Removing tiles

[corematrix]

These tiles are very very brittle and appear to be stuck down with almost 100% adhesive contact. Any thoughts on what I need to take them up?

https://youtu.be/EvK6ZfFeLyg

[Someone-Else]

A wider bit than the one you are using?
My thinking is that way it will spread the force and get more tile up not so violently.

[Job and Knock]

Dare I say it, but problem tiles like this can often be removed by the simple expedient of using a more powerful breaker, such as a Milwaukee Kango K950 (weighs 10kg, 20J blow) as opposed to a 1.5 to 2.5J SDS drill (which isn't really designed for heavy hammering). In this case using a wider tile remover bit on an SDS drill is likely to be counterproductive as you'll still be applying the same strength of hammer blow, but over a wider area, and those tiles are well stuck down. These wide tile chisels work well on soft wall tiles, but less well on heavy floor tiles I find

OK, so that maybe isn't practicable, so instead try this: start by making a few downward "cuts" across the tile with a narrower chisel which can help loosen or weaken it or possibly crack it. Then attack the tile with a more vertical angle of the drill at the beginning of the cut, moving the SDS downwards to a more horizontal direction of attack once it starts to move. If that doesn't do the trick it may be worthwhile trying to break up the more stubborn tiles using a concrete point in the SDS drill about an inch (25mm) in from the edge to break away bits of the tile

SDS Concrete Point 001_01.jpg (19.3 KiB) Viewed 1891 times

The concentration of the full force of the SDS onto a point can yield surprising results (and at £2 what's not to like? as they say), but be careful to limit its' use - it is very easy to damage the subfloor using a point