You lay a new floor, it looks perfect, and a few months later a thin line appears running across three tiles. It is not the tiler's fault, nor the ceramic's: it is the substrate that has moved and taken the floor covering with it.
Why a floor cracks
A concrete slab keeps shrinking for months after it has set. If you add temperature changes on top of that — underfloor heating, for example — the substrate expands and contracts constantly. When the ceramic is rigidly bonded to that substrate, it has no choice but to break.
The risk is higher when:
- the slab is less than six months old;
- there is underfloor heating;
- you lay large-format tiles, which spread the stress less well;
- the substrate already has hairline cracks.
The solution: uncoupling
Uncoupling means mechanically separating the floor covering from the substrate. An intermediate membrane is laid that deforms instead of transmitting the movement. The substrate moves, the membrane absorbs it, and nothing happens up above.
The DYSO membrane is an open-cell elastomer between polypropylene fibres, 1 mm thick. It absorbs cracks of up to 20 mm, which is far more than a normal floor ever moves.
The test, on video
This is what the membrane does when the substrate really opens up:
How it is laid
- Clean, sound and level substrate.
- The membrane is bonded with C2 S1 or S2 tile adhesive.
- The sheets go butt jointed, with no overlap.
- Wait 24 hours before laying the ceramic.
- Leave perimeter joints of at least 8 mm. If you cover them with a rigid skirting glued to the floor, you lose the effect.
Uncoupling or waterproofing?
They are two different things. DYSO prevents cracks but it is not designed for wet areas; for a bathroom or a terrace you need a waterproofing membrane. If your case is a terrace with hairline cracks, ECODRY120 does both: it waterproofs and bridges cracks of up to 3.6 mm.
See solutions for interiors and new builds · Call us on 951 207 299
