Bathroom project

[Phantom]

To add to all the things that I have to do for the house (see signature for house info) we now need to replace the tile in the tub surround. Why it needs to be replaced is the old grout was cracked water got in and ended up popping a few tiles off shattering as they fell, behind the tile was fiber board and then drywall. The bathroom is on the main floor with a basement below and above is a finished room for the first 2/3 and the last 1/3 (shower) is open to the roof.

We found a contractor (one man business) who gave us an estimate on doing the bathroom that was very reasonable (did not include any materials except for the tub). He was going to come out to the house yesterday to start removing the old tile but did not show up, no one answered the phone when I called last night or this morning (his wife returns the phone calls).

Now I am back to the point of doing it myself the issues with that though is my limited time and little experience doing this type of work. I have never tiled before, so it will be a new skill that I learn.

If I do this myself it will be a 2 stage project:

Stage one Shower:
Remove tile and surrounding walls and tub
Move existing plumbing from the left hand side to the right for easier access
Insulate exterior wall R-13
Add Exhaust fan
Replace tub add tile and grout

Stage one questions:
1. When adding insulation to the exterior wall of the shower is should I be using unfaced insulation?
2. After the insulation what type of protective sheeting is needed?
3. Are there any issues with installing the fan vent coming out of the soffit?
4. When installing the cement board should I Install this all the way to the floor?

Stage two (Picture):
Remove all drywall
Remove\shrink the bathroom closet adding an exposed shelf on the top for plants.
Replace bathroom door with larger one (can't currently fit a walker in the bathroom if needed)
Install new sub-floor and floor (tile)
Maybe add a new toilet
Replace vanity and sink


I might be crazy trying to do this myself but its not often that I have been accused of being sane. I just hope that I am over reacting and we can have this guy call me back.

[herlichka]

I am not sure where you live, but if you are installing R13 wall insulation I'd guess somewhere with a more moderate climate than here in Ontario!
You question about insulation, faced or not; we can't get the paper backed insulation here anymore, our building codes insist on 6 mil polyethethylene vapor barrier, complete with "tuck" tape on the joints, and the poly sealed to the floor plateand subfloor with accoustical sealant. Obviously, a bathroom has moisture laden air, and the more you can do to keep this moisture from migrating and condensing in your wall cavity, the better. Again, part of the equation would factor around climate, how much migration and condensation would depend on the temperature difference, indoor/outdoor.
You ask about "protective" sheathing over the insulation, then mention cement board. After we install and seal the poly, we would install the tub, and then sheath the wall with the cement board, and the cement board would actually rest on the rim of the tub. The cement board is the sub base for the tile install. Make sure the framing at the inside corners is nice and strong, to keep the corners from flexing. Generally speaking, the cement board is only used under the tile,the rest of the room is sheathed with moisture resistant drywall.
Your bathroom vent is fine going out the soffit, but make sure you use a proper vent kit at the soffit. It used to be common practice to just push the vent pipe over the top of the wall plate into the soffit cavity with the assumption that the warm, moist air would go through the soffit vents, but it doesn't, warm air rises, it turns around and goes straight back into the attic, and condenses on your roof framing and sheathing.

Regarding your tiling. I like tiling, I am not a "pro", but I do a fair bit of it. Probably my best advice is to plan thoroughly, and be prepared. Layout is very important, you can bury many of your "cuts" in the corners if you tile the correct wall first. Grout can cover a lot of sins. Have the proper tools ready to make your circular cuts for your faucets, there are a number of methods that all work well, patience is the key, and don't be suprised to break a tile or two. Lastly, one thing that really makes a better finish on the job is to use a brand of grout that has silicon "grout" in a tube available in the same colour. It applies with a caulking gun, and use it in place of the conventional grout in all your inside corners and where your tile meets the tub, floor, and around your faucets, etc. The silicon flexes and doesnt fall out, keeps a watertight seal.

I am sure that if you have any installation questions, product selection questions, you could ask at Home Depot or Lowes, I know they are very helpful here!

[Daox]

Are you sure you want tile? You could go with something else that is easier to install.

[Phantom]

I live in Louisville KY. The protective sheeting I mentioned was in reference to polyethethylene vapor barrier or something similar possibly Tyvek.

We kind of have to go with tile in the shower as there is a window in the center of the shower wall. The floor on the other hand is up in the air and we might do vinyl.

I will keep everyone posted on the decisions and post pics of the room and progress.

[S-F]

Venting bathroom air to the soffit is a bad idea. If you have soffit vents that is. The convection will suck the moist air up into the attic where it will condense on the roof deck and cause mold. It's against code in MA. You have to either run the vent in as straight a line as possible to the roof or, preferably, go to a gable end and out through a wall. I actually have to do this myself in the next few weeks as mine vents through the soffit and the Mass Save people won't air seal and insulate my attic until it meets code. When going to the gable end you bring the duct up from the fan and then slowly taper it gently down to the gable vent so any condensed moisture will run outside and not back into the bathroom. This is one of the big reasons to not go through the roof. The other is, obviously, that it provides an great path for convection encouraging any air leaking out the fan to go outside, thus wasting your heat and dumping hot moisture on your roof leading to ice dams. This is why you have the exit of the vent in the gable end scenario at a lower elevation than the duct work above the fan.

About the cement board, the main purpose of that stuff is to provide a surface for the tile to adhere to, I think. So no need to go to the floor, Probably a little below the top of the tub though to help keep it all water tight.

And if you are going with fiberglass I always recommend unfaced. It's tighter. It's actually friction fit. And you can see how it fits better than kraft faced batts. Also even though kraft paper isn't a great vapor barrier, it's still a bit of one and you don't want to make a vapor barrier sandwich between the kraft paper and the poly you're going to put up. Moisture that finds its way in there will be very happy to just go native, turn everything black, rot your framing and ruin your indoor air quality. But a good bath fan on a timer will go a long way towards preventing this.

I recommend the Panasonic fans. They are pretty quiet and they move a ton of air.

Also don't forget to seal every single little tiny joint and seam in your duct work. Again for moisture management. You want as little of it as possible to condense in the duct. Go to your local HVAC place and get a real nice insulated tube to go over it after it's all sealed up. Personally after I seal up mine I'm just going to blow 12" or so of cellulose on top of it so need for duct insulation.

[DEnd]

The most important thing to think about is moisture control. Cement board is about the best backer there is for tile, due to it's stiffness. However it and tile really don't waterproof the area. There are various water proofing products out there like: LATICRETE® 9235 Waterproofing Membrane, or the Schluter®-KERDI system, and others. I'd use one of thoses systems for the tub surround.

[S-F]

Originally Posted by DEnd

The most important thing to think about is moisture control. Cement board is about the best backer there is for tile, due to it's stiffness. However it and tile really don't waterproof the area. There are various water proofing products out there like: LATICRETE® 9235 Waterproofing Membrane, or the Schluter®-KERDI system, and others. I'd use one of thoses systems for the tub surround.

Do you actually use KERDI on a shower wall? Seems a little overkill to me. I know people use it for tiling a shower pan though. But then again, bathroom remodeling isn't my strong point.

[AC_Hacker]

Originally Posted by S-F

Do you actually use KERDI on a shower wall? Seems a little overkill to me. I know people use it for tiling a shower pan though. But then again, bathroom remodeling isn't my strong point.

I built a Scandinavian style bathroom that is also a shower, very small, everything is subjected to water. The entire floor is a shower pan.

I tend to over-research things, but after the research, I became convinced that cement board over properly lapped roofing felt would work just fine for the walls and a plastic membrane liner for the floor pan (cement floor and tile on top of the plastic liner), carefully folded and lapped 6" minimum behind the roofing felt water barrier on the walls.

So, you need to assume that the tile is going to be water proof but grout is not. Water can and will get behind the tile, if you use gypsum wall board, it will fail, even green wall board. If you use cement board, it will not crumble due to water, but it can start dry rot in the wood that is in contact with it. So the answer is to use a water barrier such as roofing felt or heavy plastic , lapped so that water will not get behind. Then the final consideration is how will the water escape? I left a small (1/8") gap at the bottom of the wall, at the floor for the water to drain away.

I have a friend who argued mightily with me all the way through the project, telling me that I was over-thinking the problem and that tile over green sheet rock would have been good enough, and I was wasting my money, blah, blah... he finally stopped trying to educate me when I pointed out the rotting green sheet rock in his bathroom.

The Schluter system is very good, and very expensive, it stops water at the back of the tile.

-AC_Hacker

[DEnd]

Originally Posted by S-F

Do you actually use KERDI on a shower wall? Seems a little overkill to me. I know people use it for tiling a shower pan though. But then again, bathroom remodeling isn't my strong point.

After having a leak by using the method AC_Hacker stated, yes I use it. I have another leak in another shower that uses AC_Hacker's described method, the root of the leak is cracked tile and a grout failure, along with a drain that clogged. I need to assess the damage but if I have to tear out the shower then I will use the wall part of the KERDI system. Yes it is expensive but $300-$600 is a hell of a lot cheaper than the $22,000 we just spent to fix the problems caused by a leak.

[AC_Hacker]

Originally Posted by DEnd

After having a leak by using the method AC_Hacker stated, yes I use it. I have another leak in another shower that uses AC_Hacker's described method, the root of the leak is cracked tile and a grout failure, along with a drain that clogged. I need to assess the damage but if I have to tear out the shower then I will use the wall part of the KERDI system. Yes it is expensive but $300-$600 is a hell of a lot cheaper than the $22,000 we just spent to fix the problems caused by a leak.

Well DEnd,

What you said made me a bit nervous, so I finally climbed down into the crawl space with a good light and checked everything very carefully...

No drips, no leaks, no moisture, no stains. This is after about 6 months, so I think it is fair to say that it worked out for me.

Before I started the job, I did read more than three different books on the subject of custom built wet floors. I also lurked on several tile setter's blogs and read what they had to say on the subject. Admittedly, when I tackle a new project, I obsess on information before I begin.

So, when I built the floor and put in the roofing felt water shield, I did it with the view in mind that there would be nothing else to stop the water. Then, when I put in the tile & grout, I put it in as if there would be nothing else to stop the water.

I also used the same mind-set as when I did my (first and last) roof, I tried to think like a rain drop and I kept asking the question, "where will I go next".

From all my tile-setter's blog lurking, I learned that a big source of problems is that water gets trapped behind the tile and can not escape. That's why I left a 1/8" gap at the bottom of the wall, where it meets the floor.

My 2 cents...

-AC_Hacker