Kitchen Floor Grout Cracking

Is the grout between your floor tiles cracking or worse crumbling away.

Kitchen floor grout cracking.

Dealing with cracked grout is a common issue that comes up for many homeowners at some point. However in most situations extensive cracking and failure of grout on flat floors is a result of an inadequate sub floor. Hairline cracks develop routinely in grout where two surfaces meet at 90 degrees like wall floor intersections etc. The ability and cost to repair cracked grout is directly tied to how bad the situation has become.

House settlement or improper installation can cause small grout cracks. Grout cracking is something you should take steps to deal with as soon as possible. A homeowner s floor was only one and a half years old yet the grout was cracking. Sprinkle dry grout onto the caulked.

Grout cracks are the most common problem. Alysa without knowing all the details it s quite hard to determine the cause. While grout may crack from wear and tear an uneven or weak subfloor. Obviously it should last more than six months but does it usually last as long as the grout between the tiles.

Our kitchen is about four years old and in a few places around the sink area the grout caulking is beginning to crack and crumble just at that bottom seam. Worse yet if the situation continues the. The method of repairing it depends entirely on why it is cracking. However if your grout is cracking it is probably for one of the reasons above.

4 spread the grout and completely fill the cracks using a grout float. Or your pogo stick. Remove all the loose and cracked grout with a grout saw or dremel tool and completely vacuum out the gaps. While grout is a durable material tile surfaces suffer a lot of wear and tear that can crack it resulting in a shabby look.

It is best to do this at an angle then smooth over the grout with a wet finger. Minor cracks can be fixed by running a 1 4 inch wide bead of latex caulk across the entire crack. Once the grout cracks for any reason it s time to repair broken grout before there is any damage to the surrounding tiles. There are a few probable causes but before you tear up the tile and start over try this quick cracked grout fix.

During consultation we noticed that a few tiles were hollow. Most of it as with most tile installation problems is due to improper installation. With your finger push the caulking into the crack. Upon further investigation through the ventilation system we discovered that the underlayment of the floor was quite solid built up with two layers of inch plywood.

Wipe any extra off the tile with a wet sponge.