I am not a plumber, but I am mechanically pretty good. I have a situation with my shower drain that has me stumped, so I am turing to this newsgroup. The shower in question is a fiberglass Aquaglass shower stall, 1 piece. The base is solid. Here's the story:
THe shower drain started leaking. The drywall below the shower was damaged, so I cut out the drywall and found that 4 years ago when the house was built, the plumber did not glue the drain to the PVC pipe. The drain is similiar to this one:
I called a local plumbing company (good reputation) and the plumber that arrived took the drain apart and glued it like it should have been. I wanted to give it a little time before I re-drywalled just to make sure it was not going to leak anymore. I also marked the drain nut (the nut that holds the drain to the shower base) to see if it was going to back off. He tested the drain before he left and it did not leak. About a week later, I thought I noticed some water around the drain nut. So, I stopped up the drain with a
2" test plug, filled the shower and it did leak. More of a seep, but close to dripping slowly. This was with my wife wading through the water in the shower. It did seep without her in it also. The drain nut marks indicated that the nut had NOT moved.Called plumbing company, so they sent over a very experienced plumber to look at it. He cut the PVC and pulled the drain out. Replaced the drain with the same style, and used one of those no-hub connectors, it did have the stainless steel jacket. Before he did that, we both looked for any cracks in the fiberglass around the drain. We couldn't find any. I saw that he put a good amount of putty around the flange before he wrenched the drain nut down. We tested it, no leaks. I marked the drain nut again. Later that night, I did the test plug deal again with my wife, no leaks.
This brings me to last night which was about 2 weeks since the last plumber. I tested it again, because I was going to re-drywall. I did the test plug deal again, and it leaked/seeped like the first time. THe drain nut marks again indicated that the nut had NOT moved.
Now to today. Before I loosened the drain nut, I checked to see how tight it was. I felt right at the line of snug. I loosened the drain nut, and loosened the no-hub, pulled the drain up. I looked for an hour with a magnifier and bright light, and could find no cracks at all. In fact the drain part of the base looked in excellent condition. So, I installed a brass drain like this one:
- How tight should a shower drain nut be?
- I know this is out there, but I have to ask. Do these drains have issues with expansion/contractions problems, at least when they are first installed?
- Could the putty settle more in a week or two?
Any insight is appreciated.
Thanks,
John