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I have a laundry room in a home I just bought which had some unseen water damage. They originally had the sticky vinyl tiles on there which I pulled up. The concrete underneath was pitted and uneven.

So I put down leveler...but I came back to find a corner of it had drained through what I thought originally were just some cracks that would get filled in the process.

It was flat, but not level. So I filled the gaps and leveled it out after re-prepping the new surface etc. Except I had never feathered an edge before. I've only just leveled. Since I didn't want to add any more to the existing floor height I chose to give it a shot.

The outcome isn't horrible. I could just throw sheet vinyl over it and call it done but was looking for something a little nicer than that. I've only ever tiled on completely flat surfaces. Except over the feathering there's some slight unevenness. How would I properly tile over it and get consistent plum? Do I have to float? To give you an idea hopefully the pic will help.

It's a laundry room that goes into a garage, so I'd like to keep the height difference between the floors minimal. Advice?

enter image description here

and yes...I know you can tell I've never feathered before. ;)

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You can easily knock down any irregularity with an angle grinder and a masonry blade. It will generate a lot of dust, so you'll need some good eye protection and good mask.

The answer to your question depends on how planar the surface is and what size of tile you are planning on using. Bigger tile requires a surface that is more planar, while smaller tile can deal with a less planar surface.

Hope that helps.

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  • Oh see now that's awesome advice, I didn't even think about grinding it a bit. I was looking at larger tile, like 12x12 minimum but more at like the 12x24 or 16x16, maybe I should reconsider?
    – Chris W.
    Nov 23, 2013 at 3:07
  • If you measure the out-of-levelness, you can find some online tables that will suggest tile size. If it were for a bathroom, I'd probably go to the effort to do bigger tile, but for a laundry room, I'd probably stick with something like 6x6 to make it easier.
    – Eric Gunnerson
    Nov 24, 2013 at 3:42
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A hand grinding block will also work (still dusty, but does not throw it as far, and cheaper to buy - possibly better at achieving what you want, too, since it is vary hard to go too low with one.)

If you are setting ceramic tile in thinset, defects (roughly) less than half the height of the groove size suggested for the tile you are setting are usually not a problem - so if you are told to prepare the mortar with a 1/8x1/8x1/8 notched trowel, a 1/16" defect is generally not a problem.

If using the old style thick mortar bed, you can deal with much bigger defects/irregularities.

Now, if what you are meaning is rigid vinyl tile, not ceramic, then I'm talking past you - but presumably a similar logic almost applies with the mastic (it shrinks a bit with solvent leaving, thinset does not shrink appreciably) - but grinding the transition smooth will work.

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