Bath/shower leaking down through ceiling into kitchen

greyhoundcrazy

Hi, we need to fix this for as little £ as possible. Any advice appreciated - thanks.

This leak happens intermittently. It has been hard to find a pattern to it really. Sometimes it leaks following the use of the shower. Sometimes it doesn't. Same happens with the bath. It might be to do with the amount of water.

It's hard to look under the bath because it is on a raised platform that has been tiled. We would have to rip the tiles off in order to remove the bath panel.

Maybe we should reseal everything first and if that doesn't work, progress to more invasive/expensive investigation of the pipes below?

I don't want to rip the bathroom apart for no reason because I don't have the money to put it all back in place again at the moment. I'm worried that water may be building up somewhere or soaking in, causing damage that will become very expensive if ignored.

evoke

1. Check sealant;

2. Check waste pipes (you'll need to do this one way or another);

3. Check supply pipes;

4. Check tiling.

The bath panel should always be removable for problems like this to be investigated!

If you have buildings insurance then you might be able to claim but there's likely to be a hefty excess.

You could also try a more systematic approach to finding the cause. Is the shower above the bath or in its own separate cubicle? If it's above the bath then i'd say it's got to be sealant or waste pipe.

Try plugging the plughole and so no water escapes into the waste pipe and use the shower. If water leaks through into the kitchen below then it's probably sealant/tile/grout issue.

If water only leaks through when it's going through the plughole then it could be a loose waste trap/waste pipe.

greyhoundcrazy

evoke wrote: »

1.

The bath panel should always be removable for problems like this to be investigated!

Yes I can appreciate that now. Didn't occur to me 10 years ago when I was a first time buyer unfortunately.

Thanks for the advice. Will do those things.

macman

If an acrylic bath, it may be flexing with the weight of water (when bathing), or occupant (when showering).
You'll never know until you get the side panel off.

keystone

I did a job a bath a while ago where a dear old lady (who only used about 6" of water when she had a bath) on a saving water and energy basis suddenly found water coming down into her living room. That bath was also tiled in with no access. She was convinced that the waste had developed a leak but that would hav ebeen impossible to prove without some wholesale destruction.

It turned that she had a new cleaner who was throwing water about with gay abandon (using the shower head attached to the taps) when doing the cleaning.

On close inspection the sealant round the bath had just failed with age - no obvious major flex on the bath. Took it all out and resealed it and (3 months later) no recurrence.

Cheers

cadburymisshape

We had a similar problem earlier this year! It too was intermittent and to start with we just ignored it thinking it would go away.....stupid idea really!! We put new sealant on and hey-presto, no more leak! So I would recommend doing that first as it didn't cost at that much and you can do it yourself (no cost for labour). Hope you get it fixed soon and cheaply!

keystone

cadburymisshape wrote: »

......(no cost for labour)........

Of course there was. Do you not value your time then?

Cheers

googler

There's little value in renewing the sealant around the top of the bath if the leak is from the waste pipe, so you need to narrow down the circumstances in which the leak occurs, but this is difficult to do in a bathroom that's being regularly used.

Isolating it to the sealant might involve deliberately pointing the shower head at the top edge of the bath.

Fill the bath and leave it with the plug in. If there's a leak at this stage, the plug surround needs to be reseated in the bath. If the leak shows up when you empty the bath, the waste pipe is at fault. Etc etc to eliminate other areas.

But at the end of the day, do you really want to pour more water on areas which have already been soaked? You may want to bite the bullet and take a chunk out of the bath panel and really see what's going on....

greyhoundcrazy

Thanks for all the helpful replies.

I have done the fill the bath and leave it thing. No leak.
I don't get a leak when the bath empties either.
Got a tiny leak yesterday after using the bath, which suggests sealant I think.

The shower is right beside the bath, build into the same tiled section of the room, but has it's own tray and plug hole. When I used that I got the biggest leak so far by miles.

I will try the spray the seal thing tomorrow and see what happens.

Thanks

keystone

Replace the sealant.

1. Its the easiest for you as a first step.

2. It eliminates the sealant as the source one way or the other..