EP2401449B1 - Tile-spacing member and corresponding tile-laying method - Google Patents

Description

The present invention relates to an organ, which allows to maintain a spacing and a determined orientation between the different tiles of a tiled set. The invention also relates to a tiling method using the aforementioned spacer member.

In the description and the claims of the present application, the word "tile" is used to designate not only the tiles of a tiled assembly, but also slabs that are to be placed side by side on a support while respecting alignments. In other words, the invention is in no way limited to use for ceramic tiles such as those used on kitchen or bathroom walls and it also relates to use for slabs of more large dimension. In all cases, the tiles or slabs concerned by the present invention are of substantially rectangular shape, for example square.

In the state of the art, the tiles concerned are applied to a support with interposition of a bonding material consisting of cement and / or glue; the support to be tiled is coated with this bonding material and the tiles are placed on the support by pressing them sufficiently hard to obtain a good connection between the support and the tile. In practice, the tile setter encounters two problems: first, the tiles must have their visible outer face located in the same plane so that the tiled surface does not have bumps or depressions and secondly the spacing between two adjacent tiles must be substantially constant; if such spacing is variable, the tile assembly is unsightly and, furthermore, the alignment of the tiles is not respected. These installation problems are particularly sensitive for inexperienced installers, which is increasingly the case when users, in order to reduce costs, decide to do DIY home.

To overcome these disadvantages, it has already been proposed, for example in the British patent GB 2,334,731 the use of spacers that are placed in the areas to be covered by four adjacent corners of tiles. These spacer members comprise two elements that can form a single piece. The first element constitutes the rear part of the spacer member and has the shape of a ring which is placed between the support of the tile and the tiles, in the areas covered by four corners of tiles; this ring has a constant thickness, it maintains a constant spacing between the support of the tile and the rear face of the tile, which prevents the tile produced has bumps or depressions on its outer surface, the tiles having a thickness substantially constant and the support being substantially planar. The second element of this spacer member constitutes the front portion of said member and is formed of a cross comprising two equal and perpendicular branches, the branches of the cross being intended to come interposed between the tiles, to the right of an area where there are four adjacent tiles. The tiles are pushed, at the time of installation, against the branches of the spider, the width of these branches defining the spacing between the adjacent tiles of the tiled surface. Of course, the bonding material, which maintains the tiles on their support, is put in place at the spacer member as on the rest of the surface of the support, so as to establish a connection between the spacer member, on the one hand, and the corners of tiles that it supports, on the other hand. The branches of the spider form with respect to the rear part of the spacer member an elevation, which is less than the thickness of the tiles, so that when filling by means of a joint material the intervals between tiles after the positioning of the tiles, the branches of the spacer member are no longer visible from the outside.

A spacer member of the same type has already been described in the international application WO 2006/087572 which proposed to make the rear part of the spacer member according to a particular structure which allows an easy and effective implementation of the connecting material for maintaining the spacer member on the support, on the one hand, and maintaining the tiles on the spacer member, on the other hand.

There is also known a spacer member such as that described in the US patent application US 4,862,668 . Said spacer member maintains a uniform spacing between the rows and columns of the tile mosaic. For this, this cruciform spacer member is made of polymer material, preferably semi-rigid, and has four radially extending branches and deformable to partially adapt to the dimensional variability of the tiles.

It remained, nevertheless, to solve a problem due to the fact that the tiles are generally, in plan, dimensions that present variations due to their method of manufacture. Even if good quality tiles are used, this dimensional inaccuracy has a considerable disadvantage. Indeed, if it is desired to use spacer members of the state of the art, such as those which have been defined above, one must, in the same alignment of tiles, push the tiles against the braces which are part of the spacers. As a result, if there are a number of tiles in an alignment having dimensions greater than or less than the average for the tiles, in this case the size differences accumulate in the same alignment, so that one arrives at a shift not allowing to achieve a tile having lines of joint between perfectly rectilinear tiles. As a result, the spacer members of the state of the art, even if they can help the neophyte installer, do not allow, with tiles having a tolerance on their dimensions, to obtain satisfactory results.

The purpose of the invention is therefore to avoid the aforementioned drawback by proposing a spacer member in which, in line with said spacer member, two tiles must bear on abutments corresponding to the branches of a spider to define the orientation, while the other two have a set of positioning relative to the spacer member allowing the catching tolerances on the dimensions of the tiles in plan. This backlash ensures that the installer can correct the position of one tile in two in each alignment, which avoids the accumulation of dimensional discrepancies and therefore allows the realization of alignment, even with tiles with a slight dimensional variability.

The subject of the present invention is therefore a spacer member of substantially rectangular tiles, all identical, arranged on the same support in adjacent rows parallel to two perpendicular axes, so that at least one angle of a tile is adjacent to three. angles of three other tiles, a layer of bonding material ensuring the maintenance of said tiles on the support after they have been properly positioned and a seal material filling the groove separating two adjacent tiles, said member having a rear portion interposed between the tiles and the support and a front portion which includes interposed elements between tiles adjacent, said spacer member being positioned to the right of the areas covered by four tile angles, the rear portion of said member having the shape of a ring whose middle line is a flat closed curve, the rear part supporting four tabs, which constitute the front portion and which are positioned on the ring, so as to define two by two four adjacent angular sectors centered on the central zone of the ring, the angular openings of said sectors being close to 90 °. Said spacer member is remarkable in that said angular apertures are respectively smaller or greater than 90 ° when passing from one sector to the adjacent sector, so that the two tongues of a small aperture angular sector each form stops for two successive sides of a tile positioned in said angular sector and pushed towards the central zone of the ring.

In a preferred embodiment, the ring constituting the rear part of the spacer member has a circle as a mean line; it can be provided that the tabs of the front part form a single piece with the rear part.

To ensure, on the one hand, a perfect retention of the spacer member on the support and on the other hand, the constant spacing of the spacer member relative to the support, it is advantageously provided that the cross section of the ring , perpendicular to its mean line, has the form of a V, whose point is on the side of the plane of its mean line where the tongues are not; good understood, depending on the different possible cases of laying, one can consider a V-shaped profile having a greater or lesser depth depending on the thickness of the desired layer of bonding material; the central part of the V-ring and the channel which constitutes the ring itself, are filled with connecting material to ensure a good connection of the corners of tiles with the support. The area of the tip of the V may have recesses allowing free passage on both sides of the tip of the V of the ring to allow the adhesive material to remain in place when at the time of the break, we move a little a tile relative to the spacer member.

According to one embodiment, the tongues of the front part of the spacer member extend towards the tip of the V of the ring forming a partitioning inside the ring; each tongue may constitute, overhanging the rear part of the spacer member, a rectangular parallelepiped, whose faces perpendicular to the tip of the V of the ring to the right of the tongue, are in the extension of the partitioning; at least one of the parallelepipeds forming the tongues is separated into two flexible sheets by a slot perpendicular to the mean line of the ring in the zone of the tongue, this arrangement allowing, by deformation of a sheet, to increase the positioning set of a tile within an angular sector; the height of a tongue parallelepiped above the ring is less than the thickness of a tile of the tile to achieve.

The large faces of the two tongues, which are substantially spaced by 180 ° on the circle forming the average line of the ring, may be parallel to each other and perpendicular to the corresponding faces of the two other tongues; the difference from 90 ° Angular apertures of all angular sectors, can be substantially the same.

• on dispose sur le support que l'on veut recouvrir de carreaux une couche de matériau de liaison ;
• on met en place sur le support un quadrillage d'organes espaceurs tels que ci-dessus définis, dont les anneaux sont en appui sur le support, les lignes du quadrillage étant parallèles aux axes d'alignement des rangées adjacentes de carreaux, les uns (T) de ces organes ayant, dans le sens trigonométrique à partir d'un point situé sur l'un des deux axes d'alignement, une succession de secteurs de petite puis grande ouverture angulaire alors que les autres (R) ont, dans le sens rétrograde, la même succession de secteurs, le quadrillage comportant successivement sur chacune de ses lignes un organe de type T puis un organe de type R, les languettes des organes espaceurs ayant leurs lignes moyennes disposées parallèlement à l'un ou l'autre des deux axes d'alignement précités ;
• après qu'un organe espaceur ait été positionné au droit d'un point où se rejoindront les angles de quatre carreaux adjacents, on étend dessus une couche de matériau de liaison et on met en place, dans chacun des secteurs angulaires dudit organe espaceur, l'angle d'un carreau, les deux carreaux des secteurs à faible ouverture angulaire étant bridés entre les languettes de l'organe espaceur alors que les carreaux au droit des secteurs à grande ouverture angulaire ont un jeu de positionnement, les languettes étant ainsi disposées dans les rainures qui forment les intervalles entre les carreaux ;
• et qu'enfin, on comble lesdites rainures avec un matériau approprié pour faire joint entre les carreaux et pour dissimuler les languettes vis-à-vis de l'extérieur.

The present invention also relates to a tiling method using spacer members as defined above, for producing a tile consisting of adjacent rows of tiles aligned along two perpendicular alignment axes, in which:

• it is arranged on the support that one wants to cover with tiles a layer of bonding material;
• a grid of spacing members as defined above is placed on the support, the rings of which bear on the support, the grid lines being parallel to the alignment axes of the adjacent rows of tiles, some of them ( T) of these members having, in the trigonometric direction from a point on one of the two alignment axes, a succession of sectors of small and then large angular aperture while the others (R) have, in the retrograde direction, the same succession of sectors, the grid comprising successively on each of its lines a T-type member and then an R-type member, the tongues of the spacer members having their mean lines arranged parallel to one or the other of two alignment axes mentioned above;
• after a spacer member has been positioned at a point where the corners of four adjacent tiles meet, a layer of bonding material is laid on top thereof and in each of the angular sectors of said spacer member is placed the angle of a tile, the two tiles of the small angular aperture sectors being clamped between the tongues of the spacer member whereas the tiles to the right of the large angular aperture sectors have a set of positioning, the tongues being thus disposed in the grooves which form the intervals between the tiles;
• and finally, filling said grooves with a suitable material to join between the tiles and to hide the tabs vis-à-vis the outside.

To better understand the object of the invention, will now be described by way of purely illustrative and non-limiting, an embodiment shown in the accompanying drawing and an embodiment of the corresponding tiling method.

• la figure 1 représente en perspective un organe espaceur selon l'invention ;
• la figure 2A représente une coupe selon AA de la figure 1 :
• la figure 2B représente une coupe selon BB de la figure 1 ;
• la figure 3 représente un schéma relatif à la pose d'un carrelage selon le procédé de l'invention, ce schéma montrant le positionnement de cinq organes espaceurs sur un support, quatre de ces organes étant répartis aux quatre angles d'un carreau, les axes d'alignement des carreaux étant figurés en trait mixte sur le dessin ;
• la figure 4 représente en plan un schéma de détail sur lequel la différence angulaire par rapport à 90° entre un secteur de petite ouverture angulaire et un secteur de grande ouverture angulaire a été considérablement grossi pour une meilleure compréhension de l'efficacité du système de pose selon l'invention ;
• la figure 5 représente, en perspective, une vue fractionnaire d'une variante d'une zone de l'anneau constituant la partie arrière de l'organe espaceur.

On this drawing :

• the figure 1 represents in perspective a spacer member according to the invention;
• the Figure 2A represents a cut according to AA of the figure 1 :
• the Figure 2B represents a section along BB of the figure 1 ;
• the figure 3 represents a diagram relating to the installation of a tile according to the method of the invention, this diagram showing the positioning of five spacer members on a support, four of these members being distributed at the four corners of a tile, the axes of alignment of the tiles being shown in dashed lines on the drawing;
• the figure 4 shows in plan a detail diagram on which the angular difference with respect to 90 ° between a sector of small angular aperture and a sector of large angular aperture has been considerably enlarged for a better understanding of the efficiency of the laying system according to the invention;
• the figure 5 represents, in perspective, a fractional view of a variant of a zone of the ring constituting the rear part of the spacer member.

Referring to the figure 1 it can be seen that the spacer member according to the invention comprises a circular ring designated by 1 in its entirety, said ring having in axial section the shape of a V, the tip 1a is intended to come to rest against the support on which one wants to achieve a tiling. The ring 1, which constitutes the lower part of the spacer member, thus forms a channel, which is separated into four successive sectors 2, 3, 4 and 5 by tabs 6, which project above the ring 1, said tabs extending inside the ring by a partition 6a. The protruding part of the tongues 6 is in the form of a rectangular parallelepiped, the planes of large faces are oriented toward the central zone of the ring 1 as will be specified later. The tongues 6 and the partition 6a which extends, form a single piece with the ring 1. According to an advantageous embodiment, one or more of the tabs 6 has its rectangular parallelepiped separated into two sheets by a slot 7 parallel to the two large faces, said slot extending over the entire height of the parallelepiped of said tongue and allowing a slight deformation in the direction of the thickness reduction in order to compensate if necessary phenomena of expansion of the joint material.

The four tabs 6 of the spacer member define between them four angular sectors, which have their vertex edges on the axis of the circular ring 1. This arrangement is clearly visible on the figure 4 where the trace of the axis of the circular ring is marked O. These four opposed angular sectors do not have the same angular aperture: two angular sectors 8b opposed by the apex have angular apertures equal to 90 ° - α, α being a small angle, while the other two angular sectors 8a have angular apertures of 90 ° + α. We thus define, with the tabs 6, angular sectors with small angular aperture R-α and angular sectors with large angular aperture R + α; the figure 4 shows this disparity of openness: however, on the figure 4 , the angle α shown has been considerably enlarged compared to the reality to show the structure of the spacer member described and its cooperation with the tile tiles.

The tiles of the tiles to be realized were designated by 9, they are of square form and the figure 4 shows the angles of two tiles 9, as positioned between the tabs 6 above the angular sectors 8b. The sides of the tiles 9 bearing against the tongues 6 of a sector 8b, have a well-defined position relative to the spacer member whose circular ring 1 has been partially shown on the figure 4 . One of the tiles 9, which overhangs the spacer member in a sector 8a, has been partially shown in dotted lines and it can be seen that the position of this tile with respect to the tabs 6 is not determined and therefore allows a slight clearance with respect to the point O. This set designated by 14 in the drawing can be used to change the position of a tile 9 located in a sector with large annular opening, in the direction of the two axes 11, 12 which correspond to the two rows of tiles that you want to make. The tabs in this embodiment have their large faces parallel to the axes 11 and 12.

Referring to the figure 3 it can be seen that, on the support of the tile to be produced, spacer members according to the invention are arranged in two different ways, at the corners of one and the same tile. The two alignment axes 11 and 12 of the tiling are shown and it is shown schematically, for the five spacer members shown in FIG. figure 3 , the angular sectors of small and big opening respectively by the signs - and +. We see that the spacer members placed on the top and left corner and the bottom and right corner of the single tile with the reference 9 in this figure, have the same arrangement, that is to say that starting from the point of the ring 1 located on the alignment axis 11 and rotating on the ring in the trigonometric direction, there is successively a sector of small angular aperture and a sector of large angular aperture. This type of positioning has been designated by T on the figure 3 . On the other hand, at the other two angles of the same tile, if we turn on the ring 1 of the spacer member from the point of intersection of the ring with the alignment axis 11, we find first a sector of large angular aperture then a sector of small angular aperture; this provision was designated by R on the figure 3 . It is therefore found that the tile 9 has its four corners in areas of large angular aperture, so that it can benefit from a positioning game without being clamped by the tabs 6 of the four spacers that surround it. On the contrary, the two adjacent tiles have their four corners arranged in sectors of small angular aperture, so that they are flanged by the tongues 6 of these angular sectors and have no possibility of play.

The use of the spacers according to the invention therefore makes it possible to produce a tile in which one tile out of two, in each of the alignments corresponding to the alignment axes 11 and 12, is in a fixed position, whereas one tile in two is in a position where it has a positioning clearance along the two alignment axes 11 and 12. If the sides of some tiles 9 have dimensional deviations due to manufacturing tolerances, and if, as in the state of the technique, we block against each other all the tiles of the same alignment, in this case, leads in said alignment to a cumulative shift of tiles, so that the grooves which are the intervals between the tiles and that is filled with joint material, have recesses, which cause an appearance quite unsightly tiled realized. On the contrary, with spacer members according to the invention, it is possible to make up the manufacturing tolerances of the tiles by means of that of the tiles, whose position is not clamped by the tongues 6, which makes it possible to avoid the accumulation dimensional differences in the same alignment.

Thus, the spacer members allow a three-dimensional adjustment of the tiles by, firstly, the arrangement of the tabs 6 providing positioning in a plane (two dimensions) and, secondly, the presence of the V-shaped profile. whose greater or lesser depth will ensure the positioning of the tiles relative to the support in a direction perpendicular to said plane (third dimension).

Since the establishment of the tiles and spacers bodies may therefore include relative movements of tiles, are provided to practice from place to place, the recesses 13 in the tip 1a of the ring to allow free passage of binding material and thus ensure a good distribution of this material despite the movement of a tile. Of course, the depth of the V of the ring is chosen as a function of the thickness of the bonding material that it is desired to put in place between the support and the tiles 9.

When the placing of the tiles is carried out, the grooves existing between the tiles 9 are filled with a material-joint, which makes disappear the tongues 6, the height of which is less than the thickness of the tiles 9.

Claims (12)

1. Member (9) for spacing substantially rectangular tiles, all identical, arranged on the same substrate into adjacent rows parallel to two perpendicular alignment axes (11, 12), in such a way that at least one angle of a tile (9) is adjacent to three angles of three other tiles (9), with a layer of bonding material providing the maintaining of said tiles (9) on the substrate after they have been suitably positioned and a sealing material filling the groove that separates two adjacent tiles (9), said member comprising a rear portion provided between the tiles and the substrate and a front portion which comprises elements provided between adjacent tiles, said spacing member being positioned to the right of the areas covered by four angles of tiles, the rear portion of said member having the shape of a ring (1), of which the mean line is a planar closed curve, the rear portion supporting four tabs (6), which form the front portion and which are positioned on the ring (1) so as to define, two-by-two, four adjacent angular sectors (8a, 8b) centred on the central area of the ring (1), the angular openings of said sectors being close to 90°, characterised in that said angular openings are respectively smaller or larger than 90° when passing from a sector to the adjacent sector, in such a way that the two tabs (6) of an angular sector (8b) with a small opening each forming abutments for two consecutive sides of a tile (9) positioned in said angular sector and pushed towards the central area of the ring.
2. Member according to claim 1, characterised in that the ring (1) constituting the rear portion has as a mean line a circle.
3. Member according to claim 2, characterised in that the tabs (6) of the front portion form a single part with the rear portion.
4. Member according to one of claims 1 to 3, characterised in that the right section of the ring (1), perpendicular to its mean line, has the shape of a V, of which the tip (1a) is on the side of the plane of its mean line where the tabs (6) are not located.
5. Member according to claim 4, characterised in that the tabs (6) of the front portion are extended towards the tip of the V of the ring (1) by forming a compartmentalisation (6a) inside the ring (1).
6. Member according to one of claims 4 or 5, characterised in that the area of the tip of the V comprises recesses (13) allowing free passage on either side of the tip (1a) of the V of the ring (1).
7. Member according to claim 5, characterised in that each tab (6) constitutes, overhanging the rear portion of the spacing member, a rectangle parallelepiped, of which the surfaces perpendicular to the tip (1a) of the V of the ring (1) to the right of the tab (6), are in the extension of the compartmentalisation (6a).
8. Member according to claim 7, characterised in that at least one of the parallelepipeds forming the tabs (6) is separated into two flexible sheets by a slot (7) perpendicular to the mean line of the ring (1) in the area of the tab (6).
9. Member according to claims 2 and 7 taken simultaneously, characterised in that the large surfaces of two tabs (6) substantially spaced 180° on the circle forming the mean line of the ring (1) are parallel to each other and perpendicular to the corresponding surfaces of the two other tabs (6).
10. Member according to one of claims 2 or 9, characterised in that the difference in relation to 90° of the angular openings of all of the angular sectors, is substantially the same.
11. Member according to claim 7, characterised in that the height of a tab parallelepiped above the ring (1) is less than the thickness of one tile (9) of the tile-laying to be carried out.
12. Method of tile-laying using spacing members according to one of claims 1 to 11 in order to carry out tile-laying constituted of adjacent rows of tiles (9) aligned according to two perpendicular alignment axes (11, 12), wherein:

    - a layer of bonding material is arranged on the substrate that is to be covered with tiles (9);

    - a grid pattern of spacing members is arranged on the substrate according to one of claims 1 to 11, of which the rings (1) are pressing against the substrate, the grid pattern lines being parallel to the axes of alignment (11, 12) of the adjacent rows of tiles (9), the first (T) of these members having, in the trigonometric direction starting from one of their points located on one of the two alignment axes (11, 12), a succession of sectors of small (8a) then large (8b) angular opening while the others (R) have, in the retrograde direction, the same succession of sectors, with the grid pattern comprising successively on each of its lines a member of the T type then a member of the R type, with the tabs (6) of the spacing members having their mean lines arranged parallel to one or the other of the two aforementioned alignment axes (11, 12);

    - after a spacing member has been positioned to the right of a point where are joined the angles of four adjacent tiles (9), a layer of bonding material is spread thereon and is set up, in each of the angular sectors of said spacing member, the angle of a tile (9), with the two tiles (9) of sectors with a low angular opening (8b) being clamped between the tabs (6) of the spacing member, while the tiles to the right of the sectors with a large angular opening (8a) have a positioning clearance, the tabs (6) as such being arranged in the grooves which form the intervals between the tiles (9);

    - and in that finally, said grooves are filled with a material suitable for forming a seal between the tiles (9) and in order to dissimulate the tabs (6) from the exterior.

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