tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

jacko5 · Post by **jacko5** » Mon May 27, 2013 11:53 am

My continuing bathroom re-fit...
My whole bathroom is floor to cieling plastic pladding. (Did it years ago) I have a shower/bath with a curved glass screen and flat glass door which makes it a cubicle when in use. I have changed shower valves several times and the plastic has blanked over holes and is a bit scruffy. I could just buy some more of the cladding and redo it but for about the same price I could just tile the shower part. Then comes the usual dilemma. There are as many opinions on the web about backing boards and tecniques to confuse totally. I already have a battened out wall on the side where the valve is fitted, this wall could be boarded in concrete board or plaster board and then tanked. The other wall just has the cladding dabbed onto the original wall. Some boards you can't do this. They have to be battened for air flow. Well I can't batten that wall as I would have to do a complete wall that has a window above the side of the bath. So, it seems I will have to use green plaster board and tank that section with a kit that has the corner joint pieces etc.,
The bath has to come out anyway as I want to fit the self adhesive strip that goes from the bath edge up behind the tiles or cladding. (this bath has always leaked a bit)
So, if I follow this path, whats the best way to make a join on the wall between the plastic clad and tile ? on the long wall, bearing in mind this is also where the mounting has to go for the 'rear glass door'

any helpful suggestions welcome, thanks

jacko5 · Post by **jacko5** » Mon May 27, 2013 12:31 pm

Just thought, one solution would be to box in the gap to the wall under the window at bath level, creating a little shelf. This might effect my sealing strip though.
If I did this what boards are the best to use then ? if I am battening then there is the concrete type which I think Topptiles do or Denshield or Durock etc or I think Wickes do one. I think the concrete board you can just tile straight onto, not sure about the others.

jacko5 · Post by **jacko5** » Tue May 28, 2013 11:06 am

Well quite a few viewed this post but nobody offered any help. There are some very good u tube films on good practice with high quality tiling jobs. But, they are mostly in the USA and none of the materials or products they use or recommend are available in the UK. Or not to DIY market anyway. Such products as Denshield, Durock, Permabase. All we get is what Wickes or Topptiles decide to stock which usually gets bad reviews. One of these being hardie backer which is cement based. All the boards seem to have to be battened which is not always convenient. The other type of board, such as Wickes is Gypsum based. One of your own Ultimate Handyman videos, on a total bathroom refit, seems to use standard green plasterboard and use a tank kit to seal it all. At least this method gives you the choice to batten or dab.
The two basic requirements are waterproofing and quality of tile adhesion.
Most feedback is from refitters who report back what they discover when stripping out old bathrooms how the timbers and walls have suffered from different types of board.
May be the problem is the quality of fitting in the first place. There seems to be no definitive method of boarding for showers and tiling in the UK, a lack of product choice and all tradesmen have their own ways and are often based on time and cost.
However, I would like to know what is the closest product we can get to Denshield in the UK as that seems to be the preffered for high quality jobs in the US. No idea if it has to be battened but it seems to be gypsum base with a built in moisture barrier. (Apparently, if you cover battening in plastic sheet first, this can trap moisture.)
Denshield seems to be OK as is but you need to tape and tank joins and screws and multi tape any corner joints.

I am tempted to use just plain old green plasterboard and dab on the one wall and batten on the other (refer back to start of this post) and just tank it all.
I never got any answers on my other questions either, about using tiles for shower and plastic cladding on the rest ot the walls, (already fitted) and how to join the two.

Hope some tradesmen read this and respond

royaloakcarpentry · Post by **royaloakcarpentry** » Tue May 28, 2013 4:03 pm

How you join the two finishes all depends on the depth of cladding versus the depth of tile and that is just one consideration.

the trades probably haven't answered because it isn't exactly clear in description about how the two marry up etc etc.

Green plasterboard, is moisture resistant. Moisture resistant does what it says.....resists moisture and using it as a tile backing board is not resisting moisture if there is a failure but would then be resisting water. Something it is not designed to do, nor is it designed for areas of extreme high humidity. Also there is absolutely no point in using MR and tanking it. You might as well use standard plasterboard and tank it.

A lot of it, or actually, all of it is down to quality workmanship. I have ripped out 20 year old jobs where the normal plasterboard is immaculate. I have ripped out 6 month old jobs where it is completely fcuked and the tiles are falling off. In that scenarion, the job could have been concrete based backer boards, grade 5 porcelaine tiles and the job still would have needed to be ripped out.

You should never need a jointing strip for a bath if the job is done correctly in the first instance.

Pictures, may help.

jacko5 · Post by **jacko5** » Wed May 29, 2013 10:33 pm

ok, thanks for the reply. The board on the long side of bath I am told will need a minimum of 30mm battening ( ref.aquapanel, http://www.knaufdrywall.co.uk), so the transition to the pladding which is dabbed onto wall direct,(10mm) will be about 20mm + board + adhesive + tile surface to depth. I could tile or clad the side but this difference could be taken up by the depth of the bracket for the glass door hinge mounting, except above it.
I have now gone and bought the materials but not that happy. The tiles are fine but as Wickes did not have any 12mm wall aquapanels in stock, we ended getting the stuff from Topp Tiles and they do Hardibacker, so I got that but not my first choice. (Wife just wants job done.) Now I get home and look at install details, most problems with Hardibacker seem to be that you have to clean it and dampen it or sucks the water from adhesive. But what really gets me is that it says to fit a PVC membrane sheet under it. So still I don't have all I need. I read or saw somewhere that such membranes can actually trap moisture. I suppose they are saying that cement board is impervious to water and mold but lets it through, so the timber behind can still get wet. Hence my choice to use AquaPanel which I think has a membrane in it ?

Tempted to return Hardibacker and get 12mm AquaPanel from Wickes instead.

I only have pictures of job as is now, stripped down with, no fittings. + have not worked out how to post images yet.

thanks

jacko5 · Post by **jacko5** » Thu May 30, 2013 10:09 am

At last I think I have the solution to my problem re the tiling board round the bath. I have found a product on line called Marmox. It is an insulation board with a concrete based surface. But the core itself is waterproof ! Also you can use stud or dab and screw or thin set it to wall. So no mucking about with more wooodwork and PVC lining.
The cost is about the same too. Joints are done with self adhesive tanking type tape as well as corners. I will report back on the results.

royaloakcarpentry · Post by **royaloakcarpentry** » Fri May 31, 2013 10:05 pm

It needs to be secured to battens or gypliner. Not dot and dab.

jacko5 · Post by **jacko5** » Sat Jun 08, 2013 4:47 pm

According to Marmox themselves you can fix it directly to even walls with tile adhesive or uneven walls by first drilling holes through board for fixings, then dab tile adhesive to back of board where holes come through. Offer it to wall and using a wooden blank hit it to level. When dry, re-drill holes through, plug and use stainless steel screws and their flat plastic washers. It even shows it in their own literature. This board is water proof and very light to cut and handle. With battens, just fix with the same screws and washers. In all cases cover joints with their water proof tape.
Not tiled yet, I will let you know how it goes

jacko5 · Post by **jacko5** » Wed Jun 19, 2013 9:50 am

About to tile now, all boards fitted and joints sealed etc., The tiles are 25cm x 33cm and I am putting them up landscape either straight or brick layout. was going to do portrait but landscape works out better on tile cutting. On the long wall, of the bath, where the tiles and shower section end and the tiled section will join the plastic cladding, because of the need to fix the rear shower glass door across the bath, I will need to drill the tiles, so don't want to do this too near the tile edges. As the join is at the moment, the tiles would overlap the plastic cladding by about 20mm, leaving the majority of the tile properly adhered to the backing board. The edge of the tile would have trim on it, the door mounting for the shower would be fixed on the board backed tile. Does this matter, or should I cut back the plastic cladding by a further 20mm and and insert a thin strip of the backing board instead? If this is not clear, the end tiles will overlap the plastic cladding down one side by 20mm, meaning for this part the tile will have no backing board behind it but plastic cladding. This is purely cosmetic, the area will be sealed and will not be drilled or loaded in any way.
In two minds what to do?

jacko5 · Post by **jacko5** » Wed Sep 18, 2013 10:38 am

Sorry I forgot to report back on this job. All done now. If you are in the habit of buttering tiles, then on Marmox it is better to still spread some adhesive on the board first as you will get better adhesion. Their own acyclic filler is great for any necessary filling in. For the join between plastic cladding and tile, I used some 15mm aluminum angle trim. I did not need to worry about mounting the back glass door to the shower. The family preferred the shower with just the one door as there is more room. The gap along the rest of the bath edge beyond the shower area, I filled down to the bath wall support batten with bonding plaster then covered it with quarter beading made by Home flux. It is hollow underneath and self adhesive on one edge. It looks like a white paint finish, quite neat. I may use it over the other caulking round the bath as I am never happy with the results. It looks easier than it is ! The whole job looks quite professional but not sure when I will ever need to do again. But still worthwhile. Thanks for any help and advice given,

tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad

Re: tiling shower section where rest of room is plastic clad