A Clusterfuck of Epic Proportions

So for the last week and a half, I've been reflooring the bathroom. It's been one non stop thing after another. To start, the main reason I was doing it was because somehow the seal at the base of the toilet was leaking and it had to be pulled out anyways. Additionally, I have children who like to splash in the tub so my weak ass vinyl flooring just wasn't cutting it. I have put vinyl flooring in there twice now, so it was now time to move up to ceramic tile.

Ok, so that's great right? Ceramic's relatively easy to install. However, because the cheap ass former owners cheaped out on their bathroom remodel in the 80's the subfloor was a vinyl sheet over 1/4" plywood over 1/4" fiberboard over the vinyl sheet from the 50's/60's over the original floor. Let me say that that is not an effective water barrier because there was super mold from where the wood soaked up all the water from the toilet....gross. Pulling out all that shit sucked ass as well because it was nailed down every 3" (the floor is uneven) and then I had renail the 50's linoleum down because there's nothing but glue holding it in place. On top of that the original subfloor doesn't go all the way to the wall, so I had to fill that with foam sealant.

For a new subfloor I went with 1/2" cement board (I probably should have gone with 1/4", but Menard's didn't have it). It's fairly straightforward to install, you lay down a layer of mortar so that there's no gaps under the cement board and then nail it down about every 6 to 8". It is a pain in the ass to cut out though. It is cement after all, I had to resort to using a knife to mark where I wanted it cut and then hammer the shit out of it to break up the concrete so I could cut out the other side.

Ok, so far so good. The tile isn't too bad to put in, except I got a little crooked in laying it, resulting in 1 row of tiles being a little offset from the rest. My major gripe was that I was cheap and didn't buy a tile saw and had to use a hand tile cutter for straight lines and tile nippers to carve out all the odd shapes. Tile nippers are a bitch to work with. I snapped 4 or 5 tiles before I got the hang of it.

So, woot, woot it's all going smoothly....or is it? Here's where the fun begins. When trying to set the toilet I used a non wax flange. It's essentially a piece of rubber that is glued to the bottom of the toilet and it provides the seal. Well, first of all I got the wrong one. Secondly, my toilet bolts were now too short because the tile added about a 1/2" to the floor height (and one was broken). So I go out, get new bolts and a new flange and the bolts are STILL too short to really get the toilet tight and the flange is going in tight. Anyways because I wanted to have a toilet, I put it in and tightened it as best as I could. Lo and behold, it leaks. It turns out that the cast iron pipe from the 1900's isn't quite 4" in diameter ::facepalm::

I go back to the store, get longer bolts, and a wax ring. I install the toilet and notice that the fucking tank connection is leaking again because the putty I put in there moved. Luckily I actually had another tank (Pam accidentally dropped the lid and it shattered and buying a new tank is easier than trying to find a replacement lid), so I installed the new tank, install the new bolts put the wax ring on, tighten everything and voila, success!!!! But wait, why is there still water on the floor? Apparently I put a chip in the porcelain where the water from the tank drains into the bowl and water is leaking out of that. I sure as fuck am not going to take out the bowl again so I went back to the store and got some marine epoxy which worked. WOOHOO! I haz a toilet.

Now it's time for the sink. OH FUCK! Now I have to raise all the brackets by 1/2" :'-( . In the process of taking the sink off, I broke the plastic drain assembly. I had to go back to the store and buy a new one. After putting it together, lo and behold it works! So at this point all I need to do is seal the grout and put a transition piece in the doorway and I is done.

I like being able to be Mr. DIY, but sometimes I wish I had the money to hire a pro. This was one of those times :) Pictures will be included tonight when I get home.

"As Mr. Sloan always says, there is no "I" in team, but there is an "I" in pie. And there's an "i" in meat pie. Meat is the anagram of team... I don't know what he's talking about." - Shaun of the Dead