large gap around tub...

I was being so careful too!

But when I put down the cardboard around the edge of the tub to protect it during the backerboard and tile instalation, I didn't realize I used double thick cardboard.

To compound it even more, the spot where I started was the high spot, I read that that is where you are supposed to start, well I had two layers of cardboard overlapped in that corner.

So now I have four sheets of cardboard and that's where the tub is highest!

My smallest gap is about 3/8 of an inch, and the largest is 9/16.

I was going to take a piece of decorative tile and use a wet saw to cut it into a ceramic piece of quarter round, and use either thinset, caulk, or adhesive to bond tile to tile and then caulk the gap below and above the ceramic quarter round.

Will this worK?

I have used this decorative piece as the upper detail in the install, and if I cut off a little of the tile it would match.

I've heard people say just caulk it, and find a rubber piece, or expanding foam first, but these sound like quick fix band-aids, and I'm not saying mine is better, but I don't want to see a big band of caulk on the bottom of my wall.

Thanks for your advice.

Wow, that's a bummer. If it were me, I would hire a professional tile guy to fill that void with grout. Of course, one of my best friends is a tile guy, so its easy for me to say.

Good luck.

Thanks for the reply, I was told that you never grout the gap at the bottom so the tub can move with the weight of the water. Won't the grout just crack?

Thanks again, DJ

You don't really want to grout that joint between the wall and the tub. If you can get the bottom row of tile off (you can, but you'll probably break them), you might be able to reset them with something like Dilex from www.schluter.com at the bottom. It would take up some of the gap (about 1/4" or so), and you could grout the rest after you reset the tile. The Dilex is an expansion joint designed to go especially in that position. You don't use any caulk (visible, at least) with the Dilex, which is an advantage. An alternative might be to put a different decorative tile in its place. Does that series tile have alternate size tile? Could you find larger ones, and then cut them to fit, leaving an even gap between the bottom and the tub? Depending on the brand and style, there are sometimes many sizes available.