Love the New Shower

I love the new shower and tub. I'm generally pretty happy with all the decisions we made.

1. I love the controls on the Hansgrohe valve. Having the pressure and the temperature completely separate is nice. And I like the temperature override to prevent scalding. I can turn off this feature, but I suspect I'll leave it on until the kids are older. The shower head had a nice flow, especially after I removed the flow regulating O ring. The Eco-Air spray feels nice and doesn't splatter water all over the shower walls after it bounces off my skin.

2. I really like the tub. I cleaned it today using Bon Ami and a soft nylon brush (as directed by the manufacturer) and it was very easy. I look forward to taking a bath in it someday. It seems to warm of quickly and stay very warm.

3. I like the wall tiles, but I feel like we show have picked a higher quality and larger tile though. 3x6 tiles would have been nicer for suction cups and required less grout overall. I'm happy we went with a non-contrasting grout and tile combination. Everthing blends together and I don't dwell on the natural imperfections of tile installations.

4. I also regret not building in shelving for bottles and soap. My wife nixed the choice of having corner shelves. And I vetoed having inset cubbies/shelves because I was so paranoid of future leaks and water damage. We'll definitely be building inset shelving on the master bath/shower.

If you want to come over and try out the shower, let me know. ~_^

Things Learned from this Bathroom Remodel (so far)

I spoke with a friend yesterday about my current bathroom remodel. He had some questions and I thought I'd share some of my answers.

Q: What's the most valuable piece of advice that I got from contractors?
A: Don't buy a bathtub that costs less than $400. We bought an American Standard Americast  steel tub for about $500. It weighs about 160 pounds (a third of the cast iron tub it replaced). We're very happy with it so far.

Q: Will I use a tile contractor for future work?
A: Maybe, but probably not. After watching the install and even doing a little tile install myself, I feel like I could do a pretty good job. Good advice on choosing tile... buy the best tile you can afford. Cheap tile doesn't cut nicely (chipped edge). Buy porcelain instead of ceramic it possible.

Q: Was the contractor happy with the work I did prior to him starting?
A: He was very complimentary on how plumb my walls were (he said he had never worked on walls that were so plumb... only 1/8" off). It made his cuts for the tile in the corners all the same which saved a lot of time. I guess it paid off having spent the extra time reframing the walls.

Q: Where did I buy my valve and trim package for the shower?
A: We bought it all at Aurora Plumbing in Seattle. The folks in the parts department have always been helpful (they removed the flow restrictor in the showerhead for me - I can control flow via the valve) and the sales staff in the showroom (Adele) was particularly helpful in guiding us to the right valves, spouts, etc. We just bought the new toilet for the hall bath from them (a Toto).

A Functioning Shower and Tub

I spent what time I had today installing the valve controls, trim, shower hardware, and spout. I also spent some time cleaning the tub, floor, and covering the big hole in the subfloor where the toilet will eventually sit. The tub was surprisingly easy to clean. Nothing really sticks to it: not tape, not mortar, not grout. Silicone does stick though.

The shower is now functional! I took the first shower and have to admit that it was perhaps the best shower I have ever had in my life! Going almost four weeks without one made this one extra special. My spouse also got to take a shower. She was disappointed in the shower's water pressure. I'll try to address that tomorrow. The shower wand has a flow control in it. Our two kids got to take a bath as well. They had a great time!

I taped plastic on to the floor to provide a little protection should some water find its way out of the shower. The plastic will help keep the subfloor dry and our feet clean. I also hung a new shower curtain that my spouse bought well over a year ago. It looks very nice!

Tub Walls and Tile

The tile contractor started last Thursday. He got the HardiBacker concrete board up the first day and some tile. I had to move the valve back an inch that evening though because it was too far forward to allow the wall board to lay flat. It was a moderately easy fix, and that allowed the contractor to re-install the board flat the next day and install more tile.

He left his tile saw and tools so that I could install more tile over the weekend, but I only did a little bit as I was pretty tired of all the work I'd done over the previous week. Plus my father-in-law was in town and we spent some time doing family stuff like picking pumpkins.

The contractor finished installing most of the time on Monday and then grouted on Tuesday. The grout needs to set for 72 hours and then we can shower! The faucet spout, valve handle, and shower connection can all be installed after 24 hours, but a couple of holes need to be drilled for the shower adjustment bar and that can't happen until after 72 hours.

The tile was very difficult to work with. It was cheap ceramic tile and if we could do it over we'd pick a higher quality porcelain tile. We had initially wanted to do a dark contrasting grout, but we changed our minds after the tile started getting installed. We feel the white grout hides some of the problems that the tile gave us.

We're thinking that we might try to do the tile on the floor in this bathroom ourselves as well as in the master bathroom. And we might try to do tighter grout joints. We'll have to do a little research first though.

Tub and Plumbing Installed

I installed the tub (and framed around it). I also connected the drain. Then I installed valve and all the connections for the shower. I flushed the valve (as the instructions told me to) and then tested all the joints for leaks. No leaks. Yay!

We chose a Hansgrohe valve as well as the other pieces of the shower. We're pretty excited to use it! The controls for the temperature, pressure, and diverter are really slick. We're also installing a height adjustable shower head.

Tile for Hall Bath Shower

We picked the tile for the hall bath shower. It's a 2x4 white mini subway tile. Off the shelf at Home Depot. The house up the street that we visited to see the contractor's work used them. They're nice. The contractors don't like installing them because they are fussy. We're going to use a dark gray grout with them. The contrast should be quite nice.

New Tub

Just a quick update on the bathroom remodel.

So far I have:

• Demolished the old subfloor and wall framing
• Removed sixty 5 gallon buckets of dirt from under the house to make room for me to work
• Sistered three joists
• Removed rot from two joists
• Installed new subfloor (except around the toilet area)
• Prepared the tub drain plumbing to receive the tub
• Carried the new tub into the bathroom (with the help of a friend)

The new tub seems nice.

My next steps are to reframe the walls around the tub, set the tub, and install the plumbing components for the tub and shower.

We will got buy tile tomorrow. Hopefully.