Water leaking between shower drain trap and pipe

[Jonathan Puentes]

Hi guys,

I recently got a call from our downstairs neighbor that he found water dripping from one of our bathroom pipes.

I took a quick look at our shower drain and noticed that between the trap and the pipe there was a huge amount of rotten silicone. After removing it, i found that there are small cracks between the drain trap and the pipe, it looks like cracked white grouting to me,

I talked with the previous contractor and he advised to use grouting to re-seal the area around the pipe/drain to avoid leakages. However, our building management is suggesting for me to fully remove the tiles, change the pipe and add a compression seal between the pipe and shower drain? We don't have a bathtub, we have a glass divider and shower on the tiles. (if that makes sense).

The leakage is quite small but it happens every time we take a shower. As you can see in the pic, the gap is obvious but if i try to move the pipe for any further cracks, it's quite solid and not shaky.

From what i heard, grouting is not waterproof and will eventually leak again, would you suggest something different? Epoxy or PVC cement?

Thanks for helping me!

 

[Jadnashua]

In some of those drains, there's a rubber gasket that is wedged around the pipe that seals it to the drain. None of them use caulk to do that from the factory. On some others, there's a rubber gasket underneath and a huge nut that compresses things together to seal things up.

You might get things to seal for awhile if you cleaned things off really well, let it dry out, and then used some 100% silicone caulk to make the seal.

You indicated things broke if you moved them...I'm assuming you meant the caulking (I doubt it is grout).

There is one product that might seal it for you, KerdiFix. It comes in a smaller tube, and a larger one that would fit into a caulk gun. If that doesn't work, things get messier, as it would be a real bear to get out of there, though. Grout is rigid, and if you used a cement based one, isn't waterproof, plus, they aren't meant or optimized for this purpose.

Should you try silicone, be really careful about following the required curing times which on some can be as long as a week.

Kerdifix should be okay to shower with overnight wait, but it still will take awhile to fully cure (it will cure under water, though). Still need to clean things up first so it has something solid to bond to.

If you had access from underneath, you'd have maybe some more options, but it sounds like that would require repairing the ceiling. IF that's going to happen anyway, see if you can get a good look from there. It may give you some more info on how best to repair things.

Sounds like this may be a condo or coop rather than an apartment. What do the bylaws say about whose responsibility this type of repair is?
If it's an apartment, why do you have to fix it?

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Jonathan Puentes]

Thanks Jim, I checked and there's no rubber gasket in-between.

You're right, it's caulking, the contractor confirmed it. I tried to look for Kerdifix in the UAE but they don't sell it here. They have Sikaflex which looks like a similar solution to Kerdi-fix?

It's an 79 story building, it's massive. I don't have access to my neighbor's apartment so i need to do the job from above. The responsibility is mine since we're the landlords.

 

[Reach4]

I wonder if you could identify an o-ring that could be stuffed into the crevice. There are many sizes and even cross-sectional shapes.

Buna-N or EPDM would be good materials.

 

[Jadnashua]

Schluter does have a presence in the UK, so it should be available there. KerdiFix is a silane based product - no VOCs, quite strong, and flexible. While Sikaflex does make one, theirs tends to be even more expensive.

Here's the UK contact info:
Contact Schlüter-Systems Ltd
Units 3-5 Bardon 22,
Beveridge Lane, Coalville,
Leicestershire, LE67 1TE
Phone: +44 (0) 1530 813396

 

[Jonathan Puentes]

I'll ask the contractor about the possibility in adding an O-ring, but i'll try first with sikaflex or sikaguard.

i called a couple of places and they haven't heard about Kerdi-fix in the UAE. Bringing something from the UK might be too expensive to ship here.

 

[Jadnashua]

I quickly looked at your location and mistook UAE and saw UK...the closest country that has a Schluter dealer is Turkey, which probably isn't good for you either.

Silka does make a silane based sealant that is quite similar to KerdiFix, if those are available to you. A 100% silicone might work but the bond strength isn't as great. Silicone would require more careful cleaning and drying before installing if it had a chance of working, though.

 

[Jonathan Puentes]

No issues Jim! I managed to do it with the silane-based solution called sikaflex 545. It worked incredibly well. i left it all these days to cure and i tried it today and worked perfectly fine.

I had to clean it up quite a bit so used an old rag which I threw away.

 

[Jonathan Puentes]

Hi Guys, So this is how it looks now. i had to remove the Sikfalex solution as it didnt work somehow.

I cleaned it up and left it to dry for 10 days. Then bought another solution called PL200 (Another type of silicone Polymer) and an epoxy compound called MSeal.

I filled the empty spaces first with PL200 and let it cure for 7 days, after this, the silicone was incredibly solid, nothing like i've seen before. After this, i used the epoxy clay and added a second layer to fully seal the connection between the shower trap and the pipe.

This seems to have done the job! It's like cement really (if that makes sense). I've attached a pic of how it looks now.