chataigner
Old Oak
- Joined
- Jul 23, 2014
- Messages
- 1,127
- Reaction score
- 55
Why me ??? Once again a major problem down to poor workmanship by a previous owner or his plumber. :evil: :evil:
I awoke a few days ago to the ominous sound of dripping. Turned out to be in our sitting room, or nearly, in a built-in cupboard in the sitting room to be precise - directly under the shower of course. Turned off the water, then how to get to it ? Apart from the cuboard itself, the only likely access was via the side of the downstairs toilet which is behind the cupboard and partly below the bathroom, but it meant demolishing the stud wall. Decided to do that, and yes, could now get at it all, but not easily. Underside of upstairs flooring clearly soaked through (not visible above as it is tiled over the floorboards). Water clearly coming from under the shower tray, but not from the outlet, that was perfectly dry.
No isolating valves anywhere, so cant put the water back on and it's a working day for Isabelle, so rush to the nearest DIY shed for 1/4 turn isolating valves and fittings. Cut into the pipes, soldered up the fittings, screwed in the valves, all fine, now we can put the water back on. By this time it's around 12h. Dripping stopped about 2hrs after turning off the water.
The shower is tiled on 3 sides and the water seemed to be coming from up against the tiled wall where the shower mixer was fitted. Removed the mixer, cut out the tiles around the mixer (thank goodness for a Bosch copy of the Multimaster) managed to get them out without breaking them as the whole room is done in the same tiles, almost certainly no longer available. Yes, clearly that's where it was coming from, the wall was sopping wet up to the level of the mixer. Horrified to find that it was just plaster board, I'd have used something more resistant, but there you go. The culprit was the joint between the bracket thingy that supports the mixer behind the wall and the pipe coming up from below. Another day gone by, thank goodness for a new shower cubicle I installed in the dressing room of the guest bedroom back in 2013.
But worse is to come, while investigating where the water had been going I found that the wall is tiled to the floor, then the shower tray pushed up against it and siliconed in. The slightest flaw in the silicon and the water runs down between the tray and the wall. I would have put the shower tray in first, then tiled down to it so that the tiles overlap the tray. Maybe I'm just too fussy !
No way to remedy that except by demolishing everything and starting again because it's tiled on three sides and so the tray is not big enough to reach between the walls without the thickness of the tiles, so repaired the bad joint, refitted the tiles around the mixer and turned the water back on with some trepidation. All OK ! Grouted up the last bits on the third day. Stuck everything back together with about 1m3 of silicon and hoped for the best. Seems to be OK for now, but the whole thing will have to be redone in time. In the meantime, there is the stud wall to rebuild, but that will have to wait to allow everything to dry out, there is a LOT of water soaked into the timbers.
And to think that the beautiful floor to ceiling tiled en-suite bathroom with his and hers basins and a walk in shower was one of the things that attracted us to the house in the first place !
I awoke a few days ago to the ominous sound of dripping. Turned out to be in our sitting room, or nearly, in a built-in cupboard in the sitting room to be precise - directly under the shower of course. Turned off the water, then how to get to it ? Apart from the cuboard itself, the only likely access was via the side of the downstairs toilet which is behind the cupboard and partly below the bathroom, but it meant demolishing the stud wall. Decided to do that, and yes, could now get at it all, but not easily. Underside of upstairs flooring clearly soaked through (not visible above as it is tiled over the floorboards). Water clearly coming from under the shower tray, but not from the outlet, that was perfectly dry.
No isolating valves anywhere, so cant put the water back on and it's a working day for Isabelle, so rush to the nearest DIY shed for 1/4 turn isolating valves and fittings. Cut into the pipes, soldered up the fittings, screwed in the valves, all fine, now we can put the water back on. By this time it's around 12h. Dripping stopped about 2hrs after turning off the water.
The shower is tiled on 3 sides and the water seemed to be coming from up against the tiled wall where the shower mixer was fitted. Removed the mixer, cut out the tiles around the mixer (thank goodness for a Bosch copy of the Multimaster) managed to get them out without breaking them as the whole room is done in the same tiles, almost certainly no longer available. Yes, clearly that's where it was coming from, the wall was sopping wet up to the level of the mixer. Horrified to find that it was just plaster board, I'd have used something more resistant, but there you go. The culprit was the joint between the bracket thingy that supports the mixer behind the wall and the pipe coming up from below. Another day gone by, thank goodness for a new shower cubicle I installed in the dressing room of the guest bedroom back in 2013.
But worse is to come, while investigating where the water had been going I found that the wall is tiled to the floor, then the shower tray pushed up against it and siliconed in. The slightest flaw in the silicon and the water runs down between the tray and the wall. I would have put the shower tray in first, then tiled down to it so that the tiles overlap the tray. Maybe I'm just too fussy !
No way to remedy that except by demolishing everything and starting again because it's tiled on three sides and so the tray is not big enough to reach between the walls without the thickness of the tiles, so repaired the bad joint, refitted the tiles around the mixer and turned the water back on with some trepidation. All OK ! Grouted up the last bits on the third day. Stuck everything back together with about 1m3 of silicon and hoped for the best. Seems to be OK for now, but the whole thing will have to be redone in time. In the meantime, there is the stud wall to rebuild, but that will have to wait to allow everything to dry out, there is a LOT of water soaked into the timbers.
And to think that the beautiful floor to ceiling tiled en-suite bathroom with his and hers basins and a walk in shower was one of the things that attracted us to the house in the first place !
