McDonald’s Restaurant Refurbishment

ARDEX UK have been appointed by the world’s largest family restaurant chain, McDonalds, to supply a tile fixing solution for the re-fit of all of their UK restaurant locations.

ARDEX demonstrated to McDonalds their expertise and understanding of large scale roll out refurbishment programmes, and the necessity to ensure consistency of product, as well as the provision of technical support, both on-site and via ARDEX’s dedicated technical support.  After initial consultations and site visits with the McDonalds Property Team, ARDEX proposed an efficient cost and labour saving ‘tile on tile’ solution for the tiling refurbishment.  The proposal was fully supported with several product demonstrations at ARDEX UK headquarters to the McDonalds team, as well as the appointed tiling contractors.

Each refit commences with the existing wall and floor tiles being cleaned with ARDEX DGR Degreaser.  Any damaged tiles are then removed, and the areas patch repaired to level using ARDEX ARDURAPID A45 Rapid Hardening and Drying Internal Repair Mortar, which allowed the repaired areas to be tiled in as little as 90 minutes after application, regardless of thickness.

To facilitate tile on tile application, ARDEX P4 Primer was specified for use onto the existing tiles. ARDEX P 4 produces a textured surface which helps the adhesive grip to the tile, preventing slipping and movement, and offers a rapid drying time of just one hour, enabling the early fixing of new tiles with ARDEX X 77 MICROTEC Flexible Floor & Wall Tile Adhesive.  ARDEX MICROTEC X 77 has an open time of up to 60 minutes, providing greater fixing efficiency over large areas, and has been developed to fix heavier, larger tiles without slipping.

For the floors, ARDEX P 4 Primer was specified for use on the existing floor tiles prior to the application of ARDEX MICROTEC X 78 S Ultra Rapid Setting Floor Tile Adhesive, to fix the new tiles. ARDEX X 78 S has a unique semi-pourable consistency that makes it ideal for solid bed fixing large format tiles, and provides all of the benefits of a pourable adhesive without the disadvantages (such as dripping). The ultimate in rapid hardening performance enables tiles to be walked on and grouted after only 90 minutes.

ARDEX-FLEX FL Rapid Setting Flexible Grout was chosen to fill the tile joints.  In addition to offering a colour palette of 35 colours, ARDEX-FLEX Tile Grouts incorporate flexibility, water repellence, ease of application and dirt resistance.  Paul Elwin, Senior Contracts Manager of McDonalds UK said, “We are very pleased to be working with ARDEX on our UK restaurant refit programme.  We were impressed by their ‘partnership approach’ to the entire project and their immediate understanding of what was needed was exceptional, resulting in the ideal tile fixing recommendation”.