I'm seeing it in actually 4 or 5 places and I'm afraid to look hard. Here's a photo of the general floor.

Was this tile rated for floor use?

What is your subfloor? What was in this bathroom before? Have you added more weight?

The tiles could have come cracked too- are the cracks aligned (which to me would indicate a structural issue) or are the just randomly throughout the floor which would tell me they came that way? I had a friend buy a bunch of tile at F + D and they installed it and after it was grouted they could see lots of cracked tile. He got a tad upset with the installer who claimed that the cracks weren't visible prior to grout. He decided to quality check the rest of the tiles himself prior to install and said it was nearly impossible to see the cracks unless he was outside in daylight (which is not realistic for a tile guy on his knees in a bathroom)

Yes they can be repaired (unless it is structural)

This is what I used

https://www.flooranddecor.com/stone-decoratives/bianco-orion-marble-tile-100464858.html?externalVisit=true

Maybe 2 or 3 are near/adjacent to one another and 3 are random . And then maybe 2 random very thin hairline cracks in random spots

Subfloor is cement board

F+D is notorious for selling second quality products. With that information I would suspect they were cracked prior to install and you couldn’t see it on the dusty tiles. What is under the cement board (cement board doesn’t make a floor rigid) and how was it installed? Any photos prior to tile install?

Sorry not really getting the point .The subfloor is where a good install starts and that means the floor has to be very stable , level and smooth. Were there tiles on here before? I think the mortar install was not done and that is what is reccommended so ask about that IMO this tile is best used on walls even when they say shower floors and walls.

Did you order at least 10% more of the tile than you needed for installation? That 10% overage should account for any breakage in shipping or during installation, particularly for natural stone.

At any rate, have your installer pull the cracked tiles and get replacements for them. I wouldn't put this on the installer unless you had plenty of extras for him to use.

I did order more tile , so we have some .

Update: I told the contractor and he already got to removing the cracked tile, but he said several surrounding pieces also cracked. Here's a photo if that helps any. I really hope we'll be able to avoid this happening again. It's 3 different areas.

Photos

Another one

How is the cement so clean?

I"m wondering how the cement board on the floor is so clean too, it looks like there wasn't any mortar spread on there. And it looks like you can still see the gap/space between the cement board where two pieces meet? And also wondering what that chunk of wood is doing sticking out of the cement board?

I really wanted to blame the tile until those last photos…

Darn, I saw these messages too late. He has already reinstalled the marble. What should I expect ?

Needless to say we don’t feel good about it. Any photographs of the shower during construction? Maybe showing the waterproofing?

Expect the grout to crack then come out in pieces while marble continues to crack. This project is a complete failure. No repair will save it. (floor at least) Tap on the marble with a coin listening for hollow sounds indicating zero bond.

Bounce a golf ball on the floor please. You want "snick", not "thunk".

The floor is IMO an issue and I see not mortar used for sure and that is the makers install instructions .

This is in my bathroom now, doesn't that mean he used mortar?

The white marble here is the old marble, the gray is the new (it should lighten up)

I don't have the before pictures of the water proofing but you can see some of the water proofing here

I asked the installer, he said he used a mortar but when he took the cracked tile off he scraped the old mortar off, exposing the cement board .

I am guessing this is the mortar he used

I will leave comments about the mortar used to the tile professionals but the cut out for the outlet (weird location...) looks far too large- have you tried a cover plate on it? The wings of the outlet should rest on the tile...

I am not an expert, but my experience with marble is that it tends to crack along weak spots and fissures. I have bought only small mosaics which crack less, and larger multi-colored pieces that have veins, which sometimes are weak points. I simply grout the thin cracks and try to be happy with the natural features.

When I put marble on my fireplace hearth, I did not have enough height to reinforce the subfloor, but I used a mesh product called permat that was supposed to reinforce the thinset enough to put stone on. (I think I had a layer of hardibacker in there, so IIRC there was 3/4” plywood subfloor, 1/4” hardibacker, thinset, permat, thinset over permat plus backbutter thinset, 3/8” marble ”Meram Blanc” from Tile Shop.) They sold the permat mesh at the Tile Shop. I even called the manufacturer because I couldn’t make sense of how it would help structurally, but that is what is what made for. I wasn’t too worried because the fireplace hearth does not get a lot of traffic, and I was OK with barely noticeable imperfections like thin but level cracks. I also used LFT thinset and backbuttered everything.

Marble is really hard to set perfectly on a floor that gets traffic. If I wanted it to be perfect, I would hire a CTI-certified stone-setting specialist with a lot of experience with brittle stone especially marble. Your installation is more uniform, which may show more imperfections. I understand that it’s an expensive new installation and you want to avoid any cracks. But I also think you need to be very picky about your installer and ask a lot of questions about subfloor.

FWIW, a CTI-certified highly recommended installer put porcelain tile down in my bathroom and it developed a hairline crack near a thin spot by the vent. I gave up stressing about it because, well, everything moves.

He said the mortar is called type 2 mastic from menards made for setting tile but does need 24 hrs minimum before walking

Any feedback given the new info?

Also noticing some hairline cracks that seem to be on only half the marble..does that happen where it grows ?

Thank you dmac ! I will

@joseph what do you think? I'm noticing a couple more cracked tile , not sure if that's just collateral damage from the replacements

Mastic is contraindicated for natural stone. It stains it. Its also a cheesy low quality product that is a warning shot about the lack of tile skills involved.

Joseph P - that’s what I thought also. Apparently, this particular one can be used for natural stone, although consensus is that there are much better options.

,

Using the term "mortar" on a bucket of "mastic" is similar to using the word leveling on lippage tuning systems. They level nothing!

At this point, would it somehow be helpful if he used real mortar when replacing the individual cracked marble, or does it need to be consistent with everything else?

Contractor insisted earlier that the type of mortar was the "correct type called type 2 mastic from menards made for setting tile." What should he have used? Is the issue that it can take way longer to dry depending on how thick it's laid?

Oh My, consider the loss in materials, Marble, time, and then the poor overstuffed landfill.

Hire wisely America.

@YG Your issue is most likely structural. There is a failure in the tile assembly. Probably multiple issues. All steps need to be considered prior to stone or tile installations. The cause of the failure must be identified to determine next steps.

Start here.

https://www.johnbridge.com/vbulletin/deflecto.pl

@YG - just get your measurements in order to run numbers through the deflecto calculator over at JBF. Just add your numbers to the post that you already have started over there re: your cracked tile. They like to keep everything in one continuous thread so that members can easily find all the information related to a particular project.

Remember, your contractor was required to install your tile in accordance with the manufacturer’s specifications/industry standards. If you didn’t have natural stone tile installed previously, it’s HIGHLY UNLIKELY that your subfloor met these requirements. Plus, your joists may not comply with the right specifications in order for the floor to fully support your marble tile.

@Creative Tile Eastern CT - I am very confused as to why a bucket of ”mastic” can be labeled “mortar” - seems likely to cause a great deal of confusion for a customer. Even if the customer has done some research in order to know that mastic shouldn’t be used, there’s a pretty high probability that he/she would think using a bucket of the ”Ultimate Premixed Mortar” was perfectly fine to use - because, after all, it says MORTAR - not MASTIC.

EDIT - I just realized that this wasn’t installed DIY - scary to think that a ”professional” wouldn’t have known that TEC’s product wasn’t the correct type of ”mortar.”