Drying out a bathroom

[Richard Dixon]

Dear uk.d-i-y

Having moved into my place 6 months ago I've finally got round to looking at my horror-show of a bathroom. Just taken off the tiles which were barely on and unsurprisingly revealed a wall that is damp to the touch. I've put a gruesome photo here:

advice on drying out of the wall:

- buying / hiring a dehumidifier (which is cheaper?!)

- is having the window open a help or is it better to have the heating on full blast?

Many thanks for any information Richard

[Grunff]

Heating full blast, and a proper inductrial dehumidifier (not a B&Q one). A small room will be pretty dry in a day or two. It will cost you a fortune in electricity and heating.

Hiring is the only sensible option unless you want to spend several hunderd pounds. You local hire shop should be able to help.

[Richard Dixon]

Grunff wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Thanks for the information - in the meantime whilst I don't have a dehumidifier, it is best to have a window open as much as possible?

Regards Richard

[Grunff]

Yes, heating + window.

[Andrew Gabriel]

Find and fix the source of the damp (maybe you did, you didn't say?)

Keep the room ventilated all the time and heated (doesn't have to be all the time). The wall will dry out by itself anyway once you have removed the source of the damp.

Dehumidifier can easily overdo things, and with an older house in particular this can cause damage (e.g. curled up floorboards because room on one side is vastly different humidity from room on the other side). I wouldn't bother buying or hiring one for this -- improving the ventilation is a better way.

If you are intending to strip the damp wall back to brickwork, depending on the finish, you might find this is easier and less dusty if you do it whilst the material is wet.

I would say the area under the bath is at serious risk of dry rot from what I can see. I would remove the bath panel and ensure that area is well aired and dried out too, and obviously look for dry rot there.

[Andy Hall]

The wall will dry out naturally once the source of damp is removed.

The more important question is where is the water coming from. Even in a bathroom you should not have this situation with the walls.

Is the pipe at the top purely a shower rail or is it part of the plumbing of a shower over the bath? I can't quite make it out completely.

It rather looks as though the dampest area is above the taps. Is there other plumbing buried in the wall if the visible pipe is a shower rail only?

If you take off the bath panel, does the damp extend below the top of the bath towards the floor?

Could you have penetrating damp from outside? For example, it appears that there is a window above the basin. Is there a leaking gutter above the wall behind the tap end of the bath?

This dampness could be explained by a failure of the grout and/or glaze of the tiles if you have been using the tap end of the bath as a stand up shower regularly - however, I would suggest checking really carefully that there is not some other source of water. In that sense, I think you would be better off letting it dry out naturally. It should do if the house is naturally warm through CH. It's possible that you have a smallish leak or penetration of water, and the wall will remain damp if that is the case. If you artificially dry, you may mask the problem.

.andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl

[Richard Dixon]

[e-mail] (Andrew Gabriel) wrote in news:bqacvt$meg$ [e-mail]:

Thanks ever so much to everyone for their replies. Yes, the bathroom has been used for showering - the tiles around the "splash area" came off very easily indeed which suggests that moisture had got behind the back of the tiles. In answer to another of the questions, the pipe at the top is just a shower rail. I had a timber and damp report when I moved in that suggested no penetrating damp, but you never know how accurate these are...

Having come back from the shops after 4 hours or so, the wall looks generally a lot drier already which is heartening. Thankfully I live next door to a gym so I can use the shower there!

Thanks again to all for their help - very useful indeed.

A very grateful Richard

[N. Thornton]

Hi.

The fact that the damp is concentrated in the one area indicates something. If you need a dehumidifier I suggest a cheap used fridge, leave the fridge door open and you have a £20 dehumidifier. Done it, it works.

Regards, NT

[Richard Dixon]

[e-mail] (N. Thornton) wrote in news:a7076635.0311300432.3e32b7a6 @posting.google.com:

Thanks for the tip. I actually took another photo this morning having done the heating on full blast/window open, looks much better this morning (although I'm not taking it for granted!).

[fred]

In article , Richard Dixon writes

cement/adhesive, just asking for it IMHO as any penetration past the grout would have pissed in & soaked the wall.