Is a mistake about to happen?

[Andrew Minear]

The fireplace renovation is almost done. The floor hearth has the new black granite tiles in place and it's time to grout. The regular black grout is going to be mixed and installed...hold on, will that regular grout handle the temperature swings of a fireplace hearth? What do you'll think?

[Chris Padilla]

Mix it with some latex additive instead of water. That is supposed to allow the grout a bit of flexibility over water. I dunno about temperature.

[Andrew Minear]

Good idea, I didn't think of that one, thanks.

[James Jaragosky]

One of my first jobs was as a laborer for a crew of bricklayers.
and I dreaded the point when we had a fireplace to install (made from scratch)
the amount of mortar I had to mix and haul for one fire place was immense compared to the rest of the brickwork on a home. And none of it had anything other than sand water and Portland (dye as required) in it. That included the fire brick we installed.
As far as latex additive, I would research that before using it.

[Jim O'Dell]

Go to the John Bridge tile forum, search, and ask a question if need be. They are very helpful. Kind of like the SMC of the tile world. :rolleyes: Jim.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

If the heat on the grout will be high a Latex additive may not take it.

I know an old school stone mason who says that when building for weather extremes the best thing is to get as much cement out of the mortar as you possibly can boosting the sand content. This he says will allow the mortar to expand and contract more like the stone around it.

If there's away to take that lesson over to grout and tile~?

At any rate there are a great many thing I can not guarantee but this I can:
Somewhere of a certainty there is going to be a mistake made and somewhere it's 5:00pm

[Andrew Minear]

Cliff, the certainty of a mistake is in my work somewhere, and, it's 5:00 here. Thank everyone for the input.