Fecn
Established Member
I fell guilty that I've hardly seen the inside of my workshop this year, and have scarcely had time to read UKW. Whilst I've got a couple of hours of peace and quiet (finally) I thought finally get around to posting something here, but since it's not woodwork related it's here in General Chat.
A couple of months ago I took my coat out of the cupboard downstairs and discovered it was going moldy. The back wall of the cupboard was very damp to touch, and the paintwork was starting to flake away. There was only one place it could be coming from... the shower. I usually have baths myself with my wife using the shower.
Whilst my wife was out one Thursday, I decided it was time to investigate and see if I could fix the problem. I pulled off a few tiles in the shower and found that the wall underneath was soaking.. as was the floor... as was pretty much everything. I pulled off some more tiles to see how far the damp had spread. They were so damp they practically fell off the wall. I kept pulling off tiles until I found where the damp patch stopped. I'd pulled off most of the tiles in the shower by now, but still the damp went further, so I removed the shower door, and pulled off some more tiles - Found all the damp - Hooray.
Since I wasn't keen on the old tiles in the bathroom I figured it was best to carry on taking them off the wall, so I removed the sink, the loo and the towel rail and kept on going. Once I'd got all the tiles off the wall, I figured that if I was re-tiling the walls I might as well sort out the horrible cork-tile floor too. The cork tiles were glued down with some kind of indestructible glue which I just couldn't shift, but I noticed that they were all stuck to a sheet of 12mm ply. I grabbed my cordless circular saw and cut the ply into easy-to-remove pieces and chucked it all out.
Under the plywood I found some very knackered looking chipboard which had been cut into several pieces when the central heating system had been upgraded many years ago. By now we were planning on a nice granite tiled floor and I knew I'd need a good solid base, so I got rid of all the chipboard too.
Once the chipboard was all gone, I discovered that the back block wall of the cupboard had been built directly on to the chipboard floor and had sunk slightly as the floor had moved. I decided that it could do with some reinforcing. Every shower I've ever seen fail has been because the floor moved, so I decided that I'd do everything I could to eliminate movement from the shower base.
I built a couple of brick pillars under the wall of the cupboard.
I decided to install a 45mm thick wet-zone shower base which I wanted to set down slightly below the rest of the floor. I needed to remove a 27mm from the beams under the shower base. As the cupboard wall was now supported by brick pillars, this was safe to do. I made a quick letterbox-style jig from some 12mm MDF and then routed away the tops of the joists to the right depth. Finally I chiseled out the bits I couldn't get with the router. I also added some extra support props under the rest of the joists to reduce the flex, and put noggins in every 12" to further stiffen things up. Rock Solid!
I fitted a new floor using two bits of 18mm WBP hardwood ply, and then fitted the shower base. I had to increase the drain diameter to 2" which meant fun and games with the soil stack. I also added some extra 15mm plastic plumbing (insulated of course) under the floor so that I could run a shower pump to the new shower.
I boxed in all the pipes with some 12mm MRMDF
Fitted the shower pump... 22mm copper for hot and cold to the pump... 15mm plastic from the pump to the shower.
Sealed around the shower base with a flexible rubber strip and some rubber paint.
I did some tiling. I got to buy myself a nice large capacity tile saw for this job, so I quite enjoyed it. I do like my power tools.
I'm particularly pleased with this tile - Amazing what you can do with an angle grinder.
This shower base was easier to do than it looks.
I used bleach, Cillit Bang and a pressure washer to clean up the the old loo and sink in the back garden. I used clear sealant for the join from black to white... And here's the finished result.
I rounded over the edges on the windowsill using a mixture of angle grinder, belt sander, ROS, hand sanding and polishing wheels.
Oh.. and whilst I was doing all that, my wife was working on this
Ah well.. looks like my peace and quiet is over.. time to do some more work. Hope you enjoyed this diversion. Shame it's impossible to get a decent photo of the whole room.
A couple of months ago I took my coat out of the cupboard downstairs and discovered it was going moldy. The back wall of the cupboard was very damp to touch, and the paintwork was starting to flake away. There was only one place it could be coming from... the shower. I usually have baths myself with my wife using the shower.
Whilst my wife was out one Thursday, I decided it was time to investigate and see if I could fix the problem. I pulled off a few tiles in the shower and found that the wall underneath was soaking.. as was the floor... as was pretty much everything. I pulled off some more tiles to see how far the damp had spread. They were so damp they practically fell off the wall. I kept pulling off tiles until I found where the damp patch stopped. I'd pulled off most of the tiles in the shower by now, but still the damp went further, so I removed the shower door, and pulled off some more tiles - Found all the damp - Hooray.
Since I wasn't keen on the old tiles in the bathroom I figured it was best to carry on taking them off the wall, so I removed the sink, the loo and the towel rail and kept on going. Once I'd got all the tiles off the wall, I figured that if I was re-tiling the walls I might as well sort out the horrible cork-tile floor too. The cork tiles were glued down with some kind of indestructible glue which I just couldn't shift, but I noticed that they were all stuck to a sheet of 12mm ply. I grabbed my cordless circular saw and cut the ply into easy-to-remove pieces and chucked it all out.
Under the plywood I found some very knackered looking chipboard which had been cut into several pieces when the central heating system had been upgraded many years ago. By now we were planning on a nice granite tiled floor and I knew I'd need a good solid base, so I got rid of all the chipboard too.
Once the chipboard was all gone, I discovered that the back block wall of the cupboard had been built directly on to the chipboard floor and had sunk slightly as the floor had moved. I decided that it could do with some reinforcing. Every shower I've ever seen fail has been because the floor moved, so I decided that I'd do everything I could to eliminate movement from the shower base.
I built a couple of brick pillars under the wall of the cupboard.
I decided to install a 45mm thick wet-zone shower base which I wanted to set down slightly below the rest of the floor. I needed to remove a 27mm from the beams under the shower base. As the cupboard wall was now supported by brick pillars, this was safe to do. I made a quick letterbox-style jig from some 12mm MDF and then routed away the tops of the joists to the right depth. Finally I chiseled out the bits I couldn't get with the router. I also added some extra support props under the rest of the joists to reduce the flex, and put noggins in every 12" to further stiffen things up. Rock Solid!
I fitted a new floor using two bits of 18mm WBP hardwood ply, and then fitted the shower base. I had to increase the drain diameter to 2" which meant fun and games with the soil stack. I also added some extra 15mm plastic plumbing (insulated of course) under the floor so that I could run a shower pump to the new shower.
I boxed in all the pipes with some 12mm MRMDF
Fitted the shower pump... 22mm copper for hot and cold to the pump... 15mm plastic from the pump to the shower.
Sealed around the shower base with a flexible rubber strip and some rubber paint.
I did some tiling. I got to buy myself a nice large capacity tile saw for this job, so I quite enjoyed it. I do like my power tools.
I'm particularly pleased with this tile - Amazing what you can do with an angle grinder.
This shower base was easier to do than it looks.
I used bleach, Cillit Bang and a pressure washer to clean up the the old loo and sink in the back garden. I used clear sealant for the join from black to white... And here's the finished result.
I rounded over the edges on the windowsill using a mixture of angle grinder, belt sander, ROS, hand sanding and polishing wheels.
Oh.. and whilst I was doing all that, my wife was working on this
Ah well.. looks like my peace and quiet is over.. time to do some more work. Hope you enjoyed this diversion. Shame it's impossible to get a decent photo of the whole room.
