Tiling on Universal Shower Bases
Hi there - I’m hoping to get some advice.
I’m a builder, based in Melbourne, Australia. I’ve recently done a few bathroom renovations, using a Universal Shower Base, where a fibreglass shower base is installed and then tiled over.
These jobs were all completed in the last few months, using the same tiler, but I’ve had call backs on two of them, where the grout has cracked/fallen out. One of these jobs, I’ve been back to twice with the tiler, who has scratched out the grout lines and re-grouted - the first time adding a plasticiser to the grout and the second time using epoxy grout. I did notice that there were ‘pockets’ in the grout lines that seemed to be like air bubbles? The cracking is still occurring and when I went round again, I noticed that a couple of the tiles were bouncing at the point where they meet the tile insert shower waste and I could hear water underneath.
It looks as if I will now need to pull the shower base tiles up (ugh!) to see what the problem is. The tiler is claiming that it’s the shower base moving, but I know that the plumber fully supported it before installation and set it with polyurethane/sikaflex as per instructions.
Can any of you tilers suggest an answer to what has happened? I obviously need to rectify the problem, but I’m equally concerned that this problem doesn’t happen in the future.
Thanks in advance for your help.
Tiling on Universal Shower Bases for the Original Article on Tiling Advice Forum
Hi there - I’m hoping to get some advice.
I’m a builder, based in Melbourne, Australia. I’ve recently done a few bathroom renovations, using a Universal Shower Base, where a fibreglass shower base is installed and then tiled over.
These jobs were all completed in the last few months, using the same tiler, but I’ve had call backs on two of them, where the grout has cracked/fallen out. One of these jobs, I’ve been back to twice with the tiler, who has scratched out the grout lines and re-grouted - the first time adding a plasticiser to the grout and the second time using epoxy grout. I did notice that there were ‘pockets’ in the grout lines that seemed to be like air bubbles? The cracking is still occurring and when I went round again, I noticed that a couple of the tiles were bouncing at the point where they meet the tile insert shower waste and I could hear water underneath.
It looks as if I will now need to pull the shower base tiles up (ugh!) to see what the problem is. The tiler is claiming that it’s the shower base moving, but I know that the plumber fully supported it before installation and set it with polyurethane/sikaflex as per instructions.
Can any of you tilers suggest an answer to what has happened? I obviously need to rectify the problem, but I’m equally concerned that this problem doesn’t happen in the future.
Thanks in advance for your help.
Tiling on Universal Shower Bases for the Original Article on Tiling Advice Forum
