Is it feasible to *make* a shower tray (or, better, the lower part of a shower cubicle) for a motorhome?
I have had trouble sourcing a shower tray that is suitable so I wonder whether a shower tray could be home made. Options considered but rejected:
waterproof lining, vinyl tiles on top, lots of sealant
waterproof lining and ceramic tiles
Both of these are not as easy as they sound due to the required location of the drain hole. So I wondered whether it would be possible to make the tray with fibreglass. Anyone tried anything like this?
From what I have read about fibreglass, it would be very do-able, but a lot of work involved for just making one. You would need to make a mold and design it so the mold would be releasable once set.
No doubt it would also be much heavier than the acrylic ones made for the job, but much more durable too.
If you make yourself a 'plug' out of plywood & filler i.e. the shape of the inside of the tray with a slope to wherever the drain will be... get it smooth, wax it and then be easy enough to lay up fibreglass & matting ... Aim for 8- 10mm thick, and glass in a couple of cross supports 2x1 for example, probably make sense to glass in surround frame as well.
Loads of web sites showing how to do fibre glass work.
If you want a particular colour paint the mould with a few coats of gelcoat in colour you want first.
You would need: Resin + Catalyst West systems do matched kits for quantity Matting Metal roller Acetone disposable gloves (plenty of them) wax or release agent (Silcone spray) Gellcoat if you want it coloured stippling brushes (stiff bristle disposable paint brushes)
You would need to allow for thickness of base when making your plug ..if it has to fit in an exact size.
Easy to drill hole afterwards for a standard drain ...you could even put a 'large collar/washer' on the plug, so you mould in a recess for a drain face plate which will allow water drain off easier (only needs about 5mm recess)
Not a difficult job ... just spend the time on the plug ....
I would use a sheet of 12mm ply to support the base of the tray, rather than cross-supports. Motor homes don't usually have a lot of headroom to play with.
Don't forget that smooth wet GRP can be slippery, so you may want to mould in some texture to the tray base. You also need to taper the sides of the tray slightly, to make releasing it from the mould easier.
Yes, the plan is that the fibreglass will not need to carry weight. It will rest fully on a wooden underfloor and be surrounded by a wooden frame.
In fact, rather than make a mould - a "plug" as Rick called it - would it be feasible to lay the fibreglass directly on the wooden base and frame and leave it where it is laid? In this case there would be no mould to be made and the fibreglass would be a perfect fit to the underlying structure.
I'm sure that's far from normal but could it be done? I expect that the resulting surface would be expected to be too rough - much too rough! But could that surface then be treated in some way - sanded and/or covered to make it suitable?
The finish might not be as good, but you can do it in reverse order. You will need to end the lay-up with sanding gel coat. That, as the name suggests, is intended to be sanded to a fine finish, then painted. A marine epoxy paint would probably be best for a shower tray.
Or, to help solve both problems, make a frame with a rigid base for the tray, and lay the fibreglass directly into it. Fits perfectly, and it's got a rough surface, too. If you take reasonable care with the lay up, it'll still be smooth enough to keep clean.
Would it be easier to use the material they line Wetroom floors with and get a chap in to to seal the joints in place with the proper tools. Might even find a bloke who would do the job as a Homer using offcuts from a big job.
GRP fabrication can be quite messy, you may spend a few bob just on cleaning materials, disposable gloves,Tools etc which is fine for a largish job like canoe but a bit OT for a small shower tray.
That's unusual but it is an interesting point. I have in mind getting the tray to drain to one particular corner as that's the only place I can fit something like a U bend. If I put a drain hole in the opposite corner it would have to go down through the floor directly into the waste water tank. (The top of the waste water tank is about 25mm below the floor so there's no room for any kind of trap.) But then there would be nothing to prevent smells coming up from the tank.
It's a pity. If a drain could have been be put in opposite corners then the shower floor could have gone in flat!
Do you actually need plumbing to a waste water tank? I would have thought it could just discharge through the floorpan onto the ground, like the toilet in my caravan. Regards. Terry.
Fibreglass would be the way to go as being one piece shouldn't leak. And it's how some are made anyway. A bit of Googling should give the method. Basically, you start off with a mould, which can be made from near anything and a mixture of materials. Perhaps a wood frame and plaster to give a neat shape.
When i had my motorhome which was a coachbuilt shell that i fitted out, i had found a larger than usual shower tray at magnums (place in Grimsby to get parts for self building motorhomes) and made my cubicle to suit out of shower boards, silicone and trim strips. then i went and put a crate of coke bottles in the shower whilst in Germany thinking it was a good place to store them out of the way,
Of course the crate slid about and smashed the corners of the tray to bits, i made a temporary repair with silicone and some sort of patch cloth i got from OBI (German B&Q on steroids... they even have a boat section selling anchors, oars, inflatable's, navigation lights and so on)
then when i got home i tried to find a replacement tray, but had no luck,
So i wondered about that stuff they use to spray a bed liner into the back of pickup trucks, and asked the makers of it if it would be suitable, they said probably, but couldn't guarantee it as no one had done it before (i wanted to coat the entire shower enclosure, floor to ceiling)
Then i found places that made one piece shower cubicles in situ, using a chopper gun to spray on first the stranded matting stuff, then smooth coats to finish off, They were the firms that advertise GRP spraying insides of vans for window cleaners who have the tanks and filters in the back, so if they leak no harm will be done,
Unfortunately i can't recall how much it would have cost, but it wasn't too bad considering i could add 'features' like soap holders, hooks, recess the shower valve and riser bar holders etc, and it would all be made to look one piece when finished.
But i then found out the shower tray i had used was the size fitted to static caravans, so managed to order a new one with the cubicle wall molding and a tube of MEK to bond the 2 together once in place.
I made a shower tray, or in fact a "wet room" using vinyl for the whole floor and the walls. There's no sign of leakage. I cut out the floorboards and lowered the joist and sloped the boards to where the shower waste was. I put plywood over the whole floor. The shower waste goes through the vinyl and through a nylon board underneath that is screwed to the floorboards. There's a trick to using contact glue to glue a piece of 2 metre by 4 metre vinyl on to a wall, which I solved after a bit of thought!
Only reason I said use a plug is that this is normal approach .. you put effort into making the surface 'good' as it becomes the finished surface of the 'cast'
You can laminate direct but very difficult to get smooth surface with correct fall.
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