Wetroom on concrete Altro floor

Sean Kelly · Apr 22, 2010

This family have a very nice 3 year old wetroom. 3mx2m. It’s an Altro covering on a concrete ground floor (see pic). There are 2 issues with this floor.
1. it’s a bugger to clean.
2. There is a very small puddle of water that sits around the waste/trap

The lady would like a quote for tiling it with porcelain tiles 300x300.

I know that the Altro would have to come up (it’s the non slip version). This could take 2 days?
I thought that tanking the floor would have to be done, but reading other threads on this forum I see that tanking only around the shower area is necessary.
My biggest issue is getting the correct fall to the trap. Would I have to install a new former?
I would also have to lay a bottom row of wall tiles and tank around the shower area too.
Needless to say I have not yet done a wetroom.
At the very least this is a 5 day job.

My option to the lady was to investigate a special Altro floor cleaner. I have found that companies exist that clean Altro floors, and there are special cleaners available too.

Any ideas?
Cheers
Sean

diamondtiling · Apr 22, 2010

The bottom row of tiles should be sitting on a trim that holds the altro in place, you would have to cut that out. New tiles will lift the loo but that should not cause any problems, cutting around the loo would not be advisable with the shower being so close.

Does the trap have an adjustable top to meet the tiles? If so you could install falls around it and work back to the door.

Tradetiler might have a product to clean the existing floor.

Tradetiler.com Home

Sean Kelly · Apr 22, 2010

Thanks Diamondtiling, Yep, there is a piece of plastic trim keeping the Altro in place. So, yes that need to be cut away too. The toilet is not a problem. I can just move the pan out of the room, whilst keeping the cistern attached to the wall. The centre piece does lift out of the trap and there are 3 screws holding the trap in place. I do not know if it's adjustable. When you say install falls around the trap, do you mean build it up with addy? Also, would you recomend Homelux matting?

diamondtiling · Apr 22, 2010

Even though its a concrete floor I would recommend using a tanking system, homelux would be a good choice.
The trap is situated near to one corner so you could attempt a small screed and build in the falls or cut the tiles accordingly and build up with adhesive making sure you had 100% coverage, your falls should only be slight as the water will follow them back to the trap, as you tile away from the wet area you can lower the tiles to flat so that they do not cause a step at the doorway although there will be a small one, you can use an offset door trim to counter the two heights.

Leaving the cistern on whilst you work is fine but you may have to lift it when refitting the loo.

Good luck Sean.

Thespanishtiler · Apr 23, 2010

one point to bear in mind is the gully will be specificly for altro/polyfloor and not a tiled finish.

the existing former is propably impey or akw medicare as these are often specified for disabled access adaptions so you will have the falls there to work to.
floors are often overboarded with 6mm ply to the former edge when altro/polyfloor is laid so this would have to be lifted and and probably hb board laid this would be 3mm higher than the ply so you will have to sreed in a fall to the tray from tis point spf is fine.
tank the floor and walls up to the level of the old capstand trim.
dural wp is nice and thin.

most important allow longer than you think as these type of jobs can have lots of hidden suprises.

the wc is not a close coupled type so you can trim the flush pipe once the pan goes back in

diamondtiling · Apr 24, 2010

Good points ST, and make sure you trim the flush pipe from the top, watched a plumber trim one from the wrong end once, was going to tell him but decided not to........

:smilewinkgrin::smilewinkgrin:

merlecollins · Apr 24, 2010

the wc is not a close coupled type so you can trim the flush pipe once the pan goes back in

Well spotted Spanish

faithhealer · Apr 24, 2010

diamondtiling said:
Good points ST, and make sure you trim the flush pipe from the top, watched a plumber trim one from the wrong end once, was going to tell him but decided not to........

:smilewinkgrin::smilewinkgrin:

never done that one yet lol

snips · Apr 25, 2010

hi Sean why not replace the altro for a Marley vinyl Safetred Aqua much easier to keep clean if not one tip for removing alto cut into 50mm strips with a Stanley knife and then pull up much easier cheers Chris

Sean Kelly · Apr 26, 2010

Cheers Snips, already done quote now for tiles. Difficult one to quote for as there are too many unknowns (like how long it will take to pull up existing Altro. Is there a former, can the trap be adjusted). As you have probably guessed from the photo the room is for a disabled person. I have done a lot of research on here and the rest of the web to find solutions. I really think the best bet is to get the floor professionally cleaned, and then to continue cleaning it with the proper cleaning agents and methods for the particular type of Altro. I have asked the lady to contact the original builders for product info (because there are different types of Altro on the market, and I believe they each have their own cleaning regime). Cheers everyone for your input. Sean

snips · Apr 26, 2010

Sean Kelly said:
Cheers Snips, already done quote now for tiles. Difficult one to quote for as there are too many unknowns (like how long it will take to pull up existing Altro. Is there a former, can the trap be adjusted). As you have probably guessed from the photo the room is for a disabled person. I have done a lot of research on here and the rest of the web to find solutions. I really think the best bet is to get the floor professionally cleaned, and then to continue cleaning it with the proper cleaning agents and methods for the particular type of Altro. I have asked the lady to contact the original builders for product info (because there are different types of Altro on the market, and I believe they each have their own cleaning regime). Cheers everyone for your input. Sean

hi sean i have the correct cleaner on the shelf here it is called altroclean 48W cheers chris

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