The best magazine
Sadly, even so-called professionals often make fundamental errors guaranteed to result in leaks in time.
Here are 5 tips to consider when building shower floors.
Membrane Central Every piece of a shower pan exists to support and pace the membrane in the right spot.
That's because the liner sheet catches any and all water that seeps through a tile floor, and seep it does.
That grout and even some tiles do not stop water.
The liner stops it though.
The Slope Sloped floors obviously help water flow to the drain rather than pooling on the floor.
Same goes for the liner slope.
A base mortar layer builds a slope over which the liner lies to help the liner move water to the drain properly too.
Special Drain Tile shower drains consist of more than meets the eye.
Two levels of drain holes catch water.
One layer you see in the floor itself.
The other lies buried within the floor to catch the water that makes it to the liner membrane.
That buried layer of drain is a must for a proper functioning tile floor.
Vapor Barrier It isn't just the floor that present water problems.
All that water vapor may be the start of all kinds of mold and mildew trouble too.
That's why shower walls must be built over vapor barriers to keep moisture in the shower and not in the walls behind the shower.
Barriers need not be fancy.
Simple plastic sheeting works well.
Threshold A common failure point for showers lies right at the threshold.
This need not be.
Merely stacking lumber to make a solid form builds a threshold foundation that will stand the test of time.
On the other hand, trying to build hollow forms often sets up a sure problem zone.
Shower floor pan construction consists of building up several layers of mortar and a few key ingredients.
Leave out one component or build it wrong and you likely get failure of the shower.
Failure spells water leaks and expensive damage.
Source: ...