I have a 1920s house where taking a shower on the third floor has recently also caused a shower on the second floor. The shower is constructed with a sheet metal (lead I guess) pan on a flat subfloor, with, of course, mortar and tile on top. I have bashed out good sized sections of the ceiling below and wall outside the shower and removed a bit of subfloor under the leak (not hard give its rottenness!) . I’ve narrowed down the leak to within about a square inch but don’t see an actual hole – more of a fast ooze.
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So obviously the question is: how do I fix this from below? I am hoping that the answer doesn’t involve soldering since I could probably do a good deal of damage to both lead and surrounding wood with a torch.
Replies
Not what you want to hear, but tear out the whole shower, pan and walls, and repalce the the subfloor and build a new shower. Lead Pans don't last forever-it will leak somewhere else. Look at Schluter's Kerdi shower liner.
So obviously the question is: how do I fix this from below?
You don't -- at least I wouldn't.
Note that if the shower pan is leaking, you're not likely to be able to find the specific point of the leak. And even if you fix that point, there will soon be another.
You need to replace the shower pan.
Even if you could somehow jack a new hand-made shower pan (complete with mortar pre-slope and base) into place, then put flooring and subflooring and joists in place, there would still be a problem where the old walls meet the new.
Do it right. Demolish the old shower, top to bottom, and put in a new one.
Unless you're the lead dog, the view just never changes.
I don't want to give you bad response,but you have a installation that may be 80 years old! You can't repair old lead pans, the skill to do that disappeared many years ago. More then likely the shower pan has giving.up the ghost. That means you have to rip out the shower and start from scratch one, sorry. Lots of luck.
Hmmmm, there seems to be a unanimity of opinion as to what I ought to do with this leaky shower -- and it's more in line with what I was afraid I'd hear rather than what I wanted to hear. What I wanted to hear is: "One leak in 80 years? -Not bad. Get a piece of vinyl shower pan and glue it to the bottom and you're good to go for another 80 years." Oh well.
Get a piece of vinyl shower pan and glue it to the bottom and you're good to go for another 80 years.
Feel any better yet?