Newly tiled shower/bath is leaking

[diamondtiling]

I know its always prefererential choice but grey pushfit pipes and fittings just seem less robust than the white version, i dont trust the toothed washer thingamewhatsisname, are your pipes leaking beneath the bath and running down the inside of the bath? friend of mine asked me to look at his shower room, it was a small en-suite in a fairly modern house, anyway it was leaking and the water was showing on the ceiling below, i shone a torch under the tray whilst the shower was running and there it was, drip drip drip, the shower itself is a power shower and the water was getting through a tiny crack in the grout, i raked out the grout, re-grouted and 24 hours later no leaks, so really give the grout and silicone a close examination, water can run along surfaces, you may be looking at one area thats the obvious candidate but the leak could be anywhere, fixtures to the back of the shower?? water running down from here? it happens, hope you find the cause

[disco]

water will allways take the route of least resistance/obstruction so a leak from a corner not sealed can cause a drip in the middle. I once went to a job to put right a leaking shower and all the grout from the tiles had washed out showing some of the spacers that had been left in, if grout is not mixed correctly it is porous. A single part flexible powder should have been used on tiles of this size (or a two part but this is dearer) depending on the substrate

[silver]

Tanking kits come with webbing or tapes as Whitebeam mentioned to create the "lip" onto your bath or shower tray and also to eliminate any small holes / defects / cracks / cover screw or nail heads or to put around the shower pipes where they come out of the wall before tiling.
If you took advice from a shop assistant and bought just the pot of tanking liquid / paste with no tapes or webbing....this was poor advice ......or got them in the kit never read the instructions and never used them ? this is where your problem starts.

The web lip goes onto the bath passed where your tiles will sit...you tile onto the lip....then trim with a stanley knife after tiling...then silicon........water cannot possibly reach behind the rim of your bath if done correctly.....the bit I struggle with ,putting aside you just tanked the walls is .....you say the tiler sealed all around the bath first with silicon ? maybe he missed a bit ? or if he didnt its coming from your taps
Or why didnt he notice you hadnt used tape onto the bath ? Why didnt he tell you it was done wrong ?
Also the water shouldnt come through that fast through the grout....something is also amiss either with the grouting or the tile adhesive / application
Grout...adhesive and not noticing tanking done correctly.....mmmmmmm
Have a word with your tiler.
How to fix it ......
Loosen and re seal your taps (silicon bead between tap and bath ....tighten up..and neat small clear silicon on outside too.....that eliminates them.

Then.....I would be questioning the rest of it if these basics aint right....but....if you are confident its only coming from this first grout row or couple of rows (I wouldnt be !). you could remove these lower layers of tiles around the bath...score with stanley knife along the bottom of the tiles of the next row up you consider to be good first to remove the grout.....if all the tanking kit comes with it and it will.....get another kit with web / tapes......allow the wall area/s to completely dry out.......prime wall not with PVA with acryllic primer.....apply new tanking liquid membrane with the tapes lipping onto the bath (mask the bath rim passed where the web will finish to collect any excess of the liquid when you brush it on try and use one piece around the bath....in the corner make one small cut halfway into the depth of the web so you can overlap it as it goes around the corner when all brushed up this will stick and make a non permeable corner).
Brush the liquid up against the next row of tiles partway onto the side of the tile...do this carefully making a good seal .....the grout will hide it.
Let this dry overnight.......
....Retile onto the web...grout correctly..trim web away...remove masking tape...Fill bath with water from the tap....silicon.......bobs ya fathers brother !

But to be honest I couldnt trust the rest of it being right either mate..you could do all this and then in a short time it will come from anywhere else in your shower....if you make the seal against say the third row and its as bad higher up this seal will stop it getting past the water will collect and find its way out through the poor grouting higher up...its your call.......correct solution is redo it all properly.......

but I hope this helps you fella ......oh and silicon the vertical too.......why dont all tilers do that ?

[disco]

I would also be calling a plumber back to cut the tails under the bath and dry pressure test. never done this myself but the story Ive heard so far just doesn't ring true.

[billhicks]

Hey all, sorry for the delay. I've been occupied elsewhere...

I notice a few of the most recent posts are still suggesting the plumbing is leaking etc etc. I dunno how many times I need to say it but it wasn't, isn't and never has been.

Anyways. Some points...

Bear in my when I was testing the leak I was spraying the shower head directly onto 1 place constantly, so it would exaggerate it. It's not a major leak, but it's a leak none-the-less.

I didn't feel I needed to and indeed wanted to take the bottom row of tiles off. On further examination of the leaking area in question I could see the grout was deep into the joint and could easily get another 1mm+ of more grout in there.

I think the leak was probably down to a number of things:

- Cheapest of the cheap, non flexible grout
- Thickness of grout in the joint/spot
- Possible lack of adhesive behind the joint/spot where it leaks
- Obviously, lack of silicone in the vertical corner is a major reason for the leak in that particular area.
- Missing silicone between bath and wall in that area (there was a gap, I discovered..) and obviously the tanking wasn't lipped onto the bath which I admit I didn't think of, but I still think it would be very very tricky to do as the edge of the bath are rounded..

So if the grout is crap and there's not much thickness in that particular joint then being porus water isn't going to take long to get through it. Or so that's the conclusion I reached.

So here's what *I* did. I'm sure some of you may think it's a "bodge". I appreciate it's not ideal but taking of rows of tiles after the bathroom has been completed isn't either and is OTT in my opinion given the nature of the leak. Had we not been living in the house YES I might have had the tiler come back, take the tiles off etc etc

First thing I did was get some more silicone up between the bath edge and the wall. This was straight forward given the leak was at the tap end and the pboard was stopped just where the top lip of the bath started. I'm 100% confident all the silicone I put in alone would stop the water dripping down the edge of the bath onto the floor but obviously that's the just one thing, it doesn't stop the water getting through the grout in the first place.

Second thing I did was to buy some better quality grout. Raked out the leaking joint area and applied some grout thicker than it was before. The joint looks better now, more solid.

I then sealed the grout with Seal Guard(£30 a can!!) and siliconed in the vertical corner joint.

That fixed it....I know some of you will frown upon this but I didn't want the hassle of ripping tiles off.

I did the fix, not the tiler. I learnt some lessons and will know better the next time I employ a tiler....

Here's the thing. I asked the tiler what he would have done if he'd done the whole bathroom and he said he only tanks for wetrooms and would have just used regular p-board. If he used the same grout on other jobs in combination with regular p-board you can imagine how it would just soak up any leaks. The mere fact that I had tanked and NOT lipped it, allowed the water to run down the wall and make the leak known.

We own a few rentals and I have a bit of experience with trades. As a customer you assume a tradesman knows his job inside out but I've discovered *I* need to have background knowledge just to make sure things are done correctly... it's very difficult in some cases. I still think the tiler is a good tiler in the asthetics of job but obviously his choice of materials and knowledge of certain things lets him down. How many customers are going to know this though?

All in all, a frustrating experience but had it not have happened next time I had some tiling work done I might have let the tiler use sub-standard grout/addy. I certainly won't be doing that again.

[faithhealer]

Cheers for the feedback Bill, glad it's sorted
I always stress to my customers that I will only use 'top' gear, I don't want any of 'those' phone calls!

[disco]

Does Seal Guard last forever or does it need to be re applied?

[billhicks]

Does Seal Guard last forever or does it need to be re applied?

Answer from their website:

"A lifetime on vertical surfaces. On floors, etc., it will last for years. However, on heavy walkway areas or heavily used areas such as shower recesses, the areas should be checked yearly and re-sealed if necessary."