help, shower is leaking

[pierhogunn2]

Help guys, I just discovered that the shower in my master bath is leaking...

if would appear that the water is coming from around the drain opening

My shower was installed incorrectly and the builder made 2 trips out to recaulk the joint where the shower sides mate with the shower bottom. I feel confident that this isn't the problem

My shower pan creaks and flexes as you stand on it, so I would assume that the seal around the drain has been compromised

do i:

Call a plumber and walk away from the problem

try and fix it myself ( how)

rip the entire shower out, and have a new shower base installed professionally and upgrade the rest of the shower?

[RAFlorida]

I would put my money

with a plumber. You may have damage to the floor as well.

[Thalermade]

Just recently had a leaky shower problem diagnosed and resolved.

It to was a master bath (tub/shower) 12 years old, on the second floor. We rarely use it as a tube.

the plumber asked questions before he got started and his trouble shooting was very interesting and dead on.

1. Ran a couple inches of water into the tub (from the bath spout not the shower head) with the drain closed and marked the level. Let the water sit for about ten minutes, no leaking, then let the water out and ran water out of the tub spout again for a few minutes, no leaking. Drain was fine.

2. Ran water from the shower head and sprayed the shower walls except the wall where the fixtures are, no leaking. Waited a few minutes and then directed the water spray at the fixtures. Yep that is where the problem was. Water was leaking from where the handheld water massage connects to the hose (not to where the hose connects to the shower wall). The water then would trickle right down the wall and behind/into the faucet plate (eschucheon?) and then continue on down inside the wall and come out onto the kitchen ceiling.

Plumber sealed up the plate with his plumbers caulk and I replaced the shower massage unit.

I was expecting a major rip out and who knows what else. I was very fortunate.

So start with some simple test, maybe it won't be so complicated after all.

best of luck
Russ

[Rand]

I would say rip it out and do it right. It shouldn't creak and flex.

Or you could just silicone it.

[Mr__Bill]

It sounds like the shower pan was not set right and the flexing has broken the seal or worse in the sewer line. Way back when I was doing bathrooms the plumber always set the fiberglass pans in mortar. They were solid and had no flex.


Hope it's an easy fix when you find it but I expect that you may wish to start thinking of ripping it all out and starting over.


Bill,
always happy to find work for others to do.....

[pierhogunn2]

okay, I did some trouble-shooting and here is what I found:

1. there is a little bit of plumbers putty sticking out from under one side of the drain where the drain meets the shower pan
2. the water isn't coming from the drain but the thing that mates the drain to the shower pan. It looks like it connects to the drain pipe via a threaded collar...

so here is my thinking...

1. that the flexing of the shower pan over time has caused the seal in that joint to open up enough to let water pass.
2. that the joint is made of plumbers putty, and that all I will need to do is replace what is there with something fresh.
3. to get the joint apart, I need some sort of special tool that will keep me from destroying the joint
4. that using something like silicone caulk would be inadvisable, because that would make it to where this joint would probably not come apart in the future, making any future repairs far more difficult than they need to be
5. this job will probably require 4 fingers of bourbon, neat to adequatly address.
6. that instead of resealing the sheetrock on the ceiling below the drain, I will probably frame it out, and make it so that I can get up to it for periodic inspection / repair

[Raffi]

Many moons ago I worked as a tile setters helper. Mostly it was my job to tear out leaky shower pans and replace them. I can tell you from first hand experience that you need to address this problem quickly. Dry rot is not your friend.

It is possible to replace just the shower pan. Basically the bottom two or three rows of tiles are knocked out, and the pan is knocked out. Then wood, and plumbing repairs are made, followed by a proper water barrier installation (rubber, or hot mop), then a new shower pan is installed.

[phi1l]

ya, but....

You really want to upgrade the whole shower, don't you? Have you been watching Amy Mathews on the DIY channel?? it's real easy...

[HarmsWay]

My experience was identical to Russ's. We were about a month away from starting a full bathroom reno so we just stopped using the shower. When we tore it out and inspected it, it was very clear where the water was coming in and it wasn't the drain.

Bob

[pierhogunn2]

WOOHOO. after looking closely at the problem here is what I figured out, and subsequently fixed

1. That the shower drain is a 2 piece contraption
2. that the part that stick out into the shower is threaded to screw into a cup underneath the shower
3. that the jackasses that built the house didn't put the drain pan in properly, so this will happen again
4. That all that I needed to do was clean out the old putty, and put a new pencil thin bead of new putty around the insert, and tighten it down carefully so that the new putty just starts to bulge evenly around the bottom of the insert.

I have standing water in the pan at the moment, and will leave it there until shower time tonight to validate that the problem is solved.

if this should happen again, I will redo the repair, and then go and shore up the underside of the pan with some carefully inserted great-stuff low expansion foam to cause the flexion to stop.

either way, I feel like a Man's man at the moment, unless I get back to the garage and find another soggy mess