# Subway tile installation



## troubleseeker (Sep 25, 2006)

Hopefully the counter top and the level line will be parallel, as well as the botom of the upper cabinets. If not, you will have to cheat the tile layout to make it as pleasing visually as you can. Tweaking this is time well spent. If the counter is level, use 1/8" spacers to hold a caulking gap between the tile and counter top , 1/4'" is too big to caulk neatly IMO. If they are not level, have an assortment of shims available to maintain the tiles to your determined layout. Once the wall tiles have set, remove the shims and grout. Clean out any grout from the tile,/countertop joint, as grout will not last in this joint. When you buy your grout, get a tube of color matched caulking to use here; when it dries, it will look exactly like the rest of the grout. Anything will work to cover the counter top, cardboard, a couple layers of newspaper, visqueen.


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## bigboyjoel (May 14, 2007)

*Subway tile problems*

Ok, I got the white subway tile in and it looks wonderful, however, the countertop is not prefectly even and I ended up with a 1/4 gap between the tile and the countertop on the side wall. Now, what are my options at this point to fill this gap? I'm going to have to use unsanded grout due to the fact that there is a minimal gap between the tiles, right? They make a sanded grout in a tube that I can use that matches my grout color, can I use this on ceramic tile and hopefully it won't scratch it? What do you guys think? Also, can I just use regular white silicon to minimize the gap a bit too before I grout it in so that there's not a huge amount of grout between the tile and countertop where it didn't come out even?

Any advice will help!

Joel


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## Krichton (May 2, 2006)

You can level out the countertop with shims underneath the cabinets. But you can use chaulk although it's not going to look great that way.


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