bathtub/shower walls

[Jay H]

I've decided that I am going to tile my bathtub walls, can I use the Densarmor Plus sheetrock that I have or does one have to use backerboard? The tiles that were on my wall (not in the bathtub area though) were simply mortered to greenboard. Do I need any kind of flashing behind it or can I just thinset with tile? I'm thinking just 6" square tile and I would go from floor to ceiling

Jay

 

[d.n.f.]

Put Ditra over the board. Adds about 1.50 per square.
Green board will still get mold if it gets wet. And it will get wet.

 

[Jay H]

Checking out Ditra's website, looks to me to be a waterproof underlayment... What do you mean 1.50? Is that cost or height?

I am using Densarmor Plus, which is fiberglass faced gypsum panel, supposedly better than greenboard... it sounds like Ditra can be used under the floor tile to as the video they have of installing it is actually a floor.

Only thing for the floor though is I'm laying tile over the existing tile..



Jay

 

[SolarAndWood]

I Durock anything behind tile. The possibility of a tile job needing to be redone because they were installed over something porous doesn't seem worth not doing it. It is very little additional work to use a non-porous material in the wet areas and you can still use whatever board you want for the rest of the job.

Also, I would make absolutely sure that there is no moisture under that floor you are going to tile over. Tiling over a soft or going soft spot in the subfloor will be inconvenient at best to fix later.

I have gutted a dozen bathrooms down to the studs/sub floors and not one of them was free of moisture that needed to be repaired. However, all of these were at least 30 year old bathrooms and half of them were in poor repair to begin with.

 

[Cutter]

I always use cement board on surrounds. Gypsum based board works well enough on floors. Reguardless of which product you use, make sure that you leave a good space between top of tub and bottom of backer. This allows a deep void for a quality silicone cualking.
Brad

 

[Jags]

Green board (water resistant) is going the way of the Doo-doo bird. The only difference between that stuff and regular drywall was the paper that was used. Avoid it.

Cement board is the industry standard to back tile. DensArmor plus, although a mold resistant product is not really intended for tile backing. Of the GP Dens products, either a DensShield or DensGuard tile backer product should be used.

 

[johnn]

If I follow you, what you are tiling is just the walls, and floor,,,right? Tub will be removed while tiling? I`m really slow with tiling, and would not want to move a tub, to go back in and fix a problem. Replace the green board,,I thinkz.

I`m open to learn,,but havn`t heard of putting a second layer over the first, in referance to your floor. Threshold gets kinda funky, wouldn`t it???

 

[d.n.f.]

Sorry around $1.50 per square foot.
Maybe more or less as that was my last year price.

 

[Jay H]

Sorry around $1.50 per square foot.
Maybe more or less as that was my last year price.

d.n.f.: Thanks, that clarifies things. The ballpark figure is fine...

[quote author="ml]If I follow you, what you are tiling is just the walls, and floor,,,right? Tub will be removed while tiling? I`m really slow with tiling, and would not want to move a tub, to go back in and fix a problem. Replace the green board,,I thinkz.

I`m open to learn,,but havn`t heard of putting a second layer over the first, in referance to your floor. Threshold gets kinda funky, wouldn`t it???[/quote]



ml: Yes, I was dreading removing the tile which is pretty old and would look to be a major task and still have a working subfloor below it. The floor itself appears to be pretty solid so one method is to just tile above it.. Yes, one may have to get a new threshold for the door and shave a bit off the door, but it is an option. I don't live in the Taj Mahal either.

yes, I'm resheetrocking the entire bathroom except for the little linen closet in the one corner. The tub and shower stall and door will be replaced with another tub and tiling and a new shower door.

Jay