Cost of adding an en-suite

Gavin83

benson1980 said:

Gavin83 said:

This thread is making me glad I did my entire bathroom DIY. Was a bit like Sophie4120's refurb, involving moving walls, moving radiators, completely redoing all copper pipework, waste pipe runs and soil pipe in the room and LVT flooring, plus an installation of a new extractor fan as there wasn't one before. Bath, sink and toilet are Villeroy & Boch and all the fittings are Crosswater. We went with paneling which was a lot of work in itself and I also built my own vanity unit.

Ended up costing a little under £4k in total. Were I quoted £14k I don't think I'd have bothered.

Currently doing the other bathroom which is working out at around £3.5k. Most of the stuff in there is Lusso.

Slightly off topic- Was this your first attempt at redoing copper pipes- did you find it straightforward and did you solder them? Just asking as I’m thinking of taking on this aspect as well for my next bathroom project so would be interested to hear how you got on.

Re the OPs quote: 14k sounds like a massive amount of money especially when it doesn’t include the fittings. I’d be getting two more quotes, personally…

Yep was my first attempt and yes I did solder them. It isn't too difficult once you get the hang of it. There's definitely a routine to follow, you need to make sure the pipes are super clean (I have a little tool for this, like a circular wire brush tunnel you put the pipe in) and make sure to use flux, although not loads. 22mm is marginally harder than 15mm. I did practice a bit first on some pipe offcuts so I could get a feel for how it worked and how long it would take and I'd recommend that.

Also I opted to use Yorkshire fittings. They're a bit more expensive but they have the solder already inside and they're meant to be easier to use. However I do add an extra bit of solder just to make sure. If you heat the fitting you'll eventually (about 10 secs) see the silver solder just appear out the joint. That's when it's done.

By far the hardest element for me is joining onto existing piping. It's much harder to clean them up in place and the pipes need to be almost completely dry for it to work. I've found sometimes you'll get a bit of water appear out of nowhere and it'll mess you up.

If you're reasonably confident at DIY it's worth giving it a go though.

benson1980

Hadn't heard of Yorkshire fittings before but they definitely look to be the way forward- thanks!

Ganga

Gavin83 said:

This thread is making me glad I did my entire bathroom DIY. Was a bit like Sophie4120's refurb, involving moving walls, moving radiators, completely redoing all copper pipework, waste pipe runs and soil pipe in the room and LVT flooring, plus an installation of a new extractor fan as there wasn't one before. Bath, sink and toilet are Villeroy & Boch and all the fittings are Crosswater. We went with paneling which was a lot of work in itself and I also built my own vanity unit.

Ended up costing a little under £4k in total. Were I quoted £14k I don't think I'd have bothered.

Currently doing the other bathroom which is working out at around £3.5k. Most of the stuff in there is Lusso.

I have re-furbed our bathroom twice BUT as i am now well over 70 sod it let someone else do it ,theres no point in having money and breaking your back to save a few quid ( we are not rich but would rather go on holiday whilst someone else carries out the work )