curbless shower

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Jadnashua

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You want the water to drain into the drain! It appears that water would tend to pool between the wall and the drain, assuming the slope is from the main area into the drain. It could get there by splashes or directly from the showerhead. You'd either need to reverse the slope on the wall side to the drain, or move the drain next to the wall. Then, it's best if the drain is the full width, as you might get the same pooling at either end.
 

Dlarrivee

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Nice to see the 2lb. spray foam in a few of your pictures John.

Does evaporation ever become a concern with this coin trick?
 

Freddie

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John, Another gorgeous shower. We are looking into the very same setup for our ensuite reno. Corner glass walled curbless shower and freestanding tub exactly as you show it. Am struggling as to how to make this possible. I've attached a picture of the half torn out bathroom. Ensuite Bathroom Reno 009.jpg

Can this be done without a curb and without cutting the joists? I'm in Ontario if that helps.

thanks,
 

Jadnashua

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Unless you can raise the entire floor, to construct the shower pan, it MUST slope from the entrance to the drain, and since that needs some thickness, it has to come from somewhere.
 

Freddie

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Assuming that I dropped the floor down the thickness of the floor which is 5/8" OSB and then added the drain and 3/8" for slope change ( 3' x 3' shower, drain in center). So say top of lowered floor to top of drain would be 1.25". Then add 3/8" for slope and you are at 1 5/8" from lowered floor or 1" above the floor of the remainder of the bathroom. This would be for no curbs at all.

Alternatively, I guess I could put a full 3' linear drain at the front of the shower at the door at the level of the finished bathroom flooring and slope the shower up 3/4" (3' x 1/4") to the back of the shower and add a curb to the left side of the shower. Would then have a curbless "entry" at least.

Do you think these 2 approaches would work and do my numbers seem correct?
Just looking at what each option would require in terms of changes to current bathroom and comprises. Current bathroom tile has all been taken up so that's not a deciding factor. Current bathroom had 1/4" plwood
 

Freddie

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Well finally back from NYC, totally enjoy that city. Now back to this bathroom reno. As I have not done one of these linear drains before, I've having a hard time figuring out the amount of space I need from the lowered floor to the top of the linear drain. None of the websites that I've looked at show that dimension. They do show some support below the drain but usually it is something supplied but no dimension on it. Can anyone give me some idea on thicknesses of items, so that I can best determine how and if I can make this work? I know there is paper (1/16"), wire mesh (1/8"), mortar#1 (??"), membrane (40 mil), mortar#2 (??"), thinset (1/8"), tile (1/4"). I assume mortar #1 and mortar#2 has a minimum thickness based on drain requirements but have no idea what that would be. Just looking for some guidance.

As an option, would less space be needed if I went with a standard center drain in shower rather than the linear drain?

We've got most of the fixtures and tub finalized so this is the last portion before we select tile.
 

Freddie

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Sorry John, Just getting back to it now. Thanks for the offer. I may call you this week if needed. Looks like if I remove the floor in the shower and lower it down to being flush with the joists and double up on the 5/8" thickness then I'll have a good solid floor to build up on. Looks like Schluter linear drain is about 1 1/8" to top of drain / kerdi weatherproofing point meaning I would start tiling from that height above the joist top.

If I add 3/8" plywood on top of the 5/8" osb that is currently on the rest of the floor then floor heating and Ditra then I should be about 1 3/8" above top of floor joists when I start to tile in the bathroom. So with about a 1' of slope from bathroom floor to drain then I'd make up the 1/4" difference in height.

Does this seem to make sense to you? I assume all other linear drains are similar in dimension and mud requirements.



Finished floor height would then be 1.75" above joists. When I redo bedroom floor to hardwood then it would be about 1.5" about floor joists. That should be good for mating with new bathroom floor easily.
 

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I know this is an old thread, but I'm considering having a currently useless bathroom converted to a wet room. Because of space constraints (and the size of the person who will be using the shower), we were thinking of having a curbless shower put in.

Most of the pictures in this thread no longer seem to work for me so I can't see what they were. I see mention of tile as the flooring in these installations but I'm wondering if anyone has tried this with another type of flooring. I live with my disabled mother and for some reason she really hates tile.

Would vinyl plank work in a wet room? I don't know if it has any wood in it.

Another option I was thinking about was I saw some product called Altro Aquarius that is designed for wet areas and has a non-slip surface. It looks like its a commercial product and I'm not sure on the pricing/availability in the US.

Has anyone used that?

Also, if one were to order the ACO drains, what are all of the pieces that would be needed?
So far I've seen shower channel bodies, shower channel grates, and various types of couplings.

I see there are many fancy designs for the grates, but are there any drawbacks to some of the designs? Do things fall into some of them more easily? Do some require cleaning more frequently?

Any tips on waterproofing a window from the inside so it won't get damaged from being in a wet room or getting sprayed by a shower?

Do wetrooms have to be designed differently in climates with high humidity?

I hope this is the right place for these questions.
 

Suceress

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Thanks, John.

Any hints on what search parameters to use? I tried to search for "wet room" and "wetroom" and ended up with a ton of threads that didn't have the exact wording and didn't answer my questions.
My internet decided to go out partway through the search (I have satellite internet because its all I could get out here in the woods).

No problem on the pictures. I understand how that goes.

I'll have to find out more about the wet rooms to figure out what sort of drain I would need.

Any links to threads that have already answered my questions would be greatly appreciated.
 

Suceress

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There is a lot of chit chat to a shower build. I find I need a good hour with my clients on the phone to just cover the drain selection process.

Maybe ask Jim or go see John Bridge's boys for help... (that was a joke) Or call me and I will try and sell you a drain and give you one hour of design. Have you read any of my blog posts? Have you signed up to view my private photo albums? Maybe this will help.

Your question in the first post would take me 2 hours to answer my friend - and I do not do that much work for free.

If you read all my post here over the years you will find most every question you have has all ready been answered. it just takes a lot of time to read every post. I have over 2,000 of them.

Heading out to buy a new kerdi Board Niche this morning. If you ring me in 20 minutes I'll give you a free 30 minute call.

Thank you, John. Sorry I didn't answer sooner. For some reason I'm not getting e-mail alerts for subscribed threads.
We are still in theoretical planning stages right now and have a lot of things we need to consider before we start making purchases and really commit to anything. Right now there are other projects ahead of this and we are still debating whether or not to even go forward with this one and which space we will use for it. Hopefully once we get more things straightened out we'll be able to give you a call and talk to you. I was just trying to get a better idea of what we would be in for if we were going to try a wet room. It's difficult to find anything locally since we live out in the middle of the woods where we can't get mail delivery.
I completely understand not wanting to spend a lot of time explaining something to someone who is not paying-- especially when the info is already on the site and I just need to go through it. I'll take some time and read through the threads and see what I can learn from those.
 

Dhagin

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If you're even considering a tile installation, do yourself a favor and check out johnbridge.com. The folks there are seasoned professionals, who are respectful and friendly and walk folks through many complicated tile installs every day.

These guys and gals don't just play internet contractor, they are dedicated tile professionals. :)

http://www.johnbridge.com/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=1
 

Suceress

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Thanks again, John!
I was entertaining the idea of trying to do as much of the labor as possible myself, but I think I'll take your advice and leave it to a pro-- at least on the installation part. I can do some of the demolition and removal myself. The walls are thin paneling nailed to the studs with no insulation, no moisture barriers, etc.
I'd prefer to not use tile.
I love the pictures! The glass brick walls from your work look pretty neat. That's actually something I was considering for the bathroom if we had space. I'm trying to convince the mother unit to swap the bathroom and laundry room because the laundry would be more accessible and then there would be more space for a shower so we would still fit a shower in the bathroom and not have the toilet crammed into a 23-inch alcove (which I know is not to code). My brother's shoulders are wider than that. It's useless because none of us can fit on that toilet and the shower is so small that we don't really have room to move inside of it.
I wish Houzz was easily pinnable on Pinterest. I find its a pretty good way to find some stuff because you can click the link to get to the source and find items for sale, or blogs where people post things.
That is a lovely clawfoot tub but I imagine it would be a pain to clean around. The spout for the tub doesn't seem to match the style though. It just looks so out of place. Yikes on those cracked tiles. That's one of the reasons I don't want tile. I know they should be hard to crack if installed properly, but the Doofusaurus in the family has a knack for breaking things that shouldn't break.
If I was going to go with tile, I saw some Moroccan tile from Overstock that looked pretty neat.
Again, thank you for the replies and the pictures!
 

Eurob

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suceress said:
Yikes on those cracked tiles. That's one of the reasons I don't want tile. I know they should be hard to crack if installed properly, but the Doofusaurus in the family has a knack for breaking things that shouldn't break.

If I understand it correctly , Those '' cracks '' are not present . This is how slate tiles -- lots of high and lows areas on the surface -- look like .
 

Suceress

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If I understand it correctly , Those '' cracks '' are not present . This is how slate tiles -- lots of high and lows areas on the surface -- look like .

Ohh! I thought they were cracked and had chunks missing. LOL. Just goes to show that type of tile is not for me. I guess that is what the homeowner wanted though. Hope I didn't offend anyone with my critique. I still like the glass brick thing though.

When I do see tile work that I like, it tends to be larger tiles on the floor and smaller tiles used as backsplashes.

Here is an example I found of a wetroom with a non-tile floor.
tumblr_n0qaltKhyz1qhfuqwo1_500.jpg


The floor is something called Altro Cascade. I like the wave pattern on the wall. Must have taken quite a bit of work to get that done.

Here's another example. It looks sort of like a hospital room to me.
tumblr_n0qarfXooo1qhfuqwo1_500.jpg


The floor was referred to as Altro safety flooring, but I think it might be the Altro Aquarius in either "dragonfly" or "penguin" color.

I imagine getting a good seal around all of the edges-- particularly at the drain-- would be extremely important for this type of flooring.
 

Suceress

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Ohh! So *that* is what they mean by "clamping drain". I wasn't quite sure what was being clamped. I imagine it might puncture some of the moisture barrier sheets-- hence the rule about not using Kerdi (was it kerdi?) so close to a clamping drain. I don't know enough about the mechanics of how it all works though.

I found those pictures on some UK sites. There are a ton of sites about the flooring options and wet rooms that are from the UK. I think I read from you that the UK is ahead of the US in that area. I do not envy the tile person who had to cut those wave tiles. I bet that pattern would look pretty neat with the wave pattern linear drain-- maybe with different color tiles though. Not sure if those ACO Quartz drains can be used with that flooring though.

I love your Houzz by the way. I actually started using Houzz after seeing some of your stuff there awhile back. I'd never heard of it before. You've probably seen some of my posts. I just got back home so I haven't loaded Houzz to see if anyone replied or not.

I can't believe that one guy thought that it was more acceptable to leave an unprotected wire vertical in a wall than to have to go through the trouble of possibly drilling a hole. I imagined if someone had done a tap test on his head about that time it would have sounded hollow. :p
I've gotten zapped by a low current before and it is not fun at all (it was from equipment that a satellite installer didn't ground properly and something that I should have been able to touch was "hot").

I'm off to check Houzz.
 
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