How to Lay Garage Floor Tiles

Our guide on how to lay Polymer style instant interlocking garage floor tiles.

PP High-Impact Polymer floor and outdoor tiles are suitable for all garage interior functions including home gyms, play rooms and a space to park your car.  These instant floor tiles have become an increasingly popular choice in the domestic garage and other spaces due to their great looks, their versatility, and ease of installation. No adhesive means no prep work is required, ensuring a double garage can usually be tiled in a day and can be used immediately, no waiting! Just move your stuff back in and enjoy.

Due to their interlocking design the tiles create a great looking and practical floor, easy to clean, hard wearing, a much more efficient solution than just the traditional concrete.

Basic Tools Required:

1. Your pattern design
2. Sharp utility knife for trimming and deburring.
3. Tape measure to measure trim to cut and starting points.
4. Soft rubber mallet or firm footwear to ensure tiles click together.
5. T square for marking 90 deg cuts required.
6. Jig saw or hand saw or other cutting device.
7. If available a laminate floor Shear device makes fast smooth cuts.
8. Broom or leaf blower.
9. Some friends or family to admire your work in progress and to tell you how you should do it. The kids love stamping the tiles into place, have fun with the job.

Check Your Plans and Order:

1. Spend time going through over garage area measurements and what pattern you want to create.
2. Discuss with us if you wish and we can help you get the right order.
3. Make sure you know the tile size you are working with, 305mm or 400mm so you calculate the right number you need for your area to cover.
4. When you order tiles it is recommended to make sure you have some spares in case you cut a trim incorrectly and a few extra for later in case you damage some. Spares along the wall line colour are most likely to be needed.
5. Tiles are generally sold in boxes of 15-22 tiles per box.
6. Make sure you allow for expansion space along wall lines, eg upto 13mm depending on exposure to heat and direct sun.
7. Example to do accurate counts:
1. Measure your space width and depth in metres, eg 5.7M Wide across your garage entrance x 6M Depth inside the garage.
2. When looking at the depth you need to lower the garage door and mark its interior contact point, you need to be inside this point, the door just not have to touch the tiles. Inside this point you will also place your sloping trim tile which should be 50mm wide so your real measure to the back wall should be reduced by this 50mm.
3. If your tile is .305M x .305M you will divide .305 into your length and width measures and round up.
4. The width of 5.7m is divided by .305 = 18.7 so use 19 Tiles across the width and that is how many edge tiles to order.
5. The depth is 6.0M is divided by .305 = 19.7 so use 20 Tiles down for the depth.
6. Multiply the 2 answers above: 19 x 20 = 380 Tiles required.
7. Add some extra for wastage along the wall line if u need eg + 6 tiles so order at least 386 tiles plus edge of 19 tiles
8. Decide if you want underlay, in very high walking traffic areas of workshops a cheap floating floor underlay can make it quieter to walk on. Home garage is low traffic so not necessary there but give it consideration in your plans. The hard plastic against concrete can make a small sound when walked on, test an area if not sure.
9. Edge trim is normally only at the garage entrance or doorways and not along the walls. If you want your tile area to be freestanding area then a full trim and corner pieces complete the job.
10. If your garage wall is not a flat shape, eg corrugated iron then you could think to use sloping trim as a finish all round.

STEPS:

1. Direct you friends to clear any objects you do not want to cut around from your garage or move out the way of the tiling area. Remember tiling is instant so once a portion is covered you can move stuff immediately back onto it. Sweep excess dirt and dust from the floor so all clean ready to start. A leaf blower does an excellent job here.
2. Clean soles on your shoes is good idea so you dont stomp dirt all over the tiles as you lay them, reduces clean up efforts.
3. Begin installation along the longest side wall allowing for the expansion gap and start inside the garage door.
4. Close the garage door and mark where it touches the ground. You will put the edging strip just inside this line. The edging strip is 50mm wide so tiling should start behind this point. You don’t have to have the edge right against the door, it can be back a little.
5. Even test the measure from the back wall to the garage door to see if you can just use whole tiles for the distance to reduce trimming. If so then you may reverse the laying direction in step 6 and start at the back corner and lay towards the garage door (only good if no tile trimming is necessary at the garage door end).
6. Look carefully at your tile and note there are 2 flat edges and 2 edges with lugs sticking out. The lugs sticking out are referred to as the female edge. Many people think this the other way around. Have one flat side against the wall (allow expansion gap) and the other facing the garage door way. You will then have lugs pointing into the garage centre and to the rear wall. This is done as the subsequent tiles then press down into the lugs easily and no lifting of the tiles is required to join them.
7. Note this means the edging tiles at the front of the garage should be “Female” joiners with Lugs. If you lay the tiles in another manner, then check what you need as edge tiles to finish.
8. Check you design pattern and lay first two tiles on the ground with the joiners of one tile aligned over the loops of another. Step firmly onto them or gentle tap with rubber mallet to lock the pegs into the loops.
9. Lay a single row of tiles along the garage wall, leaving a 5-10mm gap between tile and wall as an expansion area depending on your exposure to heat. If there are brick wall extrusions don’t trim yet, simply leave the space for later. Just go around them. Solid plastic garage tiles expand and contract with temperature and are why manufacturers even recommend leaving upto a 13mm gap between the tile and any wall or structure. Tiles expose to continuous direct sunlight for a period of time can expand faster than the rest of the floor and cause some buckling if they are not installed correctly.
10. Continue your installation across the garage door forming an “L” shape with your garage flooring. Once first “L” is complete check the angles carefully, easy to move tiles at this stage as not very heavy and can slide to correct any alignments.
11. Fill in the “L” by moving across the garage opening and down the longest wall repeatedly.
12. Fill in trim areas and shape for last wall column if required. Cut the tiles to any size or shape using a table saw, jigsaw, utility knife, etc. Follow manufacturer’s safety guidelines with these tools.
13. Apply edging strips to front facing the door or any doorways entering the garage, trim if required.
14. When done stand back to admire what you achieved so quickly. Find some drinks and enjoy your new look garage. Get your friends to tell you how fantastic it looks.