J
Jee
Hi guys,
We bought our first house in 2012 and, like most first houses, it was in a terrible state and needed a lot of work. This meant we had to DIY a lot, and pay professionals just for the jobs that we truly couldn't manage ourselves.
The bathroom (ground floor, not extension) was absolutely awful. The tiles were loose, but the people living here had just kept using the bathroom anyway, so the wall behind was wet and, when we knocked off the plaster, was covered in wet rot.
We took the whole bathroom out - all the plaster, everything, even dug up the floor. We treated the wet rot. We waited for it all to dry out (nearly a year). We had a builder in to tank and replaster the room, and also to put in a new concrete floor. Once the plaster was dry (and we really did wait), we tiled the corner of the bathroom for a shower.
We used Mapei ultracolour white grout, which was what was recommended by the tile shop we used. We are reasonably good at getting tiles on (we have done quite a lot of floor tiling, and splashback wall tiling) and it was all square and neat. We sealed the tiles to the shower tray with high quality Silicon, and then we had a gorgeous shower which we were really pleased with.
Fast forward 18 months, and I have noticed hairline cracks in the first horizontal line of grout (the one above the line of sealant). It took me probably 3 months to actually do anything about this (major mistake, I now know). When I raked out the grout, thinking I would just replace it, the tiles actually fell off. Then I checked the next row of tiles - they were also loose. I took the whole shower frame off (a pain in the ***) because I couldn't access the tiles that were sealed to it otherwise, and basically I had to take the first three rows of tiles off because they were no longer fully adhered to the wall.
You can see a teeny tiny pic of it above - the forum for some reason wouldn't allow me to post any larger a photo! If you look closely, you can see that there is a dark line on the plaster which is where the failed line of grout was, and then there are dark lines trickling down where the water had obviously been seeping down behind the tile. There are also a couple of damp marks above where there were smaller cracks in the other lines of grout.
When I took the tiles off, some of the higher tiles had beads of moisture on the back - I assume the water had just found its way up there and lifted the tile and adhesive off the wall.
So, I have two questions.
Firstly, how will I know when it's dry enough to retile? This is our only shower, and showering at the gym is getting a bit tiring, although it is very good for our fitness levels!
Secondly, what do I need to do with my grout to stop this from happening again? Was it because the shower tray flexed slightly and broke the grout? Do I need to add some kind of rubberiser to the grout?
Thanks in advance for your help!
We bought our first house in 2012 and, like most first houses, it was in a terrible state and needed a lot of work. This meant we had to DIY a lot, and pay professionals just for the jobs that we truly couldn't manage ourselves.
The bathroom (ground floor, not extension) was absolutely awful. The tiles were loose, but the people living here had just kept using the bathroom anyway, so the wall behind was wet and, when we knocked off the plaster, was covered in wet rot.
We took the whole bathroom out - all the plaster, everything, even dug up the floor. We treated the wet rot. We waited for it all to dry out (nearly a year). We had a builder in to tank and replaster the room, and also to put in a new concrete floor. Once the plaster was dry (and we really did wait), we tiled the corner of the bathroom for a shower.
We used Mapei ultracolour white grout, which was what was recommended by the tile shop we used. We are reasonably good at getting tiles on (we have done quite a lot of floor tiling, and splashback wall tiling) and it was all square and neat. We sealed the tiles to the shower tray with high quality Silicon, and then we had a gorgeous shower which we were really pleased with.
Fast forward 18 months, and I have noticed hairline cracks in the first horizontal line of grout (the one above the line of sealant). It took me probably 3 months to actually do anything about this (major mistake, I now know). When I raked out the grout, thinking I would just replace it, the tiles actually fell off. Then I checked the next row of tiles - they were also loose. I took the whole shower frame off (a pain in the ***) because I couldn't access the tiles that were sealed to it otherwise, and basically I had to take the first three rows of tiles off because they were no longer fully adhered to the wall.
You can see a teeny tiny pic of it above - the forum for some reason wouldn't allow me to post any larger a photo! If you look closely, you can see that there is a dark line on the plaster which is where the failed line of grout was, and then there are dark lines trickling down where the water had obviously been seeping down behind the tile. There are also a couple of damp marks above where there were smaller cracks in the other lines of grout.
When I took the tiles off, some of the higher tiles had beads of moisture on the back - I assume the water had just found its way up there and lifted the tile and adhesive off the wall.
So, I have two questions.
Firstly, how will I know when it's dry enough to retile? This is our only shower, and showering at the gym is getting a bit tiring, although it is very good for our fitness levels!
Secondly, what do I need to do with my grout to stop this from happening again? Was it because the shower tray flexed slightly and broke the grout? Do I need to add some kind of rubberiser to the grout?
Thanks in advance for your help!
