I can afford a quick reply for now:

For benches, it depends. Built in benches should be structurally sound (no movement or wood shrinkage to cause movement). they can then be membraned over (like Kerdi, since you brought that up) and tiled. They'll be an integral part of the shower.

After-marker benches "are what they are". They're only as good as the manufacturer designed and built the unit itself (weight rating, stiffness/flexing) and how they are anchored to the wall(s).

Some benches may be too narrow to be effective in an ADA shower.

Another option is a removable bench. It can be left in the shower, moved out of the shower, or moved around in the shower as needed, and it can have a platform as large or small as needed. It can even be built with a backrest and arms.

Weight placed on grab bars? Good grab bars with proper anchoring, I can do chin ups on.

Well, gotta go (out of "fun time"), I'll reply again later tonight.

Mongo

I agree with Mongo. So long as it's put together properly, especially being it'll be Kerdi shower with a topical membrane, you shouldn't have any problem whatsoever, and because it's a Kerdi shower, I would more trust a built in bench over something like a "better bench", where holes have to be poked thru the Kerdi. I mean, they CAN be plugged up with Kerdi fix, as would the ones for the grab bar, but the less protrusions, the less chance for problems.

Okay, a late night. Watched a bit of football, then ran off a set of raised panels for stairway wainscotting. Showered. Now here I am, fresh and clean!

For an ADA shower that will be built from scratch, I definitely want full-sized grab bars with solid anchoring. If someone will be isntalling the grab bars, they do need to be careful that they don't over torque the fastners and crack the grout or tile. I usually will put a shot of sealant in the screw/bolt hole, then drive the fastner home. Depends on how the shower it built.

If adding anchors later, and I can't hit a stud, then I use "wing it" anchors. Wing its are self-sealing and have great holding capacity.

If you want to cross reference your guidelines, take a look at the NKBA website. Once on that link, on the menu to the left click on the various links that deal with baths and showers. There are code minimums, as well as ADA guidelines and "recomended minimums" to help you design a user-friendly bath.

Mongo

Thank you both for your replies.
I'd forgotten all about NKBA. The website helped a great deal.
Still working on "the plan".

Canishel and all, my daughter is in a wheelchair. We just got back from vacationing in an "accessible" cabin in Gatlinburg. It was beautiful, and the shower was all tile, approx. 38x42, but the lipless shower allowed, to my distress, water to run down onto the floor. My daughter (the first showerer) had a HUGE puddle, despite the shower curtain. We called the owner and she said that she was aware of the problem but didn't know how to fix it.

As my husband and I are in the process of building our new home and getting close to the shower stage, we're trying to decide how we could do a tile shower of this dimension and solve that problem. On the other hand, Lauren doesn't need to roll into the shower--she can transfer--so maybe our best solution is to do a shower surround thingie with a small lip instead of all tile. . . ???

sdionnemoore,

The last accessible shower I did was about 5' square. I think about 5' by 5'6" or so.

Instead of a formal curb, I made a "hump" in the floor. The hump was about 1-1/2" tall and it was fairly gentle, over about 12-18". The hump was outside the shower, so the curtain hung well inside the hump, maybe 18-24" or so?

I should have drawings somewhere.

We did a few mockups to get a reasonable rise over run for the hump. The hump is easy to roll over, and it serves as the curb.

Code-wise, you need the top of the curb (the hump in this case) to be a minimum 2" above the height of the drain.

For pitch, once on the shower side of the hump, the shower floor should slope a minimum of 1/4" per foot of run, and not exceed 1/2" per foot of run.

You could also make the entire room a wet room by using a membrane like Ditra on the floors outside the shower and Kerdi on the floor and walls inside the shower.

Best, Mongo

As a consumer and not a pro by any means, I can tell you our experience. I've been a member here for a while and have concentrated on this forum for several years since we've been upgrading our 1968 home. We put in a shower and bench and it is all sound.

You need to find someone who is familiar with "MUDDING" a shower. (We took out our tub and put in a walk-in shower with grab bars).

After that, check out the John Bridge forum (google it) for how to do walk-in showers. After that, check out that same forum on how to do benches.

Once you've done your research, you may want to to check out this forum about european showers. Over there, there is often a huge wet area (okay maybe not so huge) but the wet area has a central drain in the floor. Imagine your whole bathroom as a wet area, with a drain in the middle, and the shower just spraying anywhere -- even near the toilet.

Now that sounds crazy, but a few years ago, I remember reading that that is just how some (many) European showers are engineered.

Folks, please chime in here.

Thanks Mongo and Cindyandmocha! Love the hump idea and I'll be sure to pass it along to a good mud man, when I find one!

We have a glass shower door with a silicone sweep along the bottom. The door doesn't leak, but it will sweep a wee bit of water out when it is opened. We're talking so little that the bath mat can dry the drops and hardly get wet. Our shower is 62" wide and 42" deep, and there is no hump between the shower and the rest of the bathroom floor. The shower area was recessed (as shown in the North Carolina plans) and the joists underneath reinforced.

Another alternative to a hump is to have a drain run the width of the shower opening.

Thanks to all of you for your comments and ideas. I'm following up on your suggestions and websites. None of this is simple.

Suero, there's no door in the plan for the shower.

Keep the ideas and suggestions coming!

I remember the wet room-type showers as a short-term exchange student in Japan in the late 70's. Most of my hosts had them, I thought they were a revelation. If I were building a fully accessible bathroom (or had kids!) that's the way I would go. the wet room also included the toilet- they could just hose down the whole place.

We have a wet room for our downstairs bathroom, it's 6' 6" x 7' and has a toilet, sink and shower. It's a full mud job w/ 1" stone-wanna-be porcelain floor and fully tiled walls and ceiling, drain in the middle of the floor and a 36" wide doorway w/ barn door. Mr. sandyponder made a ramp out of our wood flooring scraps that goes from the den/guest room to the bathroom to compensate for the lip created by the full mud job in that size of a space .

Our SIL (who is in a chair) rolls in and transfers to the toilet or portable shower seat easily. We have a shower curtain that bisects the room but most people don't use it, they just shower in the space provided and only the toilet gets a little wet. The sink is a wall mount so the chair can pull right up to it (and has no wood cabs to get wet). I painted the barn door with 3 coats of semi gloss on the bath side and it shows no sign of mold or water damage. We solved the "Where to put the TP in a wet room?" dilemma by purchasing a stainless TP holder (about 2' tall, holds 3 rolls, has a cover) and setting it next to the toilet.

Not only is it great for our SIL, it gives us a full bathroom downstairs in a small space and is an excellent place to bathe dirty dogs or kids with sandy feet.

sandyponder