Making a proper shower pan is the most important step in making a solid, water tight shower. It seems easy to do, but unless done properly can lead to disasters with leaks and wandering water. A shower pan is a mortar bed that slopes into a drain. Sounds easy, doesn't it? If you wish to build a shower, you can probably build the pan yourself, if you do it carefully. Let's find out how.
Instructions
1. Use a multi-layered approach for building a shower pan. Use a waterproof membrane and a mortar bed.
2. Start with the drain. The drain is the only place for water to go in a shower. If the drain gets clogged, the water will fill the shower and run onto the floor. Use a clamping ring drain. The top half works just like an ordinary drain and the bottom half provides backup drainage. Put the supporting flange of the drain directly on the plywood subfloor. It will be kept in place with mortar you install later.
3. Create a sloped floor with a thin, latex-modified mortar bed. The minimum recommended subfloor slope is 1/4 inch per foot. After calculating the proper slope, fasten 3/4x3/4-inch float strips around the perimeter of the shower floor to serve as guides when installing the mortar bed.
4. Set a clamp ring drain at the subfloor and nail 3/4-inch float strips around the edge of the shower floor. When the float strips are nailed in, cover the plywood subfloor with a layer of 15-lb. roofing felt, followed by a layer of galvanized expanded wire lath held flat with staples.
5. Trowel out the latex-modified mortar. To shape the slope, ride over the float strips and the drain flange with a wood float and compact the mortar by tamping it with the float. Since the cross-section of this deck mud can be as thin as 3/8 inch at the drain area, always use a strength-enhancing latex additive instead of water when mixing the mortar. Let the sloped mortar bed harden overnight before installing the shower pan membrane.
6. Install the shower pan liner. The shower pans must move because over time buildings move. Use chlorinated polyethylene (CPE) sheet membrane for shower pan liners. It bonds to itself to make shower pans of any size. Install blocking between the studs around the entire perimeter of the pan area, making sure the blocking extends at least one inch above the upturned sides of the pan. Also ensure that all fasteners are countersunk or flush. Make the sides eight to nine inches high or what your local codes say. Unroll the membrane and cut it to the right size, crease the corners, fold up the membrane and place it on the shower floor for a trial fit. When you are sure the fit is right, remove the membrane, loosely screw the membrane clamping bolts into the lower half of the drain and run a bead of rubber sealant around the lower drain flange. Put the membrane over the shower floor and lower it into place. After creasing and folding the excess corner material, staple it to the wall blocking, keeping all staples to within an inch of the top edge. Apply sealant between the layers of the corner folds to hold the material tight against the wall blocking.
7. Install prefabricated dam corners. Where the upturned membrane meets the shower curb, install prefabricated dam corners, available from the membrane manufacturer. Apply two 1/8-inch beads (spaced 1/2 inch apart) of sealant to the pan membrane, then use a trowel to bed the dam corners into the sealant. Place all fasteners in the top inch of the upturned edges. With the membrane in place, cut around the bolt heads protruding from the drain, and press the membrane over all four bolts. Now, tighten the bolts, then cut a hole in the membrane to open the pan to the drain.
8. Test the shower pan. Plug the drain with an expansion-type stopper and fill the pan with water up to the top of the curb. Now drain the water and install the mortar floor.
9. Float the mortar floor. Before installing the mortar bed, thread the adjustable drain screen into the body of the clamping ring drain, setting it at the finished height of the tile floor. Place a free-draining material like pea gravel around the base of the drain to prevent the deck mud from plugging the weep holes. Float out approximately half of the deck mud, lay in a piece of reinforcing wire, then cover the wire with the remaining deck mud. Use 16/16-gauge 2x2-inch mesh, 13/13-gauge 3x3-inch mesh, or 16/13-gauge 11/2x2-inch mesh. Now float the bed to its final slope. The finished height of the mortar bed should position the floor tile 1/16 to 1/8 inch above the top of the drain, and 1/8 to 1/4 inch below the bottom edge of the wall tile. Notch the top front edge of the wood float so that it rides along the bottom edge of the wall tile that you installed before you started building the shower pan.
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