CEILING TILE REPAIR/INSTALL (pics)

[vdotmatrix]

Visiting my inlaws and they had a leak last year. Insurance paid for repair. There was some residual moisture in the ceiling and a section of tiles just fell.

They are a kind of tongue and groove and it looks like the installers used 1/2-3/4” narrow crown staples(?) to attach the tiles in the tongue to the wooden furring strips in the ceiling.

There has to be a method for doing this. I would say carefully remove tiles back to tiles securely that are securely fastened. Remove the old staples (pain), and work back to the wall.

I am making this plan up and have no idea how to do this or what fasteners I should use.

what is this process called so i could further research this? The tiles are not stained. The tiles simply could not be supported by the fasteners. Weird…..

 

[Snoonyb]

I found this on ytube;

Were I to use screws, instead of the method I've used, which is finish nails inserted at an angle,I would use finish or trim screws, which have a smaller head.

 

[ChrisAtTech]

It looks like this style of tile is only secured on two sides. So, the hanging tiles are due to not being joined with a secure tile. These are often very flexible too, so if you patch the missing tiles, you may be able to flex the surrounding ones and get the tongue/groove to snap in. If they aren't staying together, I'd recommend a slight bead of glue. It's a similar concept to tongue/groove flooring where sometimes you have to cut the tongue off one side and use a little glue to do a patch or get into an awkward location.

 

[vdotmatrix]

I found this on ytube;

Were I to use screws, instead of the method I've used, which is finish nails inserted at an angle,I would use finish or trim screws, which have a smaller head.

Removing the staples is another headache. If i had one of them multitools i could cut them flush…someone used really long double staples so it is a real pain without disturbing what hasnt fallen yet. I saw this video and it seems like the easiest th8ng to do a,d buy some liquid paper to hide the screws.