So this whole project started because little drops of water started falling on our kitchen table. We knew it was the bath upstairs and so we tried to figure out where the leak was coming from. All the running water and plugging and unplugging the drain didn't cause it to leak.
Eventually we figured out that it must be leaking from the tile walls.
Since the tiles were ugly anyway we decided our shower/tub needed a
makeover.
I started with the demolition of the ceramic tiles, trying to
separate it from the drywall so we could possibly put up new tiles over
the old drywall.
Well, this is what we found. Lots of water damage behind the tiles. Whoever installed this first shower tiles didn't create any moisture barrier. In fact there were two layers of drywall. The one pictured is the deeper layer. You can only imagine how rotten the first layer of drywall was.
I got to work, took all the drywall off, cut even lines to create the joint where the new cement board and the existing good drywall would meet. I used some 10 mil plastic covering as my moisture barrier and sealed it to the bathtub flange with some silicone caulk.
After much measuring, cutting and tweaking the cement board was up and ready to receive the tile.
Luckily, I have my best friend Matt's family the Mordens who lives 4 doors
down. Cliff Morden had a wet tile saw which he let me borrow and the
cutting of the tiles began. It was a slow process cutting the new
porcelain tiles. Since they were 18" tiles the blade would get stuck
and I'd have to flip my tile piece around to meet the cut line in the
middle.
After cutting lots of tiles, I started getting much better at it. But I ran into a lot of measuring problems since our bathroom walls were not plumb and the corners were not quite exactly 90 degree angles. So every level of tiles I had to change my measurements to get wider to accommodate the unevenness of our walls.
Finally most of my tile pieces were cut and ready to get the thinset
mortar to adhere to my walls. It was fun to slather the cement onto the
wall and use the notched edge to create grooves that would cement my tile to
the board.
I also had to move my tiles so that the plumbing fixtures would come
out in between the tile joints. I found out the hard way (cracked tile
pieces)
that no matter how hard I tried,
I couldn’t do a circular cut through porcelain tile.
So once I moved my tile joints I was able to
cut triangles out of the tile to allow the pipes to come out.
Since
we were only going to remodel this bathroom one time we went and splurged by
adding granite and glass mosaic tiles to our porcelain tiles. I don’t consider myself a great decorator,
but I felt these tiles matched really well together.
.
So once all the tiles and mosaic was up, separated from each other using
1/8” spacers, we got some tile sealer (511 impregnator) and painted each of the
granite stones to seal it from the grouting that was coming next.
We used a wet sponge to apply our beige grout
and wiped it away, then buffed it with a microfiber rag.
Once that was all done, we sealed all the
grout, and then did another layer of sealer over everything one more time.
Finally, the shower has 3 layers of
protection from leaking in my kitchen again.
Add in some new plumbing fixtures, expensive acrylic Sherwin William paints
(on sale of course) for the rest of the walls and ceiling, and a new shower
curtain/liner; and we were finally done!
We love having our home look how we want it.
And the best part, I could finally seal up
the hole in the kitchen that developed from the leaking shower walls.
Whew! All Pau with my project. Lots of sweat, but it was fun and I love looking back knowing: I did that!
