Latest / Around the House with Eric G®: Home Improvement Remodeling & DIY / Moisture Matters: The Science of Tile Prep with Ardex
Transcript
- 0:31Foreign.
- 0:35Coast to coast, it's the nation's number one home improvement radio show and podcast with certified kitchen designer Eric G.
- 0:43And co host John Dudley, a former contractor and online technology expert.
- 0:49Delivering real fixes, smart tech and trusted advice.
- 0:53Remodels, repairs, energy savings, smart homes, diy.
- 0:58We've got your answers.
- 1:00It's around the House.
- 1:01Dive in and get inspired.
- 1:03Welcome to the around the House show, your trusted source for everything about your home.
- 1:08Thanks for joining us today.
- 1:09I'm Eric G.
- 1:10This summer, we have been celebrating America with our America250 campaign, trying to find those legendary companies that are manufacturing right here in the United States.
- 1:22And today we've got one of my favorites, Ardex Americas.
- 1:26And of course, my brother from another mother, William White.
- 1:29Welcome to around the House Brother.
- 1:31Hey, Eric, how you doing today?
- 1:33Great to see you, my friend.
- 1:34And you and I go way back.
- 1:36We do, we do.
- 1:38We won't even go far back.
- 1:39Let's put it this way.
- 1:40We were in Boy Scouts together back in the day.
- 1:42So this is kind of old home week for me.
- 1:45Having a great chat with you.
- 1:46And I gotta give you credit, William.
- 1:48You are my go to source for tile.
- 1:52And I thought I knew everything until I started working on my house with you.
- 1:57Really showed how little I did know about it.
- 2:00Just sharing my knowledge, my friend.
- 2:02Ah.
- 2:03And it's deep and I love it, man.
- 2:04And thanks for coming on today.
- 2:06And I love what Ardex is doing out there.
- 2:08Made in America is such a big thing out there.
- 2:11And not only is it great for the American worker and people out there, it really gives you guys the best control of the product because it's already here in the States, which sometimes can be half the battle.
- 2:21Yeah, yeah, exactly.
- 2:23On the other piece that I add to that is also supportive.
- 2:26Right.
- 2:26Made here, but also supported here.
- 2:29So got people out in the field to support the contractors who are doing those installations every day in the field, which is really kind of cool too.
- 2:38It really is.
- 2:39And I think that's the one thing with.
- 2:41With tile and surfaces like this.
- 2:43Of all the different products that you guys create out there is.
- 2:47There's so many different situations out there where the package materials of what they give you of, okay, this is how you use it.
- 2:54But there's those what abouts.
- 2:57That's where the support is so important to me because every installation is a little different.
- 3:04No two are exactly the same.
- 3:05Right.
- 3:06So especially as we talk about all over the United States, 50 states and in the union, and.
- 3:12And they all have different conditions Right.
- 3:15Different substrates, different installation contractors, different everything.
- 3:19Different weather, different.
- 3:21It's just crazy.
- 3:23Installing outdoor tile in Pittsburgh is way different than South Beach, Florida.
- 3:28This is true.
- 3:29This is true.
- 3:30Though you might use the same materials if you pick the right ones out there.
- 3:33It's just how you do it and make sure that you cover it.
- 3:35Right, Exactly.
- 3:37Yeah.
- 3:38So I wanted to talk about.
- 3:39You guys are big on the systems, and that's what I love, because as an installer for the professional and even the homeowner out there, but you guys aren't really found on the home improvement shelves.
- 3:50But you're with the experts out there, and that's what I like.
- 3:54And you can dive into a system and it's going to carry you through the project, which I think is brilliant.
- 3:59Exactly, exactly.
- 4:01So we do look at system assemblies.
- 4:03Right.
- 4:04We're typically starting with substrate prep and building all the way out to the finish.
- 4:09And quite often a lot of our products aren't really even seen at the.
- 4:14At the end of it.
- 4:15So it's what's underneath that really counts, though.
- 4:19Right.
- 4:19So starting with substrate prep, making sure that the substrate is.
- 4:23Is proper, and then building up from there with the proper adhesives, the proper waterproofing, whatever is necessary.
- 4:33Again, no two jobs are exactly the same, but to build that all the way out.
- 4:37Right, absolutely.
- 4:39And.
- 4:40And that prep is so key.
- 4:42It can make that job go so easy or you're going to fight it the entire way.
- 4:47Yep, yep.
- 4:47Especially as we start getting into more and more installations where moisture is a problem.
- 4:53And I'm talking interior installations.
- 4:56I know you mentioned exterior, but.
- 4:57Yeah, even interior installations.
- 4:59As we're getting into more materials that are moisture sensitive.
- 5:03Vinyls and some of our hardwood installations and these things, and even tiles, as tiles are getting bigger and grout joints are getting smaller and smaller, moisture's becoming an issue that comes up through the slab or through the substrate
- 5:16and dealing with that.
- 5:17So a lot of times that's actually where we start starting there.
- 5:21Preventing moisture from coming up and then building up.
- 5:24Yeah, it's.
- 5:26It makes a lot of sense because you think about it, if you're putting down large format tiles on a.
- 5:30On a concrete slab, for instance.
- 5:32Yep.
- 5:33That's a whole other world.
- 5:35Because that is like one big sponge.
- 5:37And then what are you doing to protect that?
- 5:39Protect the installation?
- 5:41Because you can make that go super smooth or it goes sideways.
- 5:45Yeah, yeah.
- 5:46So then.
- 5:47And then you go.
- 5:47You mentioned a large format tile.
- 5:50Well, also, large format tiles need a flatter substrate.
- 5:53When we used to have really small tiles, they could follow a substrate that wasn't necessarily perfect.
- 5:58Now you get big tiles and they can't follow that substrate and you end up with these teeter totters or lippage or ledging there.
- 6:07That makes it undesirable installation.
- 6:10So you need to do proper prep.
- 6:13Right.
- 6:13And that's where some of our newer technologies come in.
- 6:16We've got some crazy new technologies out there that are really fun.
- 6:20Like V1300.
- 6:21I don't even think I've got to talk to you about that one, Eric.
- 6:24No, let's hear it.
- 6:25B 1300 is a new underlayment that we have that is crazy coverage out of it.
- 6:30High flow, like, it's just.
- 6:31It's one of our exciting things that I was about to be a part of when I moved here to Pittsburgh, working with our team to develop this product.
- 6:39We launched it last year and it is the fastest growing product in the entire Arctic Global group.
- 6:47Wow.
- 6:47Yeah.
- 6:48Pretty cool.
- 6:48Well, it's so big because you think about it, especially with like we were talking about with large format, who says that those things are even flat and square?
- 6:56Those things can have their own little curl to them, right?
- 6:58They can, they can for sure.
- 7:00Yeah.
- 7:01And then when you're putting that on to maybe the not so perfect floor, you're really depending.
- 7:05That whole installation is depending on what's between that slab and what's between that tile.
- 7:09Exactly, exactly.
- 7:11Yep.
- 7:12The one thing I like too is just how easy the product is to work with.
- 7:16Like you said, you guys have really worked that in.
- 7:19And even doing my bathroom, when you and I were up there knocking that out, just putting in the heated floor and the whole tile system.
- 7:26And that was complex because we had a steam shower, we had different materials, and heck, you even caught a major error from a major company that was an installation error as far as their directions.
- 7:41Yeah.
- 7:41Yeah.
- 7:43Well, of course you never choose to do anything easy.
- 7:45You've always got to have it complicated.
- 7:47That's you.
- 7:49But you look at putting in that heat and then we did pour an underlayment over top of it and that made the rest of the tile installation go really easy.
- 7:58And that's where that proper prep comes in.
- 8:00Yeah, yeah, it makes sense.
- 8:02And you guys have been chasing down like the self leveling products for.
- 8:07You guys have been the king of that for a number of years.
- 8:10And it seems like you just keep getting it better and better and more innovation.
- 8:14Yeah.
- 8:15A lot of people don't realize this, but Ardex actually invented self leveling cement or underlings, as we call them now.
- 8:22Ardex actually invented that.
- 8:24And so we make a lot of them.
- 8:27They all do something a little bit different.
- 8:30But we are king in that technology realm of how to pour cement really thin, really strong, get it really flat.
- 8:39See, that's the key right there.
- 8:40And at the same time, it's got to cure within a reasonable amount of time as well.
- 8:44So there's a lot of different facets to that animal, because if one goes wrong, that slows you down and you'd.
- 8:51Be surprised at the chemistry that goes into it.
- 8:53That's one of my most exciting parts about moving here to corporate and being here is.
- 8:59Is going and talking with the R D guys and looking at all the little science that they put into it.
- 9:04It's pretty cool.
- 9:05Is this.
- 9:06I could imagine.
- 9:07And they're.
- 9:08And the other thing I love what you guys do too, is your Artax Academy.
- 9:11You're flying all over the place doing stuff, and you and I are always chatting on the road.
- 9:14But your training is so big because these products are technical and you need to have the training for this stuff.
- 9:22Well, training it.
- 9:23And that training goes to support the contractors, right?
- 9:25The guys that are using this product every day.
- 9:28But even a lot of them have never been through official or proper training.
- 9:33And that's what Ardex Academy is all about, is providing training to contractors, architects, designers, to really get them knowledgeable about what proper assemblies and what some of the newer technologies are.
- 9:49Because just because we're up to date 10 years ago, things have changed massively in all of our industries.
- 9:57The flooring industry, the tile industry, the moisture remediation industry, the surface like surfaces like the polished concrete toppings that we manufacture as well.
- 10:07All of those has changed so much in the last 10 years that if you did training 10 years ago, it's probably time to come back and do training again.
- 10:17The cool thing is we make it pretty easy.
- 10:19We've got, what, six facilities across us.
- 10:23We train at dedicated Ardex facilities.
- 10:25We also do them out in the field as well.
- 10:28So training is.
- 10:29Is a big part of what we do at Ardex.
- 10:32Definitely.
- 10:33Well, it's funny, it seems with the.
- 10:35With the TAL guys that I know out there that are the pros, they get into their groove and this is how I do it.
- 10:40And it's got to be interesting because that's one of those trades that it's like, I've done it this way for 20 years, trying to get them to open up the knowledge base and say there's an easier way.
- 10:51Or maybe you're not doing this right for the specifications, you're 90% there, but if you do the other 10%, that's got to be tough because that's one of those trades that, that people get in a groove and they
- 11:00don't want to come out of it.
- 11:02Yeah, yeah.
- 11:03And not to say that.
- 11:04That they were wrong or that they've been doing it wrong, but maybe there are better ways, easier ways, faster ways to get better results.
- 11:13And ultimately that's what it's about for the contractor is how do I get more work done in a single day and how do I make more money?
- 11:23Because times are tough and times are tighter.
- 11:26So that's what we want to help them with is, is how to actually make more money.
- 11:30And see, that's key.
- 11:31And, and not have those callbacks.
- 11:33Right.
- 11:33Not have the, oh, my gosh, that tile popped off the bathroom wall or I got a broken tile in the middle of the.
- 11:39Of the entryway that who knows what happened here?
- 11:41But those are the ones that can take a day or a day and a half.
- 11:44And there's no profit in that.
- 11:45When you go back out and fix.
- 11:46Stuff, as soon as you go back to a job site to even deal with a complaint, there's.
- 11:52There's.
- 11:53Yeah, there's no money in that whatsoever.
- 11:56And there's also the frustration factor is people have been using maybe some older technologies of products and going home at the end when you're having to fight with a product.
- 12:06And Eric, you and I have both done this on our own personal remodels.
- 12:09Right.
- 12:09You use a product and you fight with it.
- 12:11And fight with it.
- 12:12Yeah.
- 12:12You get it done and then you found out there's a better way.
- 12:17That's what we're about, is trying to show you there's better way.
- 12:19For sure.
- 12:19Yeah.
- 12:20And we're pushing products way harder than we used to.
- 12:23Steam showers, for instance, and all these things that we're putting into homes that you'll see an old school tile installer, they put the green board drywall up in the shower and they tile right over the top of it.
- 12:34And then somebody installs a steam unit in there.
- 12:37Wonder why this went sideways.
- 12:39And drink, that was 1982 technology just did right there.
- 12:43But it's not going to hold up to today's use and.
- 12:46And materials out there.
- 12:47Exactly.
- 12:48Yep.
- 12:49So that part, I think is awesome.
- 14:03But really, I think out in the industry, there is nobody that manages that technical expertise like you guys do.
- 14:10It's all about the Instructions and I see other brands out there, I've been to so many other training seminars at flooring places and stuff like that to see it.
- 14:18And some of these products are kind of homeowner friendly where they do okay, right.
- 14:24They've got a lot of forgiveness to them, but you expect a little less out of them.
- 14:29And I think that's where the strength of your products come out.
- 14:33Because if you follow the directions and you do it right, you've got something that's going to exceed virtually any other product.
- 14:39Exactly, exactly.
- 14:41That's what we tell people.
- 14:42And a lot of times if it's their first time using a product, will even say that is is literally just follow the instructions that are on the back of the bag, back of the product to the letter and
- 14:52it will do exactly what it's supposed to do.
- 14:54Oh well, I've never had to do that before.
- 14:56I'm telling you, if you, if you do it to the letter, what's on the back of the bag, it will 100% always do what it's supposed to do.
- 15:04It's like baking the cake, right?
- 15:05You're getting the box, you're going to follow it, it's going to turn out okay if you follow the direction.
- 15:09Exactly, exactly.
- 15:10And that's what the recipe is for, right?
- 15:12Is, is to make it replicatable every single time.
- 15:16So what are some of the latest products you've been using out there?
- 15:19Now you and I haven't worked together side by side for over a year now and of course I don't get to see all the latest stuff.
- 15:25But what's some of the new stuff you guys are using out there that's been hitting the marketplace to make things easier or better.
- 15:30So, so we, we touched on how moisture can be an issue nowadays.
- 15:34Right.
- 15:34So starting with moisture, we've got some new single coat moisture barrier which is called BB100, which is a vapor barrier.
- 15:45It's a single coat product.
- 15:47Roll it on.
- 15:47Sorry, it's a two coat but it's just roll on where a lot of times you, A lot of products in the past have been oxy based and we do have our MC Rapid that is a single coat product
- 15:59that is epoxy based.
- 16:00But here we have something that doesn't require.
- 16:03It's not a two part mix.
- 16:04Plain Mad scientist on a job site, you can open it up, mix, just stir up the contents and roll it out.
- 16:11So VB100 and then you couple that with something like our V13 because the VB100 also acts as A primer.
- 16:20Right.
- 16:21So moisture barrier and your primer.
- 16:23And then you go with our new B 1300.
- 16:26That can go down to an eight high flow, 29 square feet at a quarter of an inch.
- 16:32This stuff is crazy to work with.
- 16:36And it looks like glass when it's poured out there.
- 16:38You can go on concrete, you can go on plywood.
- 16:41It's just, it's super versatile.
- 16:44It's our new killer out there in the, in the industry.
- 16:48That's great for doing the new trends out there, like the curbless showers and stuff like I did in mine.
- 16:53It just flows right where you want it to.
- 16:55And it was so much fun.
- 16:57Especially if you're putting what down flexbone or something like that down there as well.
- 17:00Exactly.
- 17:01Yep.
- 17:02Guys out there that don't know flexbone is, Is there, is that a decoupling membrane with the heated.
- 17:08Is that kind of what that's called?
- 17:09Yeah.
- 17:10So there's two versions of Flexboat.
- 17:12Right.
- 17:12So we have our version that is just a decoupling or uncoupling mat.
- 17:16It's an eighth inch thick.
- 17:18That is going to prevent any cracks or movement from coming up into your tile work.
- 17:22We also have a quarter inch version that you can put a wire into.
- 17:27Like we did your house with a heated wire in there to create a heated floor.
- 17:31And that is also an uncoupling as well with the heat element in it.
- 17:35Yeah, that is so important, especially when you've got plywood that's flexing, you've got concrete subfloor that's cracking or moving crack.
- 17:43Yeah.
- 17:44How many times you walked into a commercial building and you're walking in and you see all these jig jagged cracks where the concrete crack below it and you can just see where it went underneath the tile and you
- 17:54go, well, they missed that.
- 17:56Yep, yep.
- 17:57One of our favorite stores right there in Portland, their showroom had cracks run right down through the middle of their walkway.
- 18:04And I'm like, you could have prevented that.
- 18:08Same thing when I was in Las Vegas at the, at the D North hall out there.
- 18:12They've got the big entry there.
- 18:13There's probably a 200 foot crack across their tile going across that convention.
- 18:18And it's just racing across like it's a fault line.
- 18:21And you can just see where that has just telescoped up through the floor.
- 18:25And if you're a homeowner, that's just a nightmare because that's just going to stick out like a scratch on a, on a brand new car.
- 18:31It does, it does.
- 18:32We also, we know Three things about concrete gray gonna crack and nobody's gonna steal it, right?
- 18:40Exactly.
- 18:41It's just a matter of where's it gonna crack.
- 18:43Sometimes we don't know.
- 18:44That's what those uncoupling membranes or anti fracture membranes do for us.
- 18:48Inexpensive and they keep those cracks from coming up through the tile work and through the finish.
- 18:54That is awesome.
- 18:55I wanted to kind of go back into the made in America stuff with you guys here.
- 18:59Are you guys making that all at your headquarters there in Pennsylvania or is it around the country?
- 19:03So we actually have five different manufacturing facilities across the US Spread out from literally from coast to coast.
- 19:09Right, Nice.
- 19:10So we've got one in California, we've got one in Georgia.
- 19:15We've got our main headquarters here just outside of Pittsburgh.
- 19:19And we do manufacture here as well.
- 19:21So it is kind of cool.
- 19:22We have also a manufacturing facility, Bourbon a Illinois, south side of Chicago.
- 19:27So we do.
- 19:28We've got manufacturing at five different locations across the US we employ across the US we employ about 400 people out here in the US and then globally, we're about 4,000 people.
- 19:42Globally, yeah.
- 19:44That's incredible.
- 19:45You guys have such a great global footprint and it's funny to think that the US is just a small part of that.
- 19:52Yeah.
- 19:52And again, part of that is also our distribution network too.
- 19:57That distribution network, again, is based on American businesses and we have some great partnerships that go back 30 plus years here in the US 40 years.
- 20:11And yeah, we're celebrating America 250.
- 20:13But Ardex wasn't here back then, and Ty was a little bit different back then and homes were different.
- 20:19But we're here in the U.S.
- 20:21you know, we've got relationships going back 30, 40, 50 years here, which is pretty cool.
- 20:28That is super cool.
- 20:29And you guys too.
- 20:30That's about relationships, right?
- 20:32It seems like once that tile installer, that homeowner knows your stuff, you're not changing them.
- 20:38Once they get in, they're like, hey, I'm not going anywhere.
- 20:41This is the way to go.
- 20:42Exactly.
- 20:43Those relationships are.
- 20:44And those distributor relationships and the contractor relationships, it really all comes together.
- 20:50It's a trifecta there.
- 20:51And then you add the architects and design and specifiers in there as well.
- 20:55It just, it really is about creating that energy for everybody.
- 21:00And we've talked a lot about what goes behind these surfaces.
- 21:05When you're talking grouts and things like that, you guys really excel.
- 21:09I love working with your grout.
- 21:10That is just like peanut butter and it cleans up easy.
- 21:14I'm not getting Covered in.
- 21:16Because I like black grouts.
- 21:17Come on.
- 21:17I like the dark charcoal stuff and other brands.
- 21:21It looks like I was playing in the.
- 21:22Cleaning out the barbecue or something when I'm done.
- 21:25Yeah.
- 21:26Your stuff, for some reason, cleans up just like, just super easy.
- 21:31And it's impressive.
- 21:32Again, different technologies that Arctics is using than some of those other manufacturers.
- 21:38And like at your house on your backsplash, we did black grout on that, didn't we?
- 21:42Yeah, we did.
- 21:43Yeah.
- 21:43And that was actually DG1 grout, which is a single component.
- 21:47Ready to use grout.
- 21:48Another.
- 21:49Cool.
- 21:50My favorite grout.
- 21:51I'm remodeling my house and it's what I put in my house.
- 21:54But like you said, the cool thing there is rather than looking like you just got done cleaning out the barbecue and your hands are all stained black, the pigments actually on each individual grain of sand.
- 22:07So you don't have to worry about staining.
- 22:09You staining the counter, making this huge black mess if you're using black grout.
- 22:13But all.
- 22:13All grout colors will typically leave a residue.
- 22:17And that DG1 doesn't.
- 22:19Again, just crazy new technologies that we have available.
- 22:23And I had that behind the 48 inch range.
- 22:25So it was getting grease, it was getting beat up.
- 22:29Because when I'm cooking, it's.
- 22:30It's a mess.
- 22:31It's spaghetti sauce, it's whatever.
- 22:34And it was just a simple wipe.
- 22:35There was no need to go in and.
- 22:37And didn't have to go back and do a bunch of sealing on it.
- 22:40Do all that maintenance stuff that.
- 22:41That you have to do with the older style materials.
- 22:44Yeah.
- 22:45With the older grouts.
- 22:46Yeah.
- 22:46And I think that's the.
- 22:47That's the key too, is the use of it afterwards.
- 22:51It's all great.
- 22:52When it's installed, people move in.
- 22:53It's great.
- 22:54But if you do a light colored grout, that can be the maintenance nightmare.
- 22:59Whether it's on a floor, a backsplash, or a bathroom.
- 23:01Yeah.
- 23:02On the old school grout.
- 23:03Yeah.
- 23:03That used to be a difficult maintenance issue where you're having to scrub it and then reseal it and do all this.
- 23:10Now with newer technologies, grout maintenance, it's not a thing.
- 23:14No one wants to spend their Saturday or Sunday scrubbing grout lines.
- 23:17I got better things to do with my time.
- 23:20I love it.
- 23:21Well, William, we're running out of time.
- 23:22How do people find your products out there?
- 23:24How do they get involved with this?
- 23:25If they're an installer, how do they find out where the latest education is?
- 23:28That kind of stuff.
- 23:29The best thing to do is actually Visit our website, arctics Americas.com we're also on all the social medias, The Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, all of that we do post.
- 23:41All of our trainings are posted online as well.
- 23:43So if anyone hearing this is interested in training.
- 23:46Absolutely.
- 23:47Reach out to us.
- 23:48We.
- 23:48We offer specified or specialized training on our different product categories.
- 23:53So we kind of break them down by segments, if you will, and do them on tile, do them on flooring, do them on moisture mitigation systems, do them on our polished or finished surfaces.
- 24:04All kinds of different trainings out there.
- 24:06And I love the products you guys have.
- 24:08It's so wide ranging.
- 24:09And guys out there, if you haven't messed with this stuff before, whether you're a homeowner contractor, take a look.
- 24:14There are so many easy buttons wrapped up in your product line.
- 24:18I can't believe it.
- 24:19Every time I get done working with you, William, it's one of those things where I turn around and go, wow, okay.
- 24:25I like that adhesive.
- 24:25I'm using that for other stuff or whatever we're working on.
- 24:28So that stuff makes it easy.
- 24:30And there's a lot of answers there that can really make it a lifetime installation.
- 24:34Just about.
- 24:35You're going to get tired of that tile before the product fails.
- 24:38And at that point, I think that's a win.
- 24:41Absolutely.
- 24:42Absolutely.
- 24:43William, thanks for coming on today, brother.
- 24:45I always appreciate you.
- 24:46I love the wisdom that you put into this stuff.
- 24:48And thanks to Ardex Americas for bringing that stuff to the US Supplying those jobs and making it right here and just makes it easier for everybody.
- 24:58And that's great jobs for America, as always.
- 25:01Good to catch up with you, Eric.
- 25:03We'll see you.
- 25:04Thanks, brother.
- 25:05I'm Eric G.
- 25:06You've been listening to around the House.
- 25:10You don't want to be a Debbie Downer Just turn a frown upside downer don't be a stick in the mud Grab your buddy, grab your butt Take this good time and turn it up louder no one ever talks
- 25:24about the nights they went to bed counting them.
- 25:27She kitchen teeth getting beauty ribs acting.
- 25:30Your age don't make a good story Knock one back no buzz, no problem no one ever talk about the shots they didn't take drinks they never drank ill they never raised Jihawk.