Replacing the Shower Unit

Much to my dismay, all the work to caulk the shower unit did not help to fix the shower leak. See my previous blog. The leak problem got worse. It's good that it's gotten worse, which makes it easier to find the problem. One thing that still bugged me was why I could NOT see the leak even I opened up a big hole on the Sheetrock underneath the shower. Does it only leak when a person is taking a shower? I made my tenant take a shower so I can witness the leak. Sure enough, as soon as she started taking a shower, the water was nearly pouring down. I'm convinced now that I'm not dealing with a drip but a deluge and it's coming from around the drain of the shower pan. I went ahead and order a new shower unit at Home Depot. Why didn't I just replace the shower pan? Because the new shower pan wouldn't match the old wall and the enclosure. It looks better when everything is new. So I did. The new shower (Sterling CA2900-32S/W) cost me $613 with tax. Thanks to Home Depot's special service, the delivery was free.

This custom order took nearly three weeks to get here. On the day of the installation on 6/08/07, my contractor and I spent nearly an hour ripping off the old shower unit. We found where the problem was. The joint between the shower pan and the drain pipe was severed under the weight of my tenant. See the picture below. It's no wonder that there would be no leak unless there is some weight over the drain. We also found the real culprit is that there was insufficient 2x4 support beams under the shower unit, allowing the shower pan to flex too much. Well, at least I found out where the problem was, that was bugging me and my tenant since last December, for nearly 6 months!

The whole replacement effort took us nearly 7 hours. The bad thing was that we started around 6pm. We didn't finish until nearly 1am. The tenant was more than accomodating, leaving us alone during these time. I had to go back the next morning to clean up and touch up the drywall that I open a hole in and the prime shower skirt. The entire work costs me nearly $1K, plus my time plus numerous trips to examine the problem without success. But I learned a great deal from this exercise: Don't jump into conclusion where the problem might be. Some of the "experts" may not be good problem solvers. Remember I hired three different experts to diagnose the problem.