge of the tile.
- Score The Tile
When the position of the tile is now perfect, score the tile by pushing firmly on the tungsten carbide scoring wheel which is across the face of the tile surface from the side which is the closest to you to the other side. It might take more than one pass of the cutting wheel to get a clear visible scoreline, but be ad iced not to try and cut through the tile with multiple passes as this may result to a chip at the edges of the glaze giving it a rough finishing around the edge.
- Snap the Tile
After scoring the tile, the next step is to go ahead and snap the tile. This can be done by raising the handle and releasing it so that the pressure bar pad pivot down onto the approximated center of the tile.
A firm but gentle pressure is then applied on the handle, this now will force the pressure pad to spread the pressure evenly to both sides of the time over the metal snapping ridge. When properly stored, the tile will neatly snap from across its scoreline.
- Sand Sharp Edges
Provided that the edges turn out to be rough or jagged, you can make use of sanding sponge to blunt the sharp edges of the cut.