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Plumbers and all: help on convex to concave tub drain strainer

12 years ago

Hi. I could use your help on how to replace a new 3" strainer dome cover with a 3" concave, central screw tub drain cover. Does that make sense?

The problem is some water is remaining outside of the tub's drain in the tub when the drain is open. This is because of the dome design of the drain cover: the stainless rises up rather than is flat or inverted down. Weird. I don't truly know who made this cover as I personally wasn't involved with its selection.

We have hard water, a new tub finish, and I just want a 3" concave (or flat) tub drain cover with central screw to fit in whatever brand of drain pipe is below it to work. Not is always as simple as it seems, and I appreciate your help. Thanks.

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Comments (4)

Ozone89
12 years ago
I'm pretty sure I know what you're talking about, and I have seen this happen before.

Do you have a screw smack dab in the center of the drain cover? Without seeing pictures, and without seeing behind the tub, I'm going to "guess" and say it's a Gerber waste and over flow.

I'm also going to assume you have to lift a lever in order to stop up the water in the tub correct?

You can either change out the trip lever for a blank cover plate, and the drain can be changed out to a "lift and turn" style drain. All of this can be done from the front of the tub.

If you know the manufacture of the waste and over flow, you can contact them to see if they have different strainer style. If you have access behind the tub and it's Brass...it's most likely a Gerber. But Gerber also make a plastic waste and over flow as well. However, if it's plastic, it could be a number of manufactures.

If it were me, I would replace the trip lever with a blank face plate, and install a lift and turn. Since the lift and turn's seem to gather hair much quicker, you can leave it out until you use it for tub applications, and purchase a $2.00 screen from your hardware store to collect the hair.

The hack way of doing things would be....concave the strainer yourself by pushing it in. It's very easy to do. : )
SparklingWater
Original Author
12 years ago
You are so kind to offer some help. I am attaching a picture of the water surrounding the opened drain. It never further drains.

Yes, a screw is smack dab in the center, and yes I have to lift a lever to activate the drain stop. It's an old tub, but a beauty in depth for soaking. Yes, there is a behind the tub access panel. I do think this is a brass assemble. I am trying to get the name of the manufacturer, and you have given me a great starting point. Nice tip too. :)

Thank you SO much.

Here is a link that might be useful:
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John here are two closeups. The first picture shows the corners of the grates and the rolled edges. The cover is actually level to the edge. In the second picture you can see the top edge of the trough part of the drain is a finished edge, as you can step on this edge you wouldn't want to cut it down. The gap between the cover and the trough is predetermined in manufacturing. What probably should have been done to make sure it drained even better is for our first row of tile to be set at a slightly steeper angle. Then each row set after that would have continued on the upward slope. It's almost flat to the drain so the water can pool/collect just a little at this edge after the shower is shut off. The entire shower is sloped though so it drains really well while you're using the shower. I just use a squeegee and push the little pooling into the drain. You can see a bit of water marks in the bottom picture, typically I rub a bit of Turtle Wax on the grate covers when I clean them, buff them off, to prevent build up - also spray after each shower with a daily shower cleaner.
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Can I get in on this conversation with a question? I have something similar in my 22 year old house. It is three stories. We do not have city sewer. We sometimes have a sewer gas odor that comes up the vents in two bathrooms only. They are exactly on top of each other. We have had a plumber out to the house three separate times. At first he said make sure to keep traps wet. We did that, smell sometimes comes back. He came out again, same thing and checked everything. Last time he said that all fixtures go into one large vent pipe on roof. Husband got up there and sure enough only one for 4.5 baths, washer, etc. The smell is only in these two bath areas. There is one bath below these two exactly as well. He said tub downstairs is not used much and trap could be dry. He extended the vent pipe up several feet in the air. He said sometimes when weather system moves in, it can hold gases down. We have absolutely no idea what this could be. It only happens every couple of weeks, but when it does, it smells so bad. We have also smelled this outside once or twice and it was so bad, I was so embarrassed. We were gone one week and our friends walked by the house to make sure everything was okay. They said they thought something BIG had died there and they actually walked around the back of the house but could not find anything. Please any thoughts. Desperate in NC
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Ozone89
12 years ago
The only thing I'm hesitant on is....if you have a Gerber waste and overflow. That's not the strainer cover I'm used to seeing with Gerber's unless they changed the look of them or it's a really old waste and over flow, or someone put on an odd ball strainer cover.

Regardless though...you have some options to correct your problem.
SparklingWater
Original Author
12 years ago
Thanks for looking and commenting Ozone. Options here are a step in the right direction.

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