Questions on Shower job

[Al Bundified]

Has anyone had any experience installing a pocket door behind a shower wall in a typical 2 x 4 framed wall?

Shower stall dimension = 38" x 48" x 38"
36" Pocket Door would be behind one of the 38" shower stall walls.

Anyone see any potential problems? Studs spaced too far apart for mounting Durock perhaps? Suggested fixes if this is deemed to be the case?

Using glazed porcelian tiles for water resistance properties. Best water resistance grout to use in conjunction with these tiles?

Next question is the correct waterproofing method to shim out an in shower electrical fog free mirror to be flush with my tile. (An example of this mirror can be seen in the "Professional's Hangout" forum - "Pic of your craziest custom tile design?" thread - page 40 - post #588 by kilroy aka Steve.)

Steve even mentions in post #595 of same thread that he wished he would've shimmed the mirror out to be flush with his tiles. I do not want to make the same mistake of not getting tile & mirror flush, so having it shimmed out yet completely waterproof (because of electrical junction box immediately behind mirror), is paramount.

Thinking of using a ready to tile pre-formed 38" x 48" x 38" shower pan from one of the manufacturers (TileRedi) in the sponsored links at the top of some of these forum pages.

Anyone have any experience with this product? Any tricks to it, things to pay attention to or watch out for when installing / tiling?

Oh yeah.

Although my name is Steve, I'm not kilroy Steve (though I'd like to be as good at tiling as him, one of these days).

[Splinter]

I've done pocket doors in shower walls, however I wont use the stud kits made for a 2x4 wall... You just get too much flex with those systems. If you can remove and rebuild the wall the width of 2x6's instead, then you should be alright... Using a 2x6 top and bottom plate, and 2x4 studs turned sideways for each wall will give you enough room between for the pocket door to fit. Use 2x6 studs for the rest of the wall where there's no door track. Dont forget the proper header across the entire pocket and doorway.

[JTG]

What Alex says about the pocket door frame being kind of flimsy it true but that being said I have put backerboard on them and and it has worked fine.
I did one time see an installation where they had screwed all the backerboard in and set the tile and the door would not slide closed. In fact it wouldn't move. It had a bunch of screws from the backerboard in it!
Good Luck
JTG

[Al Bundified]

Thanks for your reply Alex.

Quick question though, so I know I'm on the same page with you.

When you say "too much flex" with the 2 x 4 pocket door, are you referring to the stud spacing being too great when attaching the durock, or something else being "too much flex"?

Have you (or others) come up with any other solutions aside from rebuilding the wall with 2 x 6's?

This room was actually the utility closet at the end of a single car carport you see on basic brick ranch houses from the 1950's. Carport has since been framed in and become part of the living space.

Reason for the above detail, is so you know the limited amount of space I have to work with.

Putting in 2 x 6 studs would cause me to loose precious space in an already cramped room.

[muskymike]

Hi Steve, welcome! Have you considered using Kerdi? I have done several jobs that had pocket doors on the shower wall, two of them being Kerdi over drywall. You could use 5/8" drywall on just that wall and it would be very rigid.

[Splinter]

Steve, I like using the Johnson pocket door track because the wheel design is the best I've seen so far... However, the studs they have in the package are a piece of 1x2 (3/4x 1 1/2) wrapped on 3 sides with sheet metal.. They have a lot of flex to them... If you leaned on the wall with one hand while scrubbing your toes in the shower, the wall would flex a lot... I'm just not comfortable with that.

2x4's installed sideways aren't as stiff as a typically installed stud either, but it's certainly a lot better than the studs in the Johnson kit. Jerry and Mike have much more tile experience than I do, so if they say grout wont crack, I'd believe them... I've just been lucky because I could frame a sturdier wall in the few shower/pocket door wall installations I've done.

[cx]

Welcome, Al.

What Alex (Splinter) said.

My opinion; worth price charged.

[Al Bundified]

Thanks all.

CX,

You say "What Alex (Splinter) said."

Were you referring to Alex saying that the pocket door wall will flex an extreme amount because of the minimal studs?

Or were you referring to Alex saying Jerry & Mike are right & the grout won't crack?

He mentioned both & I can't figure out which paragraph of his you're referring to when you say he's right. A little clarification please.

Oh! And Alex, I'm with you on the Johnson pocket doors. They're the only ones I'll use.

Besides clarification on the above, couple of the other questions in my beginning post I'm still loooking for answers on.

Best grout to use with porcelian tiles in wet area?

Best way to shim out the electrical fog free mirror on durock to tile level, yet stay as waterproof as possible. (Will be putting the electrical box behind plastic vapor barrier and sealing hole for the wires to run through as best as possible, but still want the most waterproof shim job around mirror as possible).

Anyone have any experience working with the TileRedi pre-formed shower pan? Do's & Dont's etc....?

[cx]

I agree with Alex that a standard pocket door frame for a 2x4 wall is no place to put a tile wall. I don't like those frames much even in non-tile areas, but wouldn't even consider tiling one on my own jobs. Would build out the framing like he suggests.

Never seen one of those mirror thingees.

Never seen one of them Tile Ready pans, neither, but I do know I see absolutely no advantage to using one and several downsides. Just too easy and inexpensive to build a traditional mud pan and liner or a mud pre-slope and Kerdi shower system.

My opinion; worth price charged.

[Al Bundified]

Thanks for the clarification CX.

I'll definitely take ya'lls advice and firm up the wall where the pocket door will be.

I'd provide you a link to the fog free mirror & pre-formed shower pan, but for whatever reason, when I try to put a URL in and post it, I get a message saying I have a URL in my post and to remove it before posting.

Wierd huh?

However, if you want to see an example of the mirror installed here at these forums, just follow the instructions below;

(An example of this mirror can be seen in the "Professional's Hangout" forum - "Pic of your craziest custom tile design?" thread - page 40 - post #588 by kilroy aka Steve.)

Guess I'll figure out the waterproof shim job for the mirror on my lonesome. Can't be that hard, can it? Wood shims, silicone the snot out of it, then grout over the silicone maybe?

I'll do a search here for best grout to use with porcelian tiles. Gotta have been discussed at some point somewhere aroubnd here.

Again, thanks to all for taking the time responded to my questions.

[Al Bundified]

OK,

Installed the pocket door & firmed up the wall as suggested by Alex (aka Splinter) & seconded by CX.

I bought the small container of Spectralock Pro epoxy grout & using a few cheap porcelain tiles from the big box store, built a small mock floor & wall to practice using it on. Not bad stuff to work with really.
So I'll be using that grout as it has some advantages to traditional grout. I like the idea of an anti mold bacteria additive in it & obviously it's much more water proof than traditional grout.

New question.

Crown molding is going in this bathroom. I will be tiling up the entire shower walls & was thinking of running the crown molding all the way around the room. I figured I'd tile up to the molding in the shower stall area, with bullnose being the final run & butting right up to the molding.

Anyone see any problem with this application?

Edited:
To add link to the Fog Free Shower Mirror http://www.clearmirror.com/ShowerClearMirror.htm now that I have met the minimum number of posts required to use link feature.

[Splinter]

Anyone see any problem with this application?

Maintenance.


If you do go with the crown molding in the shower area, prime it first with an oil primer. Prime the front, back and especially all cut ends before installation.

[cx]

The grout in a tile installation is not meant to make it waterproof, nor will epoxy grout actually do that. Granted, it'll come closer than cementitious grout, but you still can't call it waterproof, nor do you actually care. The epoxy grout does have advantages for cleaning and such, but don't buy it for waterproofing.

Many (most?) cementitious grouts have anti-bacterial properties now, too, as do many caulks.

Unless your crown is very thick in profile at the bottom, I think it'd look much better installed over the tile. That's an aesthetic consideration only. And I think it would look even worse if you butt a bullnose up to the bottom, rather than just cuts.

My opinion; worth price charged.

[prescottrecorder]

Stepwarmfloor and others make low voltage heating mats that can be more safely used in a shower. If you decided to heat your shower floor and bench (if you have one) it would be easy to throw in a heated mirror.

[Al Bundified]

I was definitely going to prime all sides of the molding, but your suggestion of using an oil based primer was a good tip Alex. Many thanks!

CX,

Thanks for the info on the Spectralock epoxy grout not being completely water proof. Guess what I should've said, is that it is more water "resistant" than traditional grout.

Redgard, here I come.