Do you live on the Mornington Peninsula and think you might have a Leaking Shower… or that you need Shower Repair?

Let me guess… you’re experiencing one or more of the following shower problems?

Water is pooling on the floor (outside of the shower) during a shower.

Ugly black mould is making a home around the base and bottom of your tiles

Mould stains are creeping up the plasterboard in the rooms behind the shower

Plasterboard at the corners of your shower base are rotting and turning black

Skirting boards in the room behind your shower are starting to swell and split

Or… when you shower, the tiles start to attack you by jumping off the wall

Well… I guess your here because you want to know what’s causing your leaking shower and the best way to fix it… right?

Ok, let’s find out if you need to reseal your shower or if it’d be better to do a full shower replacement.

Let’s get to …

What could be causing your shower to leak

There could be a number of different reasons that you have a leaking shower.

I’m just going to list them out, and run through how to fix each problem.

1.Old, cracking grout:

If you have a look at your grout – mainly on the opposite wall to your shower head and from the waist down – you might notice your grout is cracking or starting to fall out. It I can also be turning a yellowy brown colour, and no matter how much you clean it, it still looks dirty.

Even the smallest little hole in the grout will allow water to run down behind the tiles and cause damage.

Leave this too long and it’ll turn into a costly shower repair.

It’s also responsible for the silicone around your base turning black with mould that you cant seem to get rid of.

How do we repair damaged grout?

The best way to eliminate grout-related-leaks, is to regrout your shower.

What we do is… we use a multi tool with a special blade that can grind out all of the damaged grout from in between your tiles (without damaging your tiles).

It looks like this:

Then we cut out all of the silicone around the corners and base of your shower

So in other words… we remove that ugly black mould from around your shower base.

You know the one…

No matter how much bleach you put on it, or how much you scrub it, the mould just wont leave.

Then we regrout every tile in your shower with clean, fresh, water resistant grout. This keeps the water where it’s supposed to be and makes your shower look brand new and super clean.

Next, we caulk your shower, making sure no water can get into the corners of your shower and and around the base.

How long does it take?

This whole process takes 1 to 2 days.

It just depends on the size of your shower and if we need to remove your shower screen and reinstall it.

We have to be sure that the silicone is dry before we reinstall you shower screen so it could be 1 extra day just to make sure its all dry properly

Ok… so how much does regrouting a shower cost?

Of course it’s impossible to give you a fixed priced without seeing your shower but… what I can do is give you a guide so you know what to expect.

For an average sized shower, say… 2 walls of tiles, 850mm wide x 1900mm high, it would cost around $880 to remove the grout, remove the old silicone, regrout the tiles, caulk all the corners and clean all the dust and mess.

If we have to remove and reinstall your shower screen that could cost an extra $150 to $200 depending on the size and style.

If you have 3 tiled walls instead of 2, then that would also cost more. Based on the shower above, it would be an additional $250.

Some people have a tiled floor instead of a shower base. This would also add to the overall cost to re-grout your shower.

I hope that gives you a guide as to what you can expect to pay for a shower re-grout, but that’s only one of the potential causes of your shower leak… so… let’s more on to number 2…

2. Silicone going mouldy and peeling away from the tiles:

You may notice that your silicone around your shower base is starting to peel away from the tiles. This allows the water to run down behind the silicon and trap the water there which causes the mould that you cant seem to scrub away.

This dodgy silicone seal is also usually the culprit to the water damaged plasterboard and swollen skirting boards at the corners of you shower base.

How do we replace the mouldy silicone?

Luckily, this is a quick and easy fix… and cheapest shower repair option…

We just need to cut out all of the old, mouldy silicone from around the base, make sure its all dry and clean, and then re caulk your shower base…

It’s that simple.

The only thing left to do now is to repair the water damage to your plasterboard (which we can also do for you)

How long does the caulking  take?

It usually takes about two hours to remove the old silicone, clean and dry properly, then re-caulk your shower.

It’s not a big job to fix this damaging shower leak.

How much does it cost to caulk my shower?

This comes in at the $160 to $200 range.

Re-caulking your shower is pretty straight forward, there’s not a lot that can go wrong, unless you don’t know the “simple little tricks” to getting a smooth, neat, finish to your new silicone.

If this is done wrong… your shower could end up being an ugly mess… and probably still leak!

But… if you are going to do this yourself, let me give you this simple little secret that can help you get that professional silicone finish…

Apply a bead of silicone in the joint that you want filled, then before it dries, spray the wet silicone and surrounding tiles with a water from a spray bottle.

Why would you do this??? Well… it actually allows you to wipe away the excess silicone without it spreading and make a mess of the tiles around the joint.

It should look like this:

Moving on…

3.  Leaking water pipes in the wall

I know this shower repair sounds expensive and messy…

It doesn’t have to be… let me explain…

What we do is… we take your shower head off and connect a gauge to the water outlet.

If the gauge doesn’t drop, then you’re in the clear… well it means your leak is coming from somewhere else.

If there is a pressure drop on the gauge, then it’s an indicator that you may have a leak in the water pipes for your shower.

Now… don’t think because there is a leak behind the wall in your shower that we have to rip out the whole shower, start over from scratch, and drain your bank account along the way.

No… firstly, 9 times out of ten, the shower leaks I get called out to, are never cased by a leaking pipe in the wall.

And… secondly, when there is a leak in the wall, there is usually a room on the other side of the shower where we can cut the plasterboard and fix the leak, with nothing left to do other than a plasterboard patch-up.

Like I said before… most of the showers I get called out to NEVER have a leak in the water pipes.

Actually… the last shower where we detected a leak in the pipe work was fixed with a 20 cent Red-Fibre-Washer.

That’s right!

We did the test…

The gauge dropped…

We changed the Red-Fibre-Washer on the spindles… and… it turned out, the leak stopped.

No need for a full shower repair…

The fibre washer the owner put on was too big and didn’t seal the tap spindles.

It was slowly dripping behind the tiles which caused mould to grow behind their white silicone and  run out the corner of the shower base to cause damage to the plasterboard.

Something so simple!

Which leads me to…

4.  Leaking shower due to incorrect shower screen installation:

Now… this is not one that you can just look at and tell if it’s done correctly.

It really doesn’t have any thing to do with the screen itself…. it has more to do with the silicone around it… and here’s the biggie… the little bead of silicone behind the screen.

You see… sometimes, the shower screen installer gets in before the caulking gets done. He doesn’t want to wait or reschedule his day so he just puts the screen in and lets the caulking (silicone) come in when he’s finished.

So you get a better understanding…. let me explain what is happening here….

Shower screens are designed to let water inside the screen, the water, then runs down and back into the shower base.

If that little section behind the screen doesn’t have any silicone… some of that water that is running down, inside the screen, actually runs back behind the tiles and inside your wall.

Oh… and another thing… you know how I said the water runs inside of the shower frame, then back down into the shower base?

It’s really important that there is NO silicone around the bottom of the shower frame, on the inside of the shower.

ddIf you have silicone here, the water runs inside the frame, gets trapped in the bottom, and has nowhere to go except back inside the wall.

So make sure that you don’t have any silicone here.

So… how do we fix a shower screen that has been installed wrong?

The only way to do this is to take the whole screen out, cut out the silicone, re-silicone all the joints and gaps, then reinstall the shower screen.

How long does this take?

You need two days to complete this job. The main reason is, you need to allow the silicone to dry for at least 24 hours before you can re-install the shower screen.

No problem… so, how much does it cost to fix this type of shower leak… what’s the price?

An average price for an average shower (you know… 850mm wide) would be around $450.

We aren’t doing a full shower replacement. We just take it out… reseal the shower… and put the screen back in.

That’s it!

A couple of other causes of leaking showers to look out for…

Have a look around and inspect the condition of your tiles… especially closer to the base of the shower. You wouldn’t believe how many people call me for to inspect their leaking shower, only to find that that have a couple of cracked tiles.

The good news is… these tiles can be replaced.

The bad news is… you need to have spare tiles otherwise they will be impossible to match up.

Also…

Be sure to have a look at anything that comes through the tiles, such as, shower head, tap spindles, flick mixer, support rails…

Behind the cover plates (the thing that covers the ugly hole in your tiles) there will be a hole that should be filled with silicone. A lot of the time, these are left without silicone and the water can run inside your wall.

This 5-minute fix could save you thousands and the hassles of a full shower repair.

What to do if you think you have a leaking shower…

If you live on the Mornington Peninsula, and you think you have a shower leak, I’ve got something really important for you…

I call it … “The Shower Leak Detection Audit”…

How this works is… I come out to your home and I inspect your shower for all the possible causes of a leak…

I check the health of your grout…

I check the condition of your silicone…

I check to see if your screen has been installed correctly…

I use a special gauge to see if your water pipes are leaking inside your wall…

I inspect your shower for possible cracks and gaps…

And… I check to see if there is damage on the outside of your shower, such as plasterboard or skirting boards… this is really a great indicator to show where the leak could be coming from…

This entire process takes around 30 minutes and from there, I can work out the best shower repair option, to fix your leaking shower…

If you would like “The Shower Leak Detection Audit” you can call or text me (Jason) on 0466183548.

For those who don’t have time to talk, you can fill out the form below and I’ll get back to you