Finishing of the walls and floors in swimming pools is frequently realized by means of ceramic tiles, bonded to the substrate with polymer-modified cement mortar. Debonding of tiles arises in the pool, as well as on the platform and on the building walls. An experimental program was carried out to investigate the possible causes of the debonding phenomena. The experimental program dealt with different layouts of the system, different exposure, different application procedure of the tile on the adhesive mortar. The experiments showed that the bond strength greatly depends on the waiting time between spreading of the mortar and application of the tile. The paper presents experimental results, as well as guidelines for an improved application and performance.
