Mosaic floors: installation instructions. Floors made of marble chips technology How to fill the voids under the mosaic covering

Mosaic! The word is intriguing and tempting: it also brings to mind stories about the ancient Greeks, in long togas, walking on mosaic floors heated by the sun of Hellas... You really want to bring all this beauty to your home. Why not? Read the following pages of this section carefully and thoughtfully - and you will succeed! True, making mosaic floors- the process is labor-intensive. You will need special machines and equipment. Stock up on appropriate building materials.

Mosaic floor made from pigment-painted monolithic concrete with marble chips filler. Such floors are decorative, low-wear, waterproof, easy to use, but are characterized by high heat absorption. Therefore, they are placed in lobbies, sanitary facilities, production and other premises intended for short-term stay of people. Mosaic floors are laid on the ground or on the interfloor ceiling. The bottom layer of such floors is a cement screed with a thickness of at least 20 mm, the top finishing layer is made of mosaic mortar with a thickness of no more than 25 mm. The installation of mosaic floors begins after completion of roofing, plastering and sanitary work in the house, glazing of openings, installation of pipelines in the underground space, hidden electrical wiring and laying concrete preparation under floors.

Base under mosaic floors- concrete preparation, interfloor slab or screed laid on top of the slab must be strong, rigid and level. Clearances between the base and a two-meter control rail are allowed no more than 10 mm. Deviation of the base surface from the horizontal or from a given slope is not more than 0.2% of the corresponding size of the room; if the width or length of the room is more than 25 m, deviations should not exceed 50 mm.

At the beginning of work, the surface of the hardened concrete preparation is treated with an electric brush, exposing the crushed stone. On concrete base Having gained strength, furrows with a depth of 3-5 mm are cut every 30-50 mm with an electric or pneumatic hammer. Before laying the layer (the bottom layer of the mosaic floor), the surface of the base is cleaned of dirt (traces of mortar, paint, oil and grease stains). Then steel brushes are used to remove the cement film that prevents the adhesion of the layer to the base. Using a cord rubbed with chalk, a chalk line is struck on the walls, located just above the mark of the clean top floor covering. 1-2.5 cm is laid down from the line, which corresponds to the upper level of the lower layer of the mosaic floor. This mark is fixed on the wall with chalk. At this level, beacon marks are installed around the perimeter of the room at a distance of 1.5 m from one another.

After laying out using a slats and a level, beacons made of pipes or slats are installed every 1-1.5 m across the width of the room. The top of the beacons fixes the thickness of the lower layer of the mosaic floor. The beacons, adjusted to the level, are frozen to the base with cement mortar. After clearing of debris, the base between the beacons is moistened with water and primed with cement laitance. Then a screed of grade 150 cement-sand mortar is laid. The mortar is laid in strips along the length of the room and leveled with a rake along the width of the strip limited by the lighthouse. The thickness of the leveled mortar (28-30 mm) is slightly higher than the level of the beacons, taking into account subsequent compaction.

The surface of the screed is leveled and compacted with a tamper. First, the screed is laid only on the odd-numbered grip strips, and after the solution has hardened - on the even-numbered ones. In places of expansion joints, brass or glass strips (veins) are placed in the interlayer. The evenness of the laid layer is checked with a control rod in different directions. Gaps between the rail and the surface of more than 10 mm are not allowed. For better adhesion of the interlayer to the mosaic layer, apply a rake or steel brush to the surface

Ingredients for finishing coating solutions mosaic floors includes binders, brighteners, fillers and pigments. Binder - Portland cement grade 400 - used for ordinary mosaic floors. White or colored Portland cements are used for floors with enhanced decorative qualities. Cement of the color required for the specified color and pattern of the coating is added to the solution. Whitener - stone flour from white and light marbles and other mineral dust-like fillers with a particle size of up to 0.15 mm. The amount of brightener added depends on the degree of lightening and the grade of cement (20-40% by weight of cement). Cement is not whitened with lime or gypsum, as this may reduce the strength of the mosaic coating. Brighteners mixed with Portland cement or other binders impart mosaic coverings light tone. The amount of whitener added increases with increasing grade of cement. To avoid reducing the strength of the coating, more than 20% brightener is added to grade 400 cements.

Filler - marble, granite or other stone chips with a grain size of 2.5-15 mm. Particles evenly distributed on the front surface of the coating add decorativeness mosaic floors. The color and size of the stone chips are selected based on pre-made coating samples. It is taken into account that the grain size of the crumbs for the finishing layer of a mosaic coating with a thickness of 25 mm should not exceed 15 mm. The best decorative qualities of chips made from white marbles and granites, giving the mosaic coating an intense color and beautiful texture. Marble and marbled limestone aggregates are highly polished when finishing the surface. Their abrasion during operation occurs evenly. Hard rock aggregates wear less than cement stone and over time floors develop a spongy and lumpy surface.

The grain composition of the stone chips determines the coating pattern. Coatings with large crumbs are more decorative. Preferably on a polished mosaic covering have 75-85% of the surface occupied by stone aggregates and the rest by cement stone. These coatings differ beautiful view and abrasion resistance. Pigments - mineral dyes - ocher (yellow), red lead and mummy (red-brown or red), chromium oxide (green), ultramarine (blue), manganese peroxide (black). Pigments pre-mixed with cement are added in a volume depending on their coloring ability, but not more than 15% by weight of cement.

The quality of mosaic mortars is determined by the choice of components, their composition and the requirements of the project (you can consult your designer on this issue). Pigments for coloring mosaic compositions must be alkali-resistant, i.e., not change color from the action of cements and other materials containing alkali, have good coloring ability and be light-resistant. Small volumes of mosaic mortar for flooring in a separate room can be prepared manually in any box suitable for this purpose. The washed stone chips with grains of 2.5-15 mm in fine, medium and coarse fractions are thoroughly mixed. Cement, pigment and brightener in the amount specified in the recipe are also mixed and sifted through a sieve measuring 900 holes/cm2. Dyes are dosed by weight, everything else is dosed by volume.

A portion of stone chips (of different fractions) is mixed with a dosed mixture of cement, pigment and brightener. The mixture to be mixed is moistened with water from a watering can. The amount of water (water-cement ratio) should be minimal (0.5-0.6 by weight of cement), ensuring workability and compaction of the prepared mosaic mixture. For significant workloads mosaic solutions prepared in cyclic mortar mixers installed in a special room, where a gravel washer for washing stone chips is also located. If you are planning a large amount of work of this kind, we advise you to provide for the use of the necessary mechanisms.

Cement, sand, dyes, crumbs of various fractions are placed closer to the mortar mixer. Measured portions of cement, dye, and whitener are poured into a mortar mixer and, while mixing, stone chips of different fractions and water are added. Mixing duration is 5 minutes.

At construction sites mosaic solutions prepared from factory-made dry mixtures. The mixtures are prepared immediately over the entire area of the room to ensure uniform coverage. Add water to the dry mixture and washed crumbs and mix in a mixer for 2 minutes. Prepared mosaic mortars for facial covering of floors must have a grade of at least 200 and mobility at the time of installation of 2-4 cm.

Mosaic floor, in which the fillers and background coating are the same color, is called single-color. Such floors have a continuous covering or are divided into small squares by strips of glass or brass. Before laying the coating, the surface of the bottom layer is cleaned of debris and dust (as usual, use a metal brush or vacuum cleaner). Then along the long sides of the room the surface is marked into strips 1.5 m wide for installing beacons. They are used as beacons steel pipes or wooden slats. From the wall where the mark of the top floor covering is made, beacons are installed using a slats and a level, fixing the level of the mosaic covering, the height of which is 20-25 mm. They are installed either immediately over the entire area of the room, or on separate sections. The beacons are secured with fastening marks made from mortar.

Immediately before installation mosaic mortar the surface of the layer is moistened with water. Before laying, the solution is shoveled to evenly distribute the crumbs in it. Then the strips between the beacons are filled with the solution. The laid mixture is leveled with a rake or trowel. The rule should not be used for this purpose so as not to move large crumbs. The horizontality of the leveled solution is controlled by a rule supported on lighthouse pipes or slats.

When leveling the next section, the compacted areas of the coating are overlapped by 10-15 cm. Near walls and in other hard-to-reach places, compaction is carried out using tampers or hand rollers, moved first in the longitudinal and then in the transverse directions. You will also need this type of tool when working in small areas at home. Cement laitance is removed from the surface of the compacted mosaic layer using a scoop and a brush or broom. The milk left on the surface, hardens, forms a film of cement stone covering the crumbs. After removing the laitance, the compacted mosaic mortar is smoothed with steel trowels, achieving a smooth coating surface. At the same time, make sure that the crumbs are evenly distributed over the surface, and add them to those places where there is not enough of it.

Grab stripes fill mosaic mortar in one. The mixture is placed in the missing strips after the solution has set, having previously removed the beacons. The grooves remaining after the beacons are filled with fresh mosaic mortar so that longitudinal stripes on the floor surface are not noticeable. The gaps where the floors adjoin walls, columns and other structures are filled with a layer of roofing felt or roofing felt and covered with a plinth. Such gaps prevent the appearance of cracks in the floors as the building settles.

To install the plinth, use a wooden template up to 2 m long. The profile side of the template is laid against the wall and pressed with a weight. Fill the gap between the wall and the template with a rigid mortar, compacting it with a tiled spatula. After filling the gap, the template is moved to the next section. After two days, a freshly laid mosaic floor is covered with sawdust in a layer 3-5 cm thick or covered with burlap and watered with water from a watering can every day for about 4-7 days. When the room temperature is above 15 °C, the coating is watered in the morning and evening for 3-4 days. If you follow this care regimen mosaic covering- it will last you much longer.

And yet, mosaic is something more than just a plain covering, although it is made from chips of natural colored stone. Admit it, the word “mosaic” evokes in you strong associations associated with childhood: multi-colored pieces arranged in the most fantastic plots... Multi-colored, isn’t it? This means that our mosaic floor should also be multi-colored. So, mosaic floors decorated with rhombuses, squares and other shapes different colors, are called multicolor. They are arranged with or without gaskets made of metal, glass and other materials along the contour of the pattern. Laying multi-color coatings without spacers begins with marking and fixing the pattern on the surface of the layer with chalk.

First, slats are laid on the border of the frieze. Then the space between them is filled with wooden frames for printing the design. Frieze slats and frames are laid along a square and level with the slats. Their top is located at the level of the future coating. The slats and frames, laid in accordance with the markings, are secured in the horizontal plane with spacers and wedges, and in the vertical plane with mortar marks. Light styling mosaic mixture start with frieze areas. Then the dark color mixture is used to fill the squares between the frames. After curing mosaic concrete Carefully remove frames and slats. The furrows remaining between the squares are filled with a mosaic mixture of a different color. The mortar is laid with a shovel, leveled with a rake or a tiler's spatula, but not as a rule, so as not to cause uneven distribution of crumbs in the surface layer.

The horizontality of the laid mixture is checked using the rule along the upper edges of the lighthouse slats and frames. The solution is compacted with metal or wooden tampers and smoothed with steel trowels. In multi-color coverings with spacers, the pattern is framed by non-removable spacer veins embedded in the floor structure. Work begins by marking the contours of the pattern - the installation locations of the gaskets, secured with cords or chalk on the surface of the interlayer. Then the veins are installed. When the solution of the interlayer is not hardened, grooves are cut along the contour of the pattern with a spatula or a cutting piece into which the veins are inserted. When the layer has hardened, the veins are installed on mortar marks and temporarily secured with a U-shaped clamp. Strips of glass 3-5 mm thick or brass, aluminum or stainless steel 1-2 mm thick are used as veins. In the lower part of the metal veins 1.5 m long, three holes with a diameter of 4-5 mm are drilled for nails that act as anchors. The veins are driven into the hardened layer to ensure stability and reliable adhesion to the mosaic mortar. If necessary, the metal veins are straightened with a mallet before installation. The height of the veins is 1-1.5 mm higher than the thickness of the facial layer mosaic floors. The level of the top edge is checked using a level and a staff and secured with mortar marks.

In places where the floors adjoin columns and pilasters, veins or spacers of roofing felt are laid to prevent deformation of the coating when the building settles. The spacer veins, calibrated and secured with mortar, form a rigid frame for the mosaic mortar. The cells formed by the veins are sequentially filled with a solution of two colors in a checkerboard pattern. The laid mortar is leveled with a tiled spatula and compacted with tampers or rollers until laitance appears on the surface. At the same time, care is taken not to displace the veins and thereby not distort the outline of the pattern. After removing the laitance, the surface of the compacted mortar is smoothed in a circular motion using steel trowels.

Coatings mosaic floors decorated with round rosettes made of multi-colored solution. Round templates are used for their construction. They are laid on a layer (in accordance with the design) and framed with a metal vein that fits tightly to the outer contour. The template is left in this position until the installation of the coating is completed. After the solution has set, the round template is carefully removed and another, square one, also framed with a metal core, is placed in its place. The space inside the circle not occupied by the square template is filled with a colored solution. By changing the shape and size of the templates, a multicolor rosette is obtained. Styling multicolor mosaic covering ends with the installation of a plinth. Caring for freshly laid multi-color flooring is the same as for single-color mosaic floors.

The first stage of work is completed - you have laid the mosaic covering. But it still looks, to put it mildly, “not very good.” Surface hardened mosaic floors covered with the remains of a film of cement stone, it is uneven and monochromatic. Don’t be upset, these shortcomings are eliminated at the second stage of work, when finishing the coating.

Finishing mosaic coverings includes the following operations: - peeling - removing the top porous layer of cement stone and exposing the decorative filler; - grinding - finishing the surface until it is maximally saturated with decorative filler; - polishing - rubbing with felt or cloth circles the surface moistened and sprinkled with powders (chrome or tin oxides) to a mirror shine.

Most finish quality mosaic floors provide roughing and grinding. This work begins approximately 5-7 days after the installation of the floors, when the coating acquires sufficient strength so that the crumbs do not break out. At construction sites, where, as a rule, there are large areas of coverage, floor finishing is carried out using self-propelled mosaic grinder, with a productivity of up to 200 m 2 /h. The machine is designed on a chassis with a rotating traverse, which has grinding heads with abrasive wheels. The machine moves by electric drive. The traverse with grinding heads is raised and lowered by a special mechanism. For small volumes of work, use a mosaic grinding machine of a simpler design, with a productivity of up to 12 m 2 /h. The working part of the machine is a traverse with a stone holder for securing roughing, grinding or polishing wheels.

Before peeling, the surface of the coating is moistened with water and sprinkled with quartz sand in a layer of 5-6 mm. Grinding machines are installed on the coating. Hoses with water are connected to them, adjusting the stream so that it is applied to the surface in a thin layer. A layer of sand on the coating prevents the formation of scratches from roughing coarse-grained wheels, and at the same time the wheels themselves wear out less. Moving mosaic grinder in front of you with slow arcuate movements (left - right). Having completed one strip of coating to the end, the next one is processed in the opposite direction.

When peeling coatings with marble chips, add soda ash to the water (1-1.2 kg per 1 m 3 of water). This surfactant additive reduces the finishing time of the coating. Peeling continues until stone chips are exposed. Small waste (sludge) generated during this process is removed with a shovel. Then the surface of the coating is moistened with water, removing remaining dirt and moisture with a brush and dustpan. Hard-to-reach areas of coatings (corners, wall areas) are treated with a universal grinding machine with a flexible shaft, powered by an electric motor.

For small volumes, such places are finished manually with grinding wheels inserted into the holder. Skirting boards are sanded using a profile grinding machine with a set of interchangeable heads. Crushed individual particles of stone chips on the surface of the coating are filled with cement mortar in the color of the coating. Scratches and small pores are moistened and sprinkled with dry tinted cement.

Having finished stripping, they begin grinding, having previously replaced the coarse-grained wheels in the grinding machines with fine-grained ones. Sanding mosaic floors is performed in the same way as stripping. At the end of the work, the coating is cleaned and washed with water. Remove by roughing and grinding top layer, approximately 5-7 mm. After these operations, the treated surface is maximally saturated with grains of stone chips, which gives the coating a decorative effect.

Polishing. Mosaic coatings are polished for high-quality finishing of building floors. In this case, the surface is puttied, clean grinding, polishing and polishing are performed. For puttying, the sanded and moistened surface is sprinkled with dry white or colored Portland cement to match the color of the coating. Using rotating grinding wheels, moistened cement is rubbed into the surface of the coating. In this case, the machines are moved back so that the wheels of the machines and feet do not remove the layer of putty. For clean grinding, mosaic grinders with fine-grained wheels are used. At the same time, excess putty is removed. Polishing in small quantities is performed manually using natural slate stone. But mosaic grinding machines are often used for this operation. After polishing, the surface acquires a matte tint and becomes smooth, slightly rough to the touch.

Polishing begins after washing the surface with water. This operation is performed using mosaic grinding machines with felt or cloth wheels, while simultaneously sprinkling the surface with polishing powder. Often, instead of polishing, the surface of mosaic floors is covered with a wax paste, which contains the following components (in mass parts): turpentine or gasoline - 10, stearin - 2, paraffin - 1, wax - 1, rosin - 0.25. Stearin, paraffin, wax and rosin are melted and after mixing, the mixture is diluted with turpentine or gasoline. The resulting paste is applied with polishing brushes to the floor surface in a thin, uniform layer. Then, using electric polishers or mosaic grinders with felt or cloth wheels, the coating is rubbed to a mirror shine.

In hard-to-reach places (in corners, near walls) this work is done manually with polishing brushes or wooden blocks covered with felt. Mosaic floors under operating conditions, periodically rub with such a paste. Remember how Cinderella in the famous cartoon rode around on brushes, polishing the parquet and at the same time rubbing it with mastic? It would be good for you to do something similar from time to time - the decorative effect and water-repellent properties of the mosaic floor will only increase.

A polymer-cement concrete floor is a mixture of stone chips, sand, cement, polyvinyl acetate dispersion and dyes laid into the coating and hardened. Such floors are durable, wear-resistant, hygienic, decorative, and do not collapse when exposed to gasoline and mineral oils. They are most often installed in the lobbies of residential buildings, in industrial premises with increased requirements for floor cleanliness.

Polymer-cement concrete floors are laid both on the ground and on the interfloor ceiling. The bottom layer of such floors is a screed made of cement-sand mortar grade 200, the top finishing layer 20 mm thick is grade no lower than 200. First, preparatory work. Before laying the coating, the bottom layer is cleaned with metal brushes and washed with water. Immediately before laying the mixture, the surface of the layer is primed with an aqueous solution of PVA dispersion of the composition 1: 1. A polymer-cement-concrete mixture is prepared at the site of the coating in concrete mixers.

Composition of the polymer-cement-concrete mixture (in mass parts): 50% PVA dispersion - 0.3; Portland cement grade 400 - 1; sand - 1.4; stone chips with a particle size of 5-10 mm - 2; pigments (chromium oxide, redoxide) - 0.05-0.1; water - 0.25. First, a PVA dispersion with water is loaded into the mixer, then pigments with cement and, after mixing, sand and stone chips. Mixing time 8-10 minutes. The prepared rigid-plastic polymer-cement-concrete mixture must be consumed within 1-2 hours. The prepared mixture is placed in gripping strips made of slats or pipes, leveled using a rule, moving it along longitudinal beacons, and compacted with vibrators until moisture appears on its surface. In corners and other hard-to-reach areas, the mixture is compacted using hand tampers.

The laid mixture is smoothed with steel trowels. When laying the mixture in even stripes, the vertical edges of the hardened polymer-cement concrete are cleaned of dirt and dust, and then moistened with water. In the places of longitudinal seams, between the laid strips, the mixture is compacted and smoothed to make the joint invisible. Freshly laid polymer-cement concrete floors gain strength in wet conditions. To do this, 2 days after laying, they are watered with water once a day for 3-4 days. The front surface is finished with mosaic grinding machines after the coating has acquired sufficient strength to exclude the possibility of chipping of stone chips. Polymer-cement concrete floors are finished in the same way as mosaic coverings.

Final finishing begins with searching and detecting defects. When installing mosaic floors, defects may occur due to violations of the work technology, the use of low-quality materials, deviations from the project requirements, or low qualifications of the installer.

The swelling of the coating is detected by tapping the floor. In defective areas, a dull sound indicates detachment of the mosaic layer from the lower layer or from the base. Such areas of the coating are removed. A notch is made on the base or layer, washed with water and the mosaic mixture is laid again, matching it to the color of the intact coating. Longitudinal or transverse cracks in the coating appear due to the lack of expansion joints in the preparation (underlying layer). To eliminate the defect, this area is removed and the expansion joint in the underlying layer and in the mosaic is restored. Small pits on the surface of the coating occur due to chipping of stone chips during mechanical processing of an insufficiently hardened mosaic floor. Sinkholes on the surface of a mosaic floor are eliminated by applying a layer of putty (a mixture of cement, marble flour and dye) to the coating and then sanding.

The uneven distribution of stone chips on the surface of the coating is due to insufficient grinding of the mosaic coating, as a result of which the coarse aggregate is not completely exposed. This defect may be caused by poor mixing of the mosaic mixture before installation or improper leveling. The most noticeable places with this defect are cut out, after which the mosaic mixture is laid again to match the color of the coating. Areas of the unsanded surface of the coating are removed by grinding. In hard-to-reach places, sanding is done manually. Efflorescences in mosaic coatings appear due to the effect of alkali contained in cement and other materials on the pigments. Places with the most noticeable defects are cut out and the mosaic mixture is laid again in the same color as the coating, but with alkali-resistant pigments.

Finished mosaic floors must have a horizontal, even and smooth surface. Clearances when checking the surface of the coating with a control strip are allowed no more than 4 mm; deviation of the floor surface from the horizontal or a given slope - up to 0.2% of the size of the room; Deviation of the thickness of floor elements from the design in some places is no more than 10%. The pattern and color of the mosaic covering must correspond to the project. No cracks or stains are allowed on the surface. The separating spacers (veins) should not have any curvatures; their upper edge should be located in the plane of the coating. In places where floors adjoin walls, columns and other structural elements Gaps and cracks that are not covered by the baseboard are also unacceptable. Skirting boards framing the floors in the room must be straight and not have noticeable curvatures in height and thickness.

It is worth remembering once again about safety precautions when performing facing and laying works. Try to organize your workplace so that stable safety of work is ensured. You need to stock up on a set of rational means of mechanization, tools, and devices designed for the safety of tiling work. When preparing the base for floors, notching the surface with hand or power tools should be done while wearing safety glasses and gloves. To avoid minor work-related injuries, tool handles should be smooth and tools should be securely fastened in their handles.

Cement, pigments and dry mixtures for preparing mosaic mortars must be dosed in safety glasses and respirators. Do not start working with a mosaic sander in the hope of learning how to operate it yourself. It is best to undergo special training and safety instructions from an experienced specialist. Before starting work, you need to check the serviceability of the grinding machine, special attention on the tightening of the mounting bolts, the strength of fastening of the abrasive wheels in the holder and the smooth operation of the starting device. The machine body must be grounded, and the grinding wheel holders must be covered with protective covers. During operation, it is necessary to ensure that the machine body is in a horizontal position. If a knocking noise occurs, the electric motor overheats, a sudden stop or other malfunctions, you must turn off the current and consult a specialist.

The power cables of electrical machines must not have kinks or intersect with other live wires. You can change grinding wheels, clean, lubricate and repair machines only after they have been stopped and disconnected from the network. Accidental voltage supply must be prevented. Mosaic work using grinding machines and electrified tools is carried out only in rubber shoes and rubber gloves.

In some rooms it may be necessary to use window sill slabs, steps or treads to cover stairs. You can also handle these jobs yourself. Window sill slabs decorate the window opening from the inside. They are installed after filling the opening window block and caulking the joints where it abuts the walls. First, wooden wedges (50 mm thick) are laid out at the same distance from one another: two wedges at the edges of the window opening, one or two in the middle. Then the window sill slab is laid on them. The laid slab is adjusted in height by knocking or hammering wedges. At the same time, make sure that the top of the installed slabs within the apartment is at the same level. In the longitudinal direction, the slab is laid strictly horizontally, and in the transverse direction - with a slope of 1% into the room. The ends of the window slab embedded in the walls must be identical.

Having completed the alignment, the slab is removed and cement mortar is laid between the wedges 2-3 mm above the laid wedges. Crushed stone is embedded into a layer of mortar more than 2 mm thick to stiffen the mortar layer. A window sill slab is laid on the prepared mortar bed, hitting it with a hammer on a wooden block. After 24 hours, the wedges are carefully removed from under the laid slab, and the resulting voids are sealed with mortar. After which the ends of the slabs in the opening slopes are sealed with brick. The surface of the installed window sill slabs is covered with roofing felt or glassine, which protects it from contamination during other construction work. If the slabs are unpolished, then the surface is polished with a special paste.

Steps laid on inclined beams are used to construct stairs. The assembly of such stairs begins with the lower frieze step, which lies in the same plane as the lower platform. Then ordinary steps are laid. The staircase is completed by an upper frieze step located in the plane of the upper landing. Overhead treads are used for cladding flights of stairs in buildings with increased requirements for the quality of finishing. Before work begins, the walls of the staircase must be plastered or tiled. The treads are laid from top to bottom. An overlay tread is placed on the mortar layer on the upper frieze step so that the level of the tread is at the level of the landing floor. Then, along the end of the upper frieze tread, a mooring cord is pulled along the length of the flight being lined. The surface of the flight of stairs is moistened and a layer of hard cement-sand mortar is spread.

An overhead tread is laid on the leveled surface, lowering it to the desired level by striking a wooden block with a hammer. The correct placement of the treads is controlled by a stretched cord, a rule strip and a level. The ends of all treads must be adjacent to the tensioned cord and be in one vertical plane. The rail is usually applied at the wall and at the end of the treads. It should touch the edges of the upper frieze tread and all others laid below. If there is a gap, the tread is pulled out or, conversely, raised, adding a layer of mortar. A level is used to check the horizontality of the tread surface in the longitudinal and transverse directions.

Lined with overhead treads flight of stairs enclose and stand for 2-3 days until the solution hardens. Then the vertical walls (risers) of the flight are plastered with cement mortar and fences are installed. Later, before completing all construction work, that is, as a last resort, the surface of the steps and overhead treads is polished with a special paste.

Breccia, as is known, is a rock consisting of cemented fragments of one or more rocks. In construction, artificial breccia or so-called breccia-like slabs are used for cladding floors. Brecciated slabs have dimensions of 400x400 or 500x500 mm and a thickness of 35-50 mm. Their front surface, similar to the spotted texture of natural marble, is highly decorative. Such slabs are produced in metal forms. Pieces of marble tiles 10-12 mm thick are laid on the bottom of the mold, leaving wide seams between them, filled with stone chips. Then a plastic cement mortar is spread and the reinforcing mesh is embedded. The remaining space of the mold is filled with a concrete mixture 25-35 mm thick.

The molds with the compacted mixture are placed in a steaming chamber, where they are kept for 12-16 hours at a temperature of 80-90 °C. After which the slabs are freed from the molds and processed on grinding machines - first ground and then polished. Breccia-shaped slabs with a finished front surface are used for flooring in rooms with a large area - for example, halls, lobbies, common corridors. The slabs are laid on a rigid, leveled base on a layer of cement mortar. The breakdown of the coating and laying technology are the same as for installing floors made of mosaic-concrete slabs. Stacked breccia-like coverings, separated by veins, are made from pieces (broken) of granite and marble slabs 15-30 mm thick. On the prepared base, in squares bounded by veins, cement-sand mortar is laid and leveled. At the same time, make sure that the solution does not reach top edge veins by approximately 5-7 mm with a chip thickness of 10-12 mm and by 10-15 mm with a chip thickness of 20-30 mm. Pieces of slabs for the construction of a type-setting covering are pre-selected according to thickness.

Filling the covering squares begins by laying the lighthouse tile in the center and setting it down with a rule strip to the top of the installed veins. Then pieces of slabs are randomly laid, leaving seams 5-7 mm wide between them. If you make the seams wider, this will lead to a decrease in the decorative qualities of the mosaic coverings. Pieces of slabs laid on the surface of the mortar are set down with a rule lath to the level of the lighthouse slab and the top of the veins. If the laid out slabs have not settled to the required level, they are pushed down with light blows of a hammer on a wooden block. Having laid the coating in a cell limited by the veins, clean the seams to the depth of the tiles embedded in the mortar. This operation is performed with a steel brush, removing the solution with a whisk or compressed air. The cleared grooves of the seams are slightly moistened with water.

Then a thin layer of plastic mortar from colored or ordinary Portland cement is poured onto the surface of the cell, after which it is leveled with a spatula, filling the seams in the coating. After 1.5-2 hours, when the solution has set, using a spatula to scrape it off, the coating is cleaned of excess solution. The seams between the tiles are smoothed with steel trowels. Continuous breccia-like coverings are laid in alternating (one after another) longitudinal strips 1-1.2 m wide. Tubular or lath beacons are installed and secured on the prepared and leveled layer. The strips between the beacons are filled with cement-sand mortar grade 150. Beacon slabs are laid along the leveled screed in a checkerboard pattern every 80-100 cm, controlling their position along the installed longitudinal beacons. The gaps between the beacons are filled with fragments of marble slabs, embedding them into the mortar layer. At the same time, make sure that the surface of the slabs forming the coating is at the same level, and the width of the seams between the laid fragments of the slabs does not exceed 5-7 mm. The further technology of work is the same as for the construction of breccia-like coverings separated by veins.

Breccia-like coverings with mosaic stripes begin to be laid from inlaid sections consisting of fragments of marble slabs. Then the strips are filled with colored mosaic mortar with stone chips. The seams between the individual coating elements are filled with pigment-tinted cement mortar in a 1:1 ratio. Care for freshly laid brecciated floors is the same as for mosaic floors. 5-6 days after the coating has gained strength, grinding and polishing begin. Stacked mosaic floors can have a decorative pattern in the form of a V-pattern or stylized images of leaves, flowers, etc. Such coverings are placed directly on the underlying layer. First, a pattern is applied to the surface of the underlying layer with chalk, which is then made from tiles and pieces of decorative stone. Straight lines are marked with a ruler, curves are marked with special templates (patterns). In accordance with the pattern, tiles of the required color and pieces of stone of the appropriate shade and size are laid on the cement mortar. The surface of the laid out pattern is checked with a level and a rule to ensure compliance with the design mark of the coating.

Drawings for mosaic floors are also transferred from a sheet of paper. To do this, a thin sheet with a life-size pattern is laid on an underlying layer moistened with cement laitance. Then pieces of stones are laid out on paper laid on cement mortar exactly according to the pattern, forming a colored mosaic image. To transfer drawings that have many curved lines, special wooden templates are made. Their height corresponds to the layer of mosaic being laid out. The complex multi-color patterns of mosaic floors are pre-assembled and laid dry on a wooden stand. At the end of the set, sheets of paper are glued onto the surface of the design, on top of which serpyanka or other rare woven material is additionally glued. The resulting pattern or its individual fragments are carefully laid over a layer of cement mortar in the place intended for it in the coating. When embedded in the mortar mixture, sheets of paper (the surface of the pattern) are pressed with slats so that the pattern is at the level of the laid coating. After the solution has hardened, the previously wetted sickle and paper are removed from the surface of the pattern. Then the coating with inlaid patterns is ground and polished. When installing brecciated and other mosaic-type coverings, fragments of slabs, pieces of stone chips and the solution binding them must have the same abrasion, so that during operation they wear out evenly and the floor surface does not become bumpy and spongy.

A mastic coating is a monolithic film of a hardened polymer composition that forms the front surface of the floor. Having prepared the base for the floor, apply or pour liquid mastic onto it and level it with a rack until it reaches the required thickness. Then they let it harden. After the mastic hardens, an even, smooth coating without cracks or seams is formed. Mastic is usually applied in two stages: first, the bottom layer is made, which serves to level out minor unevenness in the base, then the top layer, which becomes the front surface of the floor.

As a base for a mastic floor, rigid screeds made of expanded clay concrete, mortar are used, and prefabricated ones are also used. reinforced concrete slabs having a smooth surface. Mastic floors can be made warm or cold. If the floor is laid on a screed made of cement-sand mortar or on the surface of a reinforced concrete floor slab, it turns out to be cold. If a screed made of slag concrete, expanded clay concrete and other lightweight concrete is used, the floor is warm. Depending on the type of binding material, the floors that are made from mastic also differ.

Polyvinyl acetate floors are durable, they are beautiful, wear-resistant, hygienic, and come in a variety of shades. This coating consists of a mixture of polyvinyl acetate dispersion, fillers and dyes. However, it reacts very poorly to high temperature and systematic humidification, therefore such coating is not recommended for showers and bathrooms. Unlike polyvinyl acetate, polyester coatings are not afraid of water and have the same qualities. They consist of a mixture of polyester resin with a hardener, filler and dye. After manufacturing, they quickly acquire performance qualities; 1-2 days after installation, you can already walk on them safely.

Epoxy coatings are highly durable and resistant to aggressive chemical influences. They are made from a mixture of epoxy and urea-formaldehyde resins with a hardener, filler and dye. It is advisable to install such floors in a workshop or garage. The quality and durability of mastic floors largely depend on how carefully the base for them is prepared. It should be smooth, durable and sufficiently dry. Its humidity should not exceed 5%. To construct the base, concrete and mortars of a grade of at least 150 are used. They are laid in a layer 20-50 mm thick, compacted and smoothed. Simultaneously with the base, it is necessary to make plinths from a cement-sand mixture, limiting the area on which the mastic will be poured. To make skirting boards, take a cement-sand mixture of composition 1: 3 and seal it with a PVA dispersion prepared from one part glue and three parts water. The screed must be monolithic. It is checked by tapping and if a defective place is detected, which is detected by the appearance of a dull knock, this place is destroyed, the remains of cement chips and dust are removed and primed with cement laitance.

Then they are sealed with mortar, leveling the surface with the level of the surrounding base. To ensure that the connecting seam is invisible, the solution is compacted and smoothed at the junction points. The solution is used to seal all sinks and sunken areas with a depth of more than 10 mm, having previously cleaned them of dust and primed them with cement laitance. Depressions and cracks up to 10 mm deep are sealed with a polymer-cement mortar, first cleared of dust and primed with a 10% aqueous PVA solution. Polymer-cement mortar is made from a dry cement-sand mixture of grade 150 and a plasticized PVA dispersion, which is diluted with water in a ratio of 1: 4. If the base contains a lot of cracks, grooves, cavities and other defects, it must be leveled with a layer of polymer-cement mortar 10-15 mm thick .

The horizontalness of the base is checked with a two-meter control rod. The gaps between the floor and the slats should not exceed 2 mm. The finished base is cleaned of debris and dusted with a vacuum cleaner or hair brush. The humidity of the base should not exceed 5%, since with increasing humidity the adhesion strength of the mastic to the surface of the base decreases, and the time of its final hardening is significantly extended. The base prepared in this way is primed with a 10% aqueous solution of PVA dispersion, and a continuous layer of polyvinyl acetate putty is applied over the dried primer. The putty is applied “to the peel” in a layer of up to 0.5 mm, using a textolite spatula with a long handle. In this case, cavities up to 5 mm deep are sealed. The putty should have the consistency of thick sour cream and consist of the following components: 1 part - Portland cement grade 400, 4 parts - fine sand with a grain size of up to 0.25 mm, 0.25 parts - alkali-resistant pigment.

Then the putty surface is sanded and left for 1-2 days, after which the installation of the mastic floor itself begins. After the putty has dried, a leveling layer is applied, for which mastic of a more rigid composition is used, containing a large amount of filler. The walls are covered with shields or other material, since they can be stained when mastic is splashed. The leveling layer is made 2-2.5 mm thick. You can control the thickness of the layer by immersing a metal ruler with divisions in the still uncured mastic or using a wire gauge for this purpose. When spraying mastic, make sure that bubbles do not appear on the surface, which, drying faster than the rest of the mass, disrupt the uniformity of the mastic composition.

The leveling layer dries for 6-8 hours, after which it is leveled by cutting off the tubercles with a knife or spatula, and the depressions are filled with mastic of the same color. After this, the front layer of coating is applied. It uses a more elastic mastic containing less filler. The thickness of the front layer should not exceed 1.2-1.3 mm. The floor will dry faster if you arrange active ventilation in the room, and after 5-7 days it will be ready for use. At lower temperatures, the floor may take up to 10 days to dry. Mastic coatings tend to improve their qualities over time, and not vice versa. Water evaporates from the hardened mastic and it becomes more resistant to abrasion, while maintaining elasticity and resilience. Improving the quality of a mastic floor is achieved by covering it with varnish.

Mosaic concrete has been used for flooring for many centuries and remains popular today due to its high wear resistance and wide decorative possibilities, and also due to the fact that modern technology significantly increases the service life of the floor and simplifies the installation process.

Mosaic flooring is a truly universal covering, suitable for shopping centers, shops, sports complexes, cinemas, theaters, concert complexes, offices, enterprises catering, production premises, train stations, waiting rooms, churches, exhibition halls, galleries, corridors, foyers, halls, etc. It helps to realize the most complex design ideas and maintains an unchanged appearance for decades.

Mosaic concrete floors are usually monolithic, but are sometimes separated by veins or assembled from slabs. If we talk about color palette, then the floors can be in both monocolor and multicolor versions. The basis of the flooring is concrete, to which natural aggregate is added. As a filler, crumbs obtained by crushing marble, granite, balsate, quartz, jasper, serpentinite, pebbles, etc. are added to the mosaic-concrete mixture.

Laying technology

The technology for laying a mosaic floor is relatively simple, but requires strict adherence.

The temperature of air and materials during work should not fall below 5 degrees. are laid after the roofing, plastering and sanitary work has been done in the room, and the glazing has been completed.

Concrete mosaic floors are made as follows:

First, the screed surface is cleaned with an electric brush to remove dust and dirt.
At the next stage, using a slats and a level, beacons (every 1-1.5 meters), dividing frames or veins (depending on the pattern) are placed, gluing them to the base with cement.
The surface is thoroughly moistened and filled with screed, which is the bottom layer of the floor. The screed is prepared from cement-sand mortar grade 150. The thickness of the screed should be 28-30 mm. The solution is leveled over the floor area and dries. Subsequent pouring of the mosaic-concrete mixture can be done after the screed has set.
Then a cement-sand mortar is diluted for the top layer of the floor. For its preparation, Portland cement grade 400 is used, which can be white or colored, if necessary for the design project. Concrete is colored by adding mineral pigments that are resistant to light, such as ocher, carbon black, chromium oxide, red lead, etc. The technology for introducing the dye suggests that its amount should not exceed 15% of the mass of cement, otherwise the strength of the solution will decrease. In order for the mosaic floor to have a uniform color, each mixture must be made in the volume required for installation in one room.
A filler is introduced into the solution, which, as mentioned above, is stone chips divided into fractions. The presence of foreign impurities in the crumbs is not allowed. The filler has fraction sizes of 2.5-5 mm, 5-10 mm and 10-15 mm. The composition of the mixture for pouring the top layer of the floor is as follows: 1 part cement, 1 part 2.5-5 mm crumbs, 1 part 5-10 mm crumbs, 1 part 10-15 mm crumbs, 0.5 parts water. Mosaic-concrete solutions are obtained of high quality only if the components are thoroughly mixed, which is achieved through the use of mobile mixers. The prepared concrete must be consumed within 1-1.5 hours, until the mobility of the composition begins to change.
The mosaic-concrete mixture is poured and carefully leveled according to a given pattern, limited by slats. Concrete mosaic is laid in a layer no more than 3.5 cm wide.
The coating is compacted using vibrating slats, platform vibrators or tampers.
After the mixture has dried, the mosaic-concrete surface is polished.
As the mosaic dries and sands, it may develop small cracks. They should be rubbed with a mixture of cement and an appropriate dye.
Concrete looks best with a polished surface. The polished surface is polished with M-28 stones, polished with felt wheels with the addition of polishing powder, and rubbed with wax paste.

At first glance, mosaic floors amaze with their splendor and sophistication. Strong and durable, they can last more than 100 years even in the most trafficked places. The technology for making such a floor is not so much complicated as it is labor-intensive. It requires a fair amount of patience and good taste. In this article we will show you how to make a simple marble mosaic floor with your own hands.

The main difference between terrazzo mosaic floors and conventional concrete floors is that they are thin-layer, but despite this, they allow much more more design ideas. It's more decorative look flooring that is as durable and durable as a solid concrete floor.

The concept of terrazzo unites all types of self-leveling mosaic floors. They differ only in the type of binder and filler material. Thus, the function of a mosaic can be performed by marble, sand, glass, fragments of ceramic tiles, decorative stones and other natural, environmentally friendly materials.

In this article we will look at creating a mosaic floor with marble chips, since this option is the most popular. Using a similar scheme and technology, you can make floors with other fillers.

Depending on the use of binder material, several types of terrazzo floors are distinguished:

The thick floor is made from cement.
The floor of medium thickness is made from crumbs and a mixture of cement with polymer additives.
A thin floor includes only mosaic elements and an additive of polymer components.

Marble floor

Mosaic floors today are made mainly from marble due to its excellent performance qualities. This is a natural rock with extremely high density and characteristic crystal structure. Marble does not absorb water, does not react to chemicals and is quite easy to machine. It is these qualities that are necessary to create an ideal floor that will last for decades.

High aesthetic characteristics, as well as the ability to convey natural texture in detail, have found wide application in construction, landscape design and interior design.

But using whole marble slabs would not only be wasteful, but also simply impossible - pure marble is not very common. Therefore, an alternative and less expensive way of using natural material was invented - creating marble chips. It is made from illiquid goods and waste from the production of marble products. It doesn’t matter what goes into the crusher – ritual slabs or ordinary unprocessed rock – marble mosaic floors are equally strong and durable.

Advantages of marble floor:

durability (can be used even in high traffic areas);
concrete mosaic floor is resistant to moisture (can be done in bathrooms, swimming pools);
wear resistance;
environmental friendliness;
easy care;
durability;
does not produce a spark under mechanical stress (can be used in workshops and enterprises with increased fire safety requirements);
aesthetics (with the appropriate skills, you can create absolutely stunning floors with ornate patterns, paintings and ornaments).

Today, the market offers a wide range of marble chips, which differ in fraction sizes, color and other characteristics. It is mainly used for arranging floors in public institutions and on the street, since marble covering will be too cold for a home.

The disadvantages of a marble mosaic floor include not only coldness, but also the susceptibility of chips to burn out under ultraviolet light. Moreover, we are talking not only about painted products, but also about ordinary white marble - over time it begins to turn yellow.

Since the service life of a marble floor can be measured in decades and even centuries, you can simply get tired of it. And if you want to change marble to parquet, with the dismantling of the coating there will be problems. serious problems– It is very difficult to break strong marble.

And the last delicate moment is the high cost of a marble mosaic floor. The price of the service depends not only on the material used, but also on the pattern you want to implement. As a rule, laying out the pattern is paid separately, and a designer is hired for this work.

Making a mosaic floor from marble chips is not that difficult, but for this you need to strictly follow the instructions. So, first you need to prepare the base - the subfloor must be leveled with a reinforced cement screed. Then install the dividers, prepare the marble mixture, fill and polish. Let's take a closer look at each of the stages.

Preparing the base

To prepare the base for laying the mosaic floor, it is necessary to remove the old flooring, having reached the subfloor. The ideal base is a monolithic reinforced concrete slab or cement screed.

Work progress:

If there are voids, recesses or cracks in the subfloor, they must be puttied or the entire surface filled with a leveling mixture.
Pay special attention to the places where pipes enter the floor (risers in a multi-story building).
Brush the base with stiff brushes to increase the adhesive properties of the floor.
Remove all debris and dust the surface.
Set separators. This is best done during the organization cement screed, placing them one and a half meters apart. The best delimiters are made from square pipes with a side of 25 mm.
If you are going to create a complex patterned design, you will need to install additional dividers for each insert. To do this, use thin brass or aluminum plates different forms, less often - glass (for repeats or simple rectangular images).

Preparation of marble mixture

To fill a mosaic marble floor, you will need a fairly large amount of crumbs of various fractions. Different sizes of elements allow you to create a more interesting and “live” pattern. For floor art, crumbs of 5, 10 and 15 mm in diameter are usually used, choosing equal proportions of the material.

Specifics of preparing the working mixture:

Mix “different-sized” crumbs in equal proportions.
Add cement (not lower than M400) in a ratio of 1:3 or 1:4.
If you want to make a colored floor, use special natural dyes– marble flour, ocher, red lead, chrome oxide and others. Pigments in the mixture should not exceed 30% of the total mass.
Before adding water, mix all the components of the mixture thoroughly, then add liquid portionwise until you get a dense and inactive mass. It is almost impossible to name the exact proportions and amount of water, because different additives have different water absorption, so be guided by consistency, constantly stirring the mixture.

Helpful advice: before adding marble chips to the solution, they should be thoroughly washed with water to remove dust to ensure maximum adhesion to the cement and to prevent the formation of voids inside the floor.

Pouring the floor

The marble floor is poured in two layers, resulting in an unusually durable coating.

Work progress:

Prepare a classic cement-sand mortar M150. It should not be too thick to fill all the voids and even out floor defects.
Moisten the base with liquid cement mortar, highly diluted with water. Distribute the composition over the surface with a regular broom or brush.
Place the solution on the cards and level it using wooden slats or a plastic trowel to get a perfectly smooth and uniform layer about 2 cm thick.
When the bottom layer has hardened enough to be easy to walk on (it is not necessary to wait until it dries completely), you can begin the second stage of work - pouring the marble mixture. Evenly spread the solution with marble chips into cards between the dividers and smooth it with a trowel, making forward-impact movements.
Once you have filled in all the cards, leave the surface to dry for 6-7 days.

Surface grinding

In order for the flooring to acquire the shine and elegance for which it is valued, it should be sanded. When the marble floor is dry, you can begin scrubbing the surface with abrasive materials. For this, a grinder with a coarse abrasive is used, which can easily remove the top layer of hardened cement.

To make the grinding process easier and faster, wet the surface with water and sprinkle it with a layer of fine quartz sand. If potholes and voids are found after grinding, they should be filled with cement mortar and thoroughly rubbed with marble blocks.

If we are talking about creating an expensive floor with a complex pattern, it needs to be polished after regular sanding. Remove all the smallest debris and dust, put an attachment with a felt wheel on the sander, apply a special paste to it and walk over the entire surface.

To prevent the floor from cracking during drying, after laying, sprinkle a layer of cement-marble mortar sawdust, and then sprinkle them with water as they dry (once a day).

Mosaic tile floor

Laying mosaic floors can be done by pouring, as described above, or by laying out each element or fragments. Actually, this is how real mosaics were created from time immemorial. If you need to make a reliable and moisture-resistant floor in your home, you don’t have to spend money on a massive and cold marble covering. You can easily make a mosaic tile floor with your own hands, even without professional skills.

The good news is that you can save a lot at this event by using not special mosaic tiles, but regular tiles or even fragments of ceramic dishes. You can buy such illiquid material at any large hardware store or market.

Types of tile mosaics

To make tiled mosaics, not only ceramics or tiles are used. There is an amazing variety of textures, materials, shades and colors, among which you can find a product for the most demanding taste.

Mosaic tiles are:

Laying technology

If we are talking about laying special floor tiles, there is nothing complicated about it. In most cases, products are produced in the form of plates of small fragments, which are laid on cement or glue solution like regular tiles. Describing this process would be a waste of your time, but what's really interesting is creating a mosaic floor from broken ceramic or tiles.

How can you make a beautiful and durable floor from illicit chipped tiles? If you want to save money and time as much as possible, you can buy a tile battle with one color range and arrange the pieces like a puzzle. But if you intend to create a real patterned mosaic, you need to know a few secrets.

The principle of laying mosaic floors is quite simple - the main contours of the pattern are applied to the prepared base, the colors are marked, after which the tiles can be glued. Then the spaces between the mosaic pieces should be rubbed special composition suitable shade. It sounds elementary, but there are two ways to lay tiles on the floor.

If you need to cover a small area, say, in a bathroom or toilet, you can quickly “sketch” an image with a pencil or chalk and immediately glue pieces of broken tiles that fit in shape.

But if we are talking about a spacious room and a complex pattern on the floor, you will have to work hard. To lay out an even and beautiful pattern as in the sketch, you must first assemble the mosaic fragments and then glue them to the base.

How to do it:

Place the actual scale sketch on a flat surface.
Cover the sketch with transparent self-adhesive film, sticky side up.
Secure the edges of the film with tape so that the design does not “move out” during the process.
Separate protective coating from the adhesive surface and lay out a fragment of the drawing according to the sketch. Repeat the procedure for all the largest or most complex fragments that you could not lay out “by eye”.
Glue the fragments to the base, slightly drowning them in adhesive.
Wait for the glue to dry completely and fill the joints between the tiles with grout using a rubber spatula.

A useful trick: if you have a projector at your disposal, you can transfer the drawing to the floor or wall and lay it out much faster.

Tip: if you are laying mosaic tiles on the floor in the kitchen, it is better to cover them with a protective grout varnish so that accidentally spilled coffee or wine does not leave unsightly stains.

Finally, we invite you to see what masterpieces can be made from ordinary tile battles:

Mosaic floors made from marble chips are becoming increasingly popular because they can be seen in premium apartments, in educational institutions, in shopping centers, at car washes. Why are they so popular? The bottom line is that such coatings are distinguished by high performance characteristics, as well as good decorative properties.

Types and advantages of marble chips

Marble chips – natural material, small fragments of rocks having a granular-crystalline shape. It is mined in marble quarries by crushing and further packaging mining waste into fractions.

This is important to know:
The material in question is used not only to create a poured floor, but also to produce decorative tiles.

According to the range of application and degree of decorativeness, marble chips are divided into three classes: gray, white, colored. But the group of colored stones is represented by a wide variety of colors: red, beige, black, green. In addition, shades can be natural, that is, offered by nature, or artificially created, depending on the wishes of the customer.

Colored marble chips open up wide possibilities and allow you to design any designs

Floors made of marble chips are characterized by a number of significant advantages, which need to be discussed in more detail. In particular, we mean the following positive properties:

environmental friendliness - there can be no talk of any harmful impurities, since this is a safe natural material;
excellent strength and wear resistance of the coating - these indicators can be further increased with the help of special hardeners. This point is especially relevant for public spaces with high traffic;
low flammability - marble chips, compared to other materials, are the most fire-resistant;
floors are laid without the use of high-tech equipment. This means that the installation costs are not very high;
An important quality of the material in question is the fact that even when metal objects fall on the floor, sparks do not occur. This indicates that the coating is fireproof;
moisture resistance is an important parameter;
resistance to chemicals– the coating does not react to negative impact emulsions, mineral oils, organic solvents, alkaline solutions;
attractive appearance and architectural expressiveness - rooms with such floors look elegant and luxurious.

Installing a concrete mosaic floor step by step

Installing floors from marble chips is not a very complicated technology, but still, when carrying out the entire complex of work, you must adhere to certain rules. To understand the essence of the process, we will consider each stage separately.

Of course, first you need to carefully prepare the base. How to do this? Firstly, the surface needs to be cleared of debris, secondly, serious defects must be eliminated, and thirdly, holes near the pipes must be sealed. After performing the above steps, you should treat the surface with an electric brush to roughen it. Then the surface is dust-free and moistened with water before applying the mixture. Also, before installation begins, it is necessary to determine the floor level and apply appropriate marks to the walls around the perimeter of the room.

Worth paying attention:
A suitable base for a floor made of marble chips is cement-sand screed, reinforced concrete slabs, concrete.

The next step is the installation of dividing veins. If the floor is one color, beacons should be placed on the base at a distance of 1-1.5 m from each other. And if a multi-color coating is planned, you must first make markings on the floor in accordance with the contours of the future pattern. To do this, dividing veins made of brass, glass, aluminum or polymer materials are installed along the contour. They are fixed with cement mortar or slightly recessed into the screed, which is done before laying the mosaic layer.

This is important to know:
the top of the vein must be located at the same level as the floor.

Such a magnificent floor from marble chips can only be made by real professionals.

Preparing the mosaic composition is a crucial moment that requires special attention. To prepare the composition, the following ingredients are used: stone flour, cement, marble grains of different sizes, pigment and water. Here it is necessary to emphasize that large, medium and fine crumbs are used to evenly distribute the mass over the surface. But for the floor to look its best, after sanding, 80% of the area should be occupied by stone aggregate, 15% by mortar.

Before preparing the mixture, the crumbs are washed to improve adhesion to the solution. All components are mixed dry, and water is added gradually using a watering can. Ideally, the solution should be inactive and rigid. The amount of water is adjusted depending on the moisture content of the marble chips, because excess moisture deteriorates the quality of the solution.

This is important to know:
To obtain the desired shade, whitening additives are introduced: most often these are marble flour, ultramarine, ocher, chromium oxide.

List of stages of floor installation:

the bottom layer is made of cement-sand mortar, which is placed in cards and smoothed with trowels;
as soon as the mixture has set, but has not yet hardened, the mosaic mortar is laid - it is compacted using trowels, vibrating slats or light tampers to the level of the previously laid dividing slats;
laitance accumulating on the surface is removed with rubber scrapers. This point cannot be ignored, because a cement film may form;
the compacted mortar is carefully leveled and smoothed;
at the next stage, the lighthouse slats are removed and the furrows are filled with solution.

Worth paying attention:
The hardening period lasts 5-7 days. During this time, it is necessary to keep the floor damp. To do this, the surface is moistened with water once a day and covered with mats and sawdust.

And of course the final stage is sanding and polishing the floor. First, let's look at the features of grinding:

this work is carried out 6 days after the installation of the floor;

The mosaic grinder is used to process large areas

the hardened coating is rubbed down with coarse abrasive materials, and the surface is pre-wetted with water and sprinkled with quartz sand;
if after this process individual grains crumble, the damaged areas are sprinkled with dry tinted/untinted cement, which is rubbed into the pores with marble blocks;
Next, you should perform fine grinding with abrasive stones No. 230-325.

Polishing makes marble appear in all its beauty.

As for polishing, the final gloss is achieved using special equipment with a felt wheel.

How to care for marble floors

In this regard, we can say that over time the floor surface becomes dull, expressionless and begins to absorb dirt. In addition, grains of sand carried on the soles of shoes form invisible microcracks and scratches on the floor surface. Also, in areas of maximum traffic, dirty paths appear and the seams between the tiles are destroyed. If the above problems occur, the floor should be sanded and polished.

Marble chip flooring is beautiful and durable, but it requires special care

First, leveling grinding is performed, during which the renewed marble becomes like a monolithic surface with invisible seams. The marble is then sealed using polyester adhesive to match the color of the floor being restored.

This is important to know:
Before final sanding, the color of the seams can be restored or changed.

The last stage of marble processing is polishing using the crystallization method. After this procedure, the surface layer is polished to a mirror shine.

Marble loves cleanliness, so it needs to be cleaned regularly with neutral detergents. Plus, natural stone afraid of hard soles, sand and heels, as they scratch and injure him. To prevent these problems from arising, in places with frequent traffic you need to lay a soft rug, then the floor long time will remain clean and shiny.

Concrete floors with marble chips - beautiful coatings with unique manufacturing technology. For this reason, the entire range of work must be performed by experienced professionals, knowing the subtleties processes.

Despite the fact that marble chips are not a particularly popular building material, concrete mosaic slabs to create a beautiful floor covering are made using this particular stone filler.

A filler of this kind is obtained in the process of industrial crushing of natural material. Natural raw materials are used to create crumbs different colors, which allows the final product to have different aesthetic properties.

In the modern market, the greatest demand is for concrete mosaic tiles, which are produced with the addition of marble chips to the solution. This type of coating is distinguished by increased performance, optimal aesthetic qualities and an affordable, reasonable price.

Pay attention! A floor made of mosaic concrete with the addition of marble chips is also called terrazzo.

Scope of application and features of mosaic flooring

The photo shows several types of concrete slabs for flooring

Mosaic concrete flooring of self-leveling type, monochromatic or covering using material of different colors, can most often be found in public and administrative buildings, offices, shopping centers, educational or medical institutions, and in other premises with high level patency().

If we talk about the strength characteristics of floors, it should be noted that a mosaic concrete coating is in no way inferior to a solid concrete floor.

Pay attention! Mosaic floors using marble chips can most often be found in industrial premises. This scope of application is due to the fact that this type of coating does not produce a spark under mechanical stress. These qualities allow the use of concrete coating with marble chips in those buildings and visits to which they apply increased demands fire safety.

Technology for creating concrete mosaic flooring

Installing a mosaic floor in industrial facilities is a task that can only be solved by professionals, but at home, when creating floors, for example, in a garage or other premises, you can create such a floor with your own hands.

Structurally, this coating consists of a material such as mosaic concrete, which is the base. The finishing also includes natural stone filler, a layer thickness of 2-2.5 cm.

Mosaic concrete technology for flooring is the process of creating a floor covering, which is carried out as follows:

Preparation of the base surface;
Installation of dividing structures;
Preparation of concrete solution;
Pouring the coating;
Sanding the finished coating.

Preparatory activities

The best base option for laying such a covering is a bare concrete floor, concrete slabs or a cement-sand mortar screed.

Before you start pouring the coating, you must make sure that the base is prepared for this procedure.

During the preparation of the surface, the following instructions must be followed:

Removing all existing debris from the surface;
Elimination of serious defects;
Sealing holes around utility pipes;

Pay attention! All pipes and other communications should be carried out in advance, because after arranging the floor, in order to make a hole in the created coating, you will have to use a method such as diamond drilling of holes in concrete, and this is quite expensive and can be destructive to the coating.

Using a manual wire brush or its electric equivalent, we process the surface, giving it roughness to ensure better adhesion to the finish;
We arrange the screed;

Cover the surface with a primer or simply moisten it with water;
We determine the thickness of the floor covering and make corresponding marks on the wall X.

Installation of dividing structures

If your choice fell on creating a single-color floor, then at this stage you need to install guide rails, with the help of which it will be as convenient and simple as possible to level the surface filled with the mixture. The slats are laid in one horizontal plane, maintaining a distance between each subsequent one of 1-1.5 m.

The arrangement of a color coating begins with the installation of dividing veins for screens of different colors. These same veins are made of non-ferrous metals, glass or other polymer-type materials. Such structures are fixed using cement mortar.

Advice. The upper level of the dividing veins is flush with the intended level of coverage.

Also, colored flooring can be created using concrete mosaic tiles. There are a huge number of options for laying out multi-colored tiles to achieve a bright and original design.

Pay attention! In the case of using concrete tiles during the laying process, it is necessary to use a method such as cutting reinforced concrete with diamond wheels, which allows you to adjust the tiles to size.

Preparation of the solution

The preparation of a solution for laying a mosaic floor is made from the following ingredients:

Stone flour - 1 part;
Cement-1 part;
Water - 0.5 parts;
Color pigments - 0.15-1.3 parts;
Marble chips of various fraction sizes - 1 part.

Advice. In order for the created coating to have the maximum level of strength, cement grade M400 should be used as one of the ingredients of the mixture.

The following can be used as color pigments used to color the mixture:

Marble flour;
Chromium oxide;
Ultramarine;
Ocher.

Covering device

The prepared mixture is evenly distributed over the entire surface and leveled using a rule or squeegee. It is necessary to level carefully, excluding depressions and protrusions of crumb fragments (