View attachment 13029As most of you know I've moved into an older house that needs a bit of work. Structurally good, every room needs decorating at some point and the garden needs attacking. In no rush, just something to do over a number of years. Over Christmas we saw a nice Christmas tree in B&Q it was ?100 with all the lights built in, this came down quite a bit in price after Christmas. So we popped into B&Q, but there was non left in stock. On the way way out saw there were complete bathroom suites for ?450, bath taps, sink & taps, and the loo. Not too bad. We were looking at the ones in Wickes for around ?500, and said to ourselves later on this year we will probably go for one. Well we didn't want to get the most basic one, so we took a look over at their bathroom section. Ideally we wanted a 'P' shaped bath, curved shower screen to complete the bathroom suite.
We weren't going to buy anything that day, just having a look. There was a 15% off for that day. So I hummed and ar'ed and said yeah we will do it, around ?700 for the bath suite. Then when we sat down to pay for it all, we said, oh we need a shower too. So the person dealing with our order walked round to the showers with us. Stating at ?120 ish, they were plan white oval ones, didn't really take out fancy. We saw a nice frosted glass one. It was made by Mira, the lady said there is a further 15% off all Mira showers. however this shower did not have a price on it. So someone was fetched to tell us the price. It was ?338, but after discount it was around ?280. It did looks like, also have temperature compensation if someone else turns the tap on in the house it keeps your shower water the same temperature. We went for that one.
The lady printed out the receipt, it came out in the Kitchen section. Jokingly we said we need a new kitchen too. She estimated it would be around ?4k, and also have the 15% discount. They done a credit check, it was interest free for 3 years, which was a great bonus. We needed to get our kitchen measured up, but it came to about ?6k after discount as we wanted a few nice fancy bits. It would have made things a bit tight for this year, so next year they will surely have the same 15% off offer, so we will probably go back then. Its something that will be there for 20 years so we may as well get the one we want.
A couple of weeks later we took delivery of the new bathroom. It fits in the little room quite well. I started checking things, like what pipes to use for the loo, what ubends to buy etc.. So too a few photos to get an idea of what was needed.
Tiles had to be chosen. I have been to a place in Waterlooville few years ago called 'In 2 Tiles' they are near Kwikfit. The chap in there is a great guy, no pushy sales. Gives free advice, and lets you get on looking. He also has a soft spot for American cars. There were many many sheets of tiles to look through, i could have spend all day there. One set felt very Mediterranean, and with two tones of tiles it looked like what i wanted even though I went there open minded and not sure what i wanted. I felt like a woman shopping for a moment, looking at every item in every shop only to go back to the first shop to buy something. Although I done all this in one shop. :becky:
Plastered over the cable. Notice in the left photo, there was some loose plaster above the bath. So this had to be filled in too. Its like the bath was cemented in.Had to get the tiles off. We are keepng the mirror. The old tiles were tiles around it. Some tiles fell off, some needed minor tapping. After a few hours all tiles on those couple of walls were off.
However tapping the wall some of it sounded hollow.
Once the plaster off. I had to practice some plastering skills. Never done it before. After putting the cables in it gave me a bit of practice. I also got more tools to help apply the plaster. There is now 25kg(weight in powder form) of plaster on the wall.
It ended up nice and smooth, and using a straight edge, its all within around 0.5mm on being level across a 1 meter straight edge. Which is pretty good, certainly perfect for tiles. So now the plaster is all done. Its time to get the old bath out. Even that isn't as simple as you would think.
We weren't going to buy anything that day, just having a look. There was a 15% off for that day. So I hummed and ar'ed and said yeah we will do it, around ?700 for the bath suite. Then when we sat down to pay for it all, we said, oh we need a shower too. So the person dealing with our order walked round to the showers with us. Stating at ?120 ish, they were plan white oval ones, didn't really take out fancy. We saw a nice frosted glass one. It was made by Mira, the lady said there is a further 15% off all Mira showers. however this shower did not have a price on it. So someone was fetched to tell us the price. It was ?338, but after discount it was around ?280. It did looks like, also have temperature compensation if someone else turns the tap on in the house it keeps your shower water the same temperature. We went for that one.
The lady printed out the receipt, it came out in the Kitchen section. Jokingly we said we need a new kitchen too. She estimated it would be around ?4k, and also have the 15% discount. They done a credit check, it was interest free for 3 years, which was a great bonus. We needed to get our kitchen measured up, but it came to about ?6k after discount as we wanted a few nice fancy bits. It would have made things a bit tight for this year, so next year they will surely have the same 15% off offer, so we will probably go back then. Its something that will be there for 20 years so we may as well get the one we want.
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From the photos I could tell that the bath u-bend is the same diameter as the plastic one available now. I also had to find out where the power cable was coming from. As the new shower is going at the opposite end of the bath, I'm going to have to run in a new power cable to the shower.View attachment 13035View attachment 13036View attachment 13037View attachment 13038View attachment 13039
So I had to dig a channel into the wall to put in a new power cable to the shower. Before we do that we need to know the size of the cable. The shower is 9800watts. So due to the length of cable, allowing for volt drops, and trying to keep an air gap around the cable, I went for 10mm2 cable and a channel large enough to give it at least a 3 mm gap all round. This cable had to run down under the stairs to the trip switch.Cables put into the channel and the cover put over ready for plastering over later on.Tiles had to be chosen. I have been to a place in Waterlooville few years ago called 'In 2 Tiles' they are near Kwikfit. The chap in there is a great guy, no pushy sales. Gives free advice, and lets you get on looking. He also has a soft spot for American cars. There were many many sheets of tiles to look through, i could have spend all day there. One set felt very Mediterranean, and with two tones of tiles it looked like what i wanted even though I went there open minded and not sure what i wanted. I felt like a woman shopping for a moment, looking at every item in every shop only to go back to the first shop to buy something. Although I done all this in one shop. :becky:
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Soo many tiles to choose from, I took a few photos of some I liked. The bottom three photos are the tiles we settled on but with a different separator. The tiles are Kristal Avorio and Kristal Ambra. The separator we wasn't too sure on so we went back another time, and saw a copper mosaic glass separator photos of it later on.View attachment 13045View attachment 13046View attachment 13047View attachment 13042View attachment 13051View attachment 13040View attachment 13041
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Plastered over the cable. Notice in the left photo, there was some loose plaster above the bath. So this had to be filled in too. Its like the bath was cemented in.Had to get the tiles off. We are keepng the mirror. The old tiles were tiles around it. Some tiles fell off, some needed minor tapping. After a few hours all tiles on those couple of walls were off.
However tapping the wall some of it sounded hollow.
[video=youtube_share;f9jTJY_OlFo]http://youtu.be/f9jTJY_OlFo[/video]
So after this digging around I ended up removing quite a lot of plaster.This had to be done, as sticking tiles to loose plaster would be silly. Once the plaster off. I had to practice some plastering skills. Never done it before. After putting the cables in it gave me a bit of practice. I also got more tools to help apply the plaster. There is now 25kg(weight in powder form) of plaster on the wall.
It ended up nice and smooth, and using a straight edge, its all within around 0.5mm on being level across a 1 meter straight edge. Which is pretty good, certainly perfect for tiles. So now the plaster is all done. Its time to get the old bath out. Even that isn't as simple as you would think.
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Yes that is a car jack in the first photo. The bath would not budge, it wasn't screwed to the metal frame. No screws in the legs holding it to the floor. It was cemented into the wall. So as I knew I needed to tidy the wall with fresh plaster, therefore out cam the jack to get this bath moving. Got the bath out, dismantled the wooden frame, and then took the sink off the wall. I have a couple of pipe cutters so cutting the pipes just takes a matter of seconds. Next was to lift up the floor boards and start running in some new pipes to put the taps at the opposite end of the bath.After the bath was removed it left a gap around the wall. This was re plastered, and the pipes wee added under the floor, and up the wall. Once the pipe was in place up the wall. i made sure it was sticking out 32mm from the wall surface. 8mm taken up by the tile thickness, approx 2mm for tile glue, and the center of the pipe is 2mm offset inside the shower. This all worked out perfectly.Brought in the bath from the spare room to offer it up to check for size. It just fits in perfectly. Offered the side panel up to get an idea what it will all look like. Then took the bath out, back into the spare room, where I measured up where the holes should go for the taps. Applied sealant around the taps before tightening, also the waste pipe assembly. Not its ready to put back into the bathroom.Bath in, and just had to try it out, well it had been a couple of days without a bath, so it was needed. Also put one tile on the wall. First of many.
