Why You Need To Entirely Demo Your Bathroom When You Remodel



If your residence is old sufficient for a washroom improvement, you may wish to go on as well as entirely intestine it. I began my washroom remodel last month with a full demolition. If I hadn't, a variety of issues would certainly have been not available for repair service ... or perhaps obscure. Right here's just what I located when I opened up the walls and ceiling of my 1981 condominium right here in the Quad Cities.

Deal with plumbing surprises
Here's another thing I discovered. I'm not a pipes professional, but I see a problem below. Think of if that area of typical drain line for our back-to-back sinks got blocked. Now imagine running a snake in there from one sink. Do you assume it would make the turn? Probably not. We transformed it out and also balance out both.

Repair termite damages
When I opened the exterior wall surface, I discovered termite damages in 2 locations: the king stud, jack stud, and maim on the bathtub side of the window as well as the jack stud on the other side of the home window. The bright side is that the damages was done long ago. As long as I've lived here, the proprietors' organization has kept up with termite therapy and surveillance, but I understand there was a period when they really did not. Hence the damage I discovered.

Change decayed subflooring
Along with the termite-damaged wall surface, I also discovered rotten subflooring near the tub. This was mostly from getting also damp, as well as I believed it since floor tiles had begun turning up in that area.

Offset no or little insulation
I knew we had insulation in our walls. I believed it was R-11 fiberglass batts due to the fact that our upstairs next-door neighbor's icemaker had a bad leak a couple of years earlier, getting fifty percent of our laundry room ceiling and part of the wall surface. The usual wall surface had R-11 batts. I figured the remainder of the wall surfaces did, as well. I recognized they had insulation due to the fact that I've inspected behind button and receptacle plates.
I got a little surprise when I took the drywall off of that exterior bathroom wall surface as well as saw this:

This is actually an advantage, in a way, since it means I'll obtain even more enhancement than I believed I was going to get.

Seal up the air leaks
Yes, our 1981 apartment is dripping. I knew about the big bath tub openings as well as other plumbing penetrations since I've seen them from the cellar. I really did not recognize that the walls were encased with asphalt-impregnated fiberboard (Celotex) that supplied lots of air leak paths. Again, looking on the bright side, that means I'll have the ability to make more enhancement than I 'd assumed.

I can't wait to do a blower door examination when it's all done. Sadly, I will not be able to separate out the improvement due just to my bathroom job. The owners' association simply had the whole flooring sealed with spray foam insulation. I'm thinking our total air leak will certainly be around half of what it was.

Set up an exhaust fan and also repair ductwork
Did I discuss our apartment was built in the 80's? The master bath has a home window, so naturally, it really Dunlap Construciton did not require an exhaust follower, right? Wrong. I have actually got over a year of data on temperature as well as loved one moisture because bathroom without an exhaust follower. Currently I'm placing one in as well as will gather much more data. Keep tuned for the results.

But even if your bathroom already has a fan, I would certainly bet it does not relocate enough air. The normal bathroom fan stirs half its rated air flow. If your bathroom follower isn't really obtainable from the attic, opening up the ceiling is the only means to obtain at the duct as well as repair it. Exactly what you see in that photo listed below prevails for bath follower ducts: sagging flex air duct that makes a lot of turns. (That's not my brand-new fan, by the way.).

Solve other potentially unknown repair needs.
Several years ago we had to do some pipes benefit the tub in the hall restroom. When the plumbing professionals had the wall surface opened, I inquired to put shutoffs in on the cold and hot water lines so that if anybody needed to work with that plumbing in the future, they would not have to shut off the water to the entire building.
So they put in the valves. When I opened up the wall, I saw them as well as took this picture:.



I would certainly use that shower a couple of times over the years and also always wondered why the stress was so low. Now I recognize. The plumbers set up the shutoffs however then really did not open them completely. Those red manages need to be straight in line with the pipelines. Great!

I additionally located that our ceiling had 2 layers of drywall. We have a smooth ceiling throughout our condominium, but the original ceiling was stippled. Thankfully, it wasn't a snacks ceiling, which can contain asbestos.

And I discovered the initial, horrible wallpaper.

If you're redesigning a shower room, there a lot of excellent needs to go all the way as well as gut it totally. That's just what I'm doing. We're nearly ready to begin shutting it back in, so remain tuned for even more stories from the bathroom.

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