Home  5  Books  5  GBEzine  5  News  5  HelpDesk  5  Register  5  GreenBuilding.co.uk
Not signed in (Sign In)

Categories



Green Building Bible, Fourth Edition
Green Building Bible, fourth edition (both books)
These two books are the perfect starting place to help you get to grips with one of the most vitally important aspects of our society - our homes and living environment.

PLEASE NOTE: A download link for Volume 1 will be sent to you by email and Volume 2 will be sent to you by post as a book.
Buy individually or both books together. Delivery is free!


powered by Surfing Waves




Vanilla 1.0.3 is a product of Lussumo. More Information: Documentation, Community Support.

Welcome to new Forum Visitors
 Join the forum now and benefit from discussions with thousands of other green building fans and discounts on Green Building Press publications: Apply now.

The AECB accepts no responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions in the content of this site. Views given in posts are not necessarily the views of the AECB.



General: RE: Door for a wet room

Bottom of Page

1 to 27 of 27

  1.  
    • CommentAuthorDavidP
    • CommentTimeNov 4th 2010
     
    Hello there all

    Am just looking for some advice on an extension that i'm building and it's wet room.

    Its a tiny wet room..... 2m x 1.5 and i shall tile the wet room and the customer wants to use karndean in the living area (the wet room is off this area) Not sure what to do where the tile meets the Karndean... and also what kind of door to use on hte wet room and whether to fit a water tight seal to the botoom of the door...

    Any help on wet rooms...

    Thanks

    Dave
  2.  
    With a room of 2 X 1.5 I presume the door will open into the living area which may make a water tight seal difficult. I would organise the finished floor level of the wet room to be a bit lower than the living area. Will it be a drained floor? I would also ask the customer if a door mat will be used and then make sure there is sufficient clearance under the door if the mat location requires it.
    Peter
    • CommentAuthorDavidP
    • CommentTimeNov 5th 2010
     
    thats what i intented to do... however they have chosen a tiled floor in thewet room with thick tiles and a 3-4mm vinly tile in the living area. The wet room all has a slight incline down the waste.
    • CommentAuthorDavidP
    • CommentTimeNov 5th 2010
     
    So i was thinking of a little upstand where the end of the tiles are..
    • CommentAuthortony
    • CommentTimeNov 5th 2010
     
    door to open in or out? -- a whole lot easier with open in --

    Type of door? -- frosted glass? metal? wood might not survive.
    • CommentAuthorCWatters
    • CommentTimeNov 5th 2010 edited
     
    How about making your wet room door out of glass and using a frameless shower seal on the bottom? Instead of an upstand have a glass door sill around 10mm high for the seal to mate with?

    Is it just a shower? Wet rooms are over rated in my view. First person to use it makes the floor all wet then everyone using the loo gets wet socks or treads water into the living area. A large low profile shower tray is a better bet. No need for a plynth under it if you plumb it in right.

    Can get them made custom size according to...
    http://www.solidity.co.uk/Shower_trays.htm
    but there are some quite large off the shelf ones available.
    • CommentAuthordocmartin
    • CommentTimeNov 7th 2010
     
    What is the ventilation in the wetroom? You will need a gap under the door if using MVHR or an extractor fan with no vent in the window frame.
    My wet room, off a carpeted inner hallway, is 2.2m x 1.75m. There is a large gap under the door for the MVHR but I have no problems; probably the slight extra dimension is critical.
    • CommentAuthorCWatters
    • CommentTimeNov 7th 2010
     
    or over the door.
    • CommentAuthorDavidP
    • CommentTimeNov 7th 2010
     
    The door opens in.... I think the customer would prefer a wodden door... I was thinking that it would not work as well as a glass/metal door. But they would just not suit the style of the house and the wet room (shower/toilet and hand basin).

    With regards the ventilation a low voltage extractor in the shower area and a velux window in the room too... which could be left on vent??

    The place is small... hmm... like the idea of a glass upstand.

    Any more ideas?

    A very thankful dave
    • CommentAuthorowlman
    • CommentTimeNov 8th 2010
     
    Had you considered a sliding door? It's posible to buy pocket door kits to take standard doors. They are a metal frame complete with running gear, bolted to the wall left or right of the opening and plasterboarded over. the door slides unseen into the pocket created. You could then fashion a water stop at cill level.
    • CommentAuthordocmartin
    • CommentTimeNov 8th 2010
     
    Dave,
    our shower is mains pressure (v. good ) from an unvented twin coil cylinder. We never use it at full power; the splash only reaches 1.6m from the back wall of the shower. If your clients would be prepared to use the shower in this way a wooden door would be OK. Mine is original to the 85 yr old house; reclaimed from an outhouse.
    With 1.75m of width, I was able to put up a simple 1m wide 10mm glass screen on toe clamps. This gives a dry approach to the sink and toilet. I was also able to create a 900x650mm alcove for the pan/cistern in the far corner. The resulting space seems more generous than the area you have to work with.
    Could you borrow the idea of a tip up basin used in tiny caravan shower rooms? Probably unnecessary with a range of small corner toilets and sinks to choose from.
    Regards, Martin.
    • CommentAuthorCWatters
    • CommentTimeNov 8th 2010 edited
     
    We have a sliding door on a guest ensuite. They do save space but there are some considerations...

    They are slow to open and close without "slamming". Might only take a few seconds longer but if in regular use this can become irritating.

    When the sliding door is open the stop must be set correctly or the door handle traps fingers against the side of the opening.

    When open part of the door obstructs the opening so the opening may need to be wider than a normal door. Whan closed some of the door remains in the wall. Taken together this can mean you need quite a wide door which may not be available in the style you need.

    It's essential to follow the fitting instructions. Do not use the wrong screws or over tighten the screws that hold the plasterboard to the frame. If you do the screws may penetrate too far into the pocket and scratch the door the first time it's opened.
    • CommentAuthortony
    • CommentTimeNov 8th 2010
     
    if the door got wet or damp it wouldn't dry out very well if left in the pocket

    you can get edge fitted pull handles which hang flat in the edge of the door so the door can slid right home
    • CommentAuthorDavidP
    • CommentTimeNov 8th 2010
     
    Thanks all for your help.... the wet room is only to be used (well the shower) when family and say about 4 people come over to stay. So not very often at all, do you guys think a bit of an upstand would be required to help stop any water leaving the room?

    Thank you all again
    Dave
  15.  
    If you can not organise the finished floor level of the wet room to be a bit lower than the living area then a bit of an upstand can only help
    Peter
  16.  
    We're building a similar, if somewhat larger wetroom, and will have a 2cm lip at the door, so floods can't escape, but the door is wood, we've just waxed it well, and the shower sprays away from the door, though I still expect it to get quite wet on occasion. Wood can cope with wetness as long as its allowed to dry out again.
    • CommentAuthortony
    • CommentTimeNov 9th 2010
     
    dont forget to seal the bottom of the door
    • CommentAuthorowlman
    • CommentTimeNov 9th 2010
     
    Posted By: jemhayward:
    but the door is wood, we've just waxed it well,

    A builder friend of mine did that and when the inevitable water splashes dried out the door looked terrible, with paler spot marks everywhere. If you want to keep your door pristine looking choose some other surface finish, although it may be too late by the sound of it, in my opinion plain wax isn't up to the job.
    Mike
  19.  
    I'm hoping the door won't suffer much splashing, but we can refinish it if necessary, we will also be fitting a threshold drip lip before we go "live" so any water running down the door will run back onto the tiles. Testing with water sprays suggests the finish will hold up, but not given it a good soaking yet...
    • CommentAuthortony
    • CommentTimeNov 9th 2010
     
    and with soapy stuff??
  21.  
    can't afford soap!
    • CommentAuthorDavidP
    • CommentTimeNov 10th 2010
     
    Would you guys recommend a varnish then?

    Oh and another tangent.... shower extractors? We have a vaulted ceiling... so in the shower area in the top of the shower area or outside the shower area thus avoiding the 12v fan and transformer.

    Thanks
  23.  
    Having worked as a boat builder, and being crap at tiling, I concluded that the way I could best build a wet room was out of wood - no tiles at all.

    I have the whole thing out of birch ply, with the joins covered by some strips of mahogany bedded in flush. All the wood has been given 3 coats of epoxy, 5 coats on the floor.

    Works fine. I built in a 2" step with a slight inward slope on it so any splashes between the step and the door would drain back into the wet room. The door is a standard panel door from the dump, given several coats of aluminium primer before the finishing coats.

    The room is small, and a normal toilet would have been intrusive, which lead me to build a composting toilet instead (though the plumbing for a normal toilet is already plumbed in behind the ply). It's a box round a bucket, with a compartment for the sawdust. A lid over the box makes for a nice place to sit when you want to dry between your toes.
  24.  
    I had some difficulties with the floor. I sanded through the top layer of ply in a couple of places on the floor, and it didn't look good. Still, we needed some sort of bumpy surface so we don't slip in the shower, and this job being last autumn, I collected a few leaves and bedded them in to the epoxy over the dodgy spots.

    It didn't work, due to the waxiness on the leaves. I tried again after soaking some more leaves in acetone. Still didn't stick well, and the floor looking worse with each attempt.

    In the end, I mixed some wood dust with epoxy to make some leaf coloured epoxy paint, and it works sort of.
    • CommentAuthorowlman
    • CommentTimeNov 10th 2010
     
    David, By far the best solution would be to fit tne door complete, then remove all the hardware and take it to a good cabinet workshop or the like, and have it lacquer sprayed. It will save you hassle in the long run. I prefer two pack laquers for this type of tough environments. Putting in a 12v extractor isn't that onerous so personally I'd go for one in the shower area, why spread the steam everywhere.
    Mike
    • CommentAuthorrhamdu
    • CommentTimeNov 12th 2010
     
    Fabulous, unique wet room, John Pedersen! Definitely floats my boat.

    I had not seen your post when I launched another thread on whether engineered wood is a suitable floor for bathrooms http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/forum114/comments.php?DiscussionID=6533

    I can't overcome my instinct that wood and water don't mix, despite the evidence of wine casks, Japanese hot tubs, the Cutty Sark and the logs-in-a-swamp foundations of Winchester Cathedral - none of which required 5 coats of epoxy.
  27.  
    Thanks.

    Lots of boat have been built of ply or strips of wood laminated with epoxy, and so long as the epoxy was thick enough and applied in the right conditions, it lasts very well indeed. I've sailed thousands of miles in a plywood boat that didn't leak a drop.

    I once built a cedar strip wooden bath - managed to get curves everywhere rather than the flat bottomed elongated barrels I've seen elsewhere. Lot of labour though!

1 to 27 of 27

  1.  
Add your comments

    Username Password
  • Format comments as
 
Back to Discussions Top of Page
   
The Ecobuilding Buzz
Site Map    |   Home    |   View Cart    |   Pressroom   |   Business   |   Links   
Logout    

© Green Building Press