Now it seems I need to do some bathroom tile repair. Do I do it right? Check back in a few years.

About ten years ago, we replaced the linoleum in our house with tile. This included the kitchen, hallways and bathrooms. In a previous house we had good a experience with Congoleum Duraceramic tile. We found the Duraceramic product to be softer than ordinary ceramic tile, as well as warmer. Also durable. So, we chose to use it again and all has been well. Until now.

Recently, we noticed some cracking in the grout beside the shower in our main bathroom. Also, while the tiles were not loose, one of them seemed to spring up and down slightly near the cracked grout. I thought about hiring a professional for a repair. The guy I talked to about bathroom tile repair asked if we had the grout or replacement tile. Unfortunately, we had neither.

So we visited a couple of Duraceramic retailers locally. Neither stocked grout nor our style of tile. I contacted the Canadian distributor, who told me that our “malt” colored grout was no longer available. At this point, I had a vision of needing to do a major replacement rather than a bathroom tile repair.

In the spirit of “making it up as I go along”, I thought I would try my replacing the grout. If it doesn’t work, I can always do a more sophisticated repair later. Also, I know that you are supposed to use a special (proprietary) Duraceramic brand grout. However, I thought I would try some ordinary grout and see if it worked. My bathroom tile repair project then moved on to Home Depot where I bought a small container of Polyblend sanded grout mix of the nearest color.

Using a utility knife, I began to cut away the old grout, as shown in the picture above. I used a straight edge to guide the knife and not damage the tile. Since the grout was already cracked it came away pretty easily. That’s when I noticed that the wood underlay was damp. Oh oh. I cleaned out the channels and used a hair dryer to begin drying things out.

But was the damp underlay a result of the cracked grout, or was there some other leak?

Bathroom Tile Repair Finding the Leak

As I pulled back the baseboard near the bottom of the shower door, I found the source of the leak. And a big one.

At the bottom of the stud next to the shower door, I found an open hole. There was some evidence that the original installers had applied a bit of silicone, but otherwise no attempt appears to have been made to properly seal the surface or fill the hole. I suspect that in recent years, whenever the shower door opens, a bit of water splashes onto the tile, and then some finds its way to this hole. So, I left everything open for a few days, with a bit of heat, and hoped the underlay damage was not too bad. I still want to try a bathroom tile repair and see if it holds.

But first I need to seal this hole. More on that in the next article.