My customer has a ceramic soap dish in her tub and the grab bar on the dish is broken. She wants the old one removed and a new one installed. I didn’t buy the dish yet. How do you remove the old dish? Is is just caulked? I don’t see any screws holding it in. Thanks
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Replies
get a big ole hammer and...
oh never mind.
it is likely siliconed on but wait for the tile guys to answer. their advice will hold more weight than what I could give.
Elijah
To remove the dish ( or a damaged tile for that matter ) start by remover the grout around the piece. This can be scraped out with a file tang or you can buy a tool for the job. Next, take a small hammer and chip away at the centre of the tile/ holder untill you break through. Then work your way back to the edges ( and old chisel can be used for this ). Clean up the remaining adhesive then mount the new piece and regrout.
If you attempt this without removing the grout first, you run the risk of chipping the surrounding tiles.
regards
Mark
Quittintime
When you start the breaking process use a prick or center punch to at least fracture the glazing first. This will help give you a semblence of controlled breaking.
DON'T FORGET THE EYE PROTECTION.
i have seen those old soap dishes and such plastered in, and almost impossible to remove without damage.
i would try to figure out if there has been any tile repair where the fixture was removed and replaced. if it was replaced, they might have whacked a pound of plaster back in the hole and shoved the fixture in. that would make it difficult to remove.
good luck rg
Get a Dremel and a grout removal bit. They come in a sixteenth and an eigth. Remove the grout. I like to drill a hole in the offending tile (in your case, the soap dish) with a glass arrow point bit. Then using a steel punch and a large hammer, tap (not pound) away until the the tile cracks. Continue the effort until some pieces actually come out. Then I use a brad remover, like a tiny eagle bar, to get under the tile pieces and lift the rascals out. Continue until all the offending tile is removed.
Use your Dremel to grind down the setting bed and remove all the thinset, otherwise the new tile will be proud of its neighbors. This will take some time.
Apply the new dish with either thinset or 100% silicone. It doesn't matter much, although silicone will grab and stick the new tile better and thinset will hold it there better in the long run, but you have to use tape and tile spacers to hold it in place for a couple hours while the thinset cures.
Grout as usual.
Regards,
Boris
"Sir, I may be drunk, but you're crazy, and I'll be sober tomorrow" -- WC Fields, "Its a Gift" 1934