QUESTION: Is this layout correct?

[JackOfAllTrades]

Dear experts,

We are having our tract home upgraded (unfortunately by the builders - we have NO choice in this one) and I would appreciate your comments on the appropriateness of this layout on the shower floor.

You can see visually where you enter the shower, and you can also see how the grout lines are not centered at the drain centerline either. I have drawn in the red lines to show where I believe the grout lines should be. As you can see, the red lines would pretty much intersect at the corners, so I think it would work well.

To cut to the chase, as these tiles were laid yesterday, I would like to know if I should have these ripped out and reset per the centerline of the drain as I feel is appropriate.

Please click on the link and let me know your thoughts ... I thank you all very much in advance for your input!

Please view/comment on this layout

JOAT

[John Bridge]

Looks to me like you would be creating more of a mess. You'd have the little "points" on three walls instead of on one. I guess it's debatable.

[scott anthony]

Never mind you need experts.

No really these pics are great and tell us all we need to know.
The layout it not the best but it's not the end of the world either.
You could try to center the drain off of one tile and come out with nice size cuts everywhere, but that might be a tough cut.
If you or they center the drain off of four tiles, like John said I think maybe you might small ones at the edges.
When it's grouted it always looks better.
Either way centering the drain is the way to go here.

[Dog paws]

If I'm looking at this right, standing at the shower door, you have points at your west and south walls. Half cuts at the north and east. If you align your grout lines centered to the drain, you will then have even smaller points, (half of what they are now), on all four walls.
If you center the job for the fullest cuts around the perimeter, you'll end up with a L-cut, or maybe even a plunge cut at the drain.

[Art in Stone]

I agree with John.
I guess it depends on where you would like to see all those little cuts at.

[scott anthony]

I want to take back the idea that one tile might work center.
Seeing how the tile is larger than the drain it would need to be cut in 4 peices to allow the slope. No way.

[ninemile]

I too don't know whether it's worth having them pull up floor and redo. Unfortunately it looks like the walls dictate small triangles on at least 1 side like you've got now. It will look cleaner with grout though, just use a similar color to the tile to avoid calling too much attention to pattern.

But if it were me doing the job, I would've cut a nice contrasting floor boarder and designing it so that I could shift the field tiles and get nice even cuts on all sides.

But then, I'm into the cut tile thing

[JackOfAllTrades]

Thank you all for your comments and critiques ... I'm not sure exactly how I feel about it at this point, I think I will "sleep on it" and revisit the shower again this weekend and take another look with a fresh mind (yeah right!).

I'm going to take a few more photos of it at that time, from the top view, showing all of the tiles from wall to wall, as I wasn't able to stand in there since the mortar was wet. I'll post them up and we can possibly revisit this armed with a little bit more ammunition.

Thanks again for all your feedback, and I'll keep you updated when I get more pics!

JOAT

[John Bridge]

Colleen,

You're idea is a good one. That's one way to do away with the points.

Still, though, I can't say the floor is done wrong. Centering on the drain is not a high priority usually. Of course, usually I'm using a 2x2 or 1x1, and it doesn't show up as much.

[tileguytodd]

Perhaps if the tiles had not been set on the diagonal,things would have worked out better.Of course then they would have had to lay out all walls and floor at the same time to get everything to match.Most likely what i would have done.

[Vader,Darth]

I think it's making a mountain of a problem out of nothing.

I'm sure it will look great when it's grouted, so why worry about it?

As long as it doesn't leak, don't waste the tile guy's time with a minor 'flaw.'

[doitright]

Everyone has brought up some great points here. I see why the setter chose his particular layout. If I would choose to start with full halves at right angles, I would certainly put them in the focal corner and put the points at the curb, and the least visible wall.

I'm also for that matching grout idea Coleen mentioned. Is it worth tearing out, absolutely not! Would each of us have done something different, probably! It's a tract house. Tract houses where I live call for one piece fiberglass units or 4 x 4's with a fiberglass pan. This is definetly way better than that!

As for the idea of lining up with the wall tiles, good idea also, but I'd take a closer look at the wall tile layout. I see that there would be a sliver tile issue on the existing layout.

Leave it alone and enjoy it. Make sure it gets the proper sealers and maintenance when it's completed and put into use.

[JackOfAllTrades]

Hi again everyone ... just wanted you to see what the shower drain area would look like if the tiles were centered about it's "axis".

Personally, regardless of what happens to the cut pieces and that they would fall on the far wall away from the shower entrance curb, I still feel that it looks more 'proper' this way than the way it is currently, and that is, IMHO, cockeyed.

We'll probably just "live with it" the way it is, but I can tell you all a few stories about the so-called tilesetter who did this job. I think the forum personalities here are indeed professional gurus of the trade. All of them make the guy who did our bathroom a rank amateur, and that's no exaggeration. I am literally pulling out my hair getting him to reset tile after tile, row after row. I am no professional by comparison, but I know that I can "hands down" do a better job that this unqualified individual. I'm teaching him how to do it!!! It's very frustrating, and this shower floor is the epitome of my experience thus far with this contractor. If I had hired him personally, he would have been fired before lunchbreak!



Click on the thumbnails to see a "before and after"

[scott anthony]

I agree
Small peices never look too bad when on the diagnol.
Now go get some sleep

[hammerhead]

Sorry to say this, I'll probably get reprimanded, but CHILL OUT! Dale just did a "L" shaped bathroom floor. The owner wanted a different color accent tile in the middle on a diagonal. Dale layed it out so that the accent was in the middle, cuts on the 2 walls were equal, but back behind the toilet the cuts had to be different and smaller. The man of the house had a little hissy fit about this, his wife was fine with it. Got this job thru a local flooring store. Somebody has got to tear it out and start over. We don't get paid! You cannot stretch tile and people just have to understand that.