Thank you. I can now add pea gravel to my list of possibilities. Are there two sets of weep holes or just one set (vertically)?

a "set" consists of 8 (varies by manufacturer) vertical weep holes on the underside of the white plastic piece shown.

If he doesn't know what the weep holes are for, find a new tile installer. Quickly.

I am thinking (hoping) it was a communication problem. Texting shortcuts. I sent him your video to say that was what I was referring to.

He has been in business for 40 years and built the second floor addition on my last house. He has built 120 bathrooms. Never put marble on a shower floor before now. Probably won't want to again after this.

Regarding my wet marble floor, my contractor (general contractor) has been relying on advice from his tile setter and the pros at the tile store. By the time the tile setter begins his work, if there is a drainage problem, wouldn't it be underneath the last layer that the tile setter sees? So maybe he would not know that there is a problem?

Please correct me if that is wrong.

Teri, I give you points for patience and keeping that hopeful eye open. You have our number if you want a phone consultation. Best of luck.......

I may call you next week if we are still at a standstill. I don't know what he is thinking because he hasn't talked to me for several days. Meanwhile, the spots on the wall are getting larger.

Between John Whipple and Tundra, I'm beginning to think that marble is not a good idea....or is it more that people don't know how to put it in? And if one does not know how to put in marble, how do I know about other kinds of tile? I'm getting more flummoxed by the thread...

"...or is it more that people don't know how to put it in? ..." - marjie1059

More people do not know how to install it. Most sheet marble is low end and poorly put together.

As a home owner educating yourself about the basics is critical to getting a good shower built. Demanding the basics get done is a step in the right direction.

Some of the basics include:

• Flood Test
• Pre-Slope
• Weep Hole Protection
• Proper Cure times between steps
• Proper grout selection
• Soak Tests for tile

Marjie, I know what you mean. On the one hand, the pros seem to discourage marble on a bathroom floor. But on the other hand, they are indicating that I have some kind of drainage problem.

If I am having a drainage problem, it seems like the marble would be a blessing in disguise. I don't want to have a problem that I am oblivious to.

The same sort of on-the-one-hand, on-the-other-hand comments are on every thread I have read about this issue.

I would like to know if I could have darkening tiles simply because the tiles are translucent and thinset darkens (like the sidewalk does) when wet. That is what my contractor is insisting, if I understand him correctly.

John Whipple, I hadn't seen your post directly above because it hadn't shown up yet when I was answering Marjie. That is very helpful and gives me a basis to ask questions of my contractor.

I will ask you point blank, my contractor's claim of the tiles being translucent (and nothing wrong with the construction itself), could that be true?

Marble tile will darken when wet and then dry out. After the initial install this could take weeks. If you have a circle around the drain and all other tile is fine the chances that it is water under the mortar bed are extremely high.

Mortar will shrink a little as it cures. It will also get a few tiny hairline fractures. If the shower is not leaking you might find the shower starts to preform better with time. Or you might find that the entire shower becomes wet looking. This would be the sign of a raised liner and basically a lot of standing water under the tile install.

Do you have more tile left over? Can we test some of it to see what it acts like?

Can you post pictures of the shower as it is now?

Erik from Tundra is a solid guy. I have been friends with him online for a long time and seen many of his jobs. If you have access to him coming over I would bring him down for a look. Have you seen the jobs he has done over the past few years? Sometimes seeing things in person reveals things you just can't see in photos. Locally I charge people between $125.00 - $250.00 for a design site visit like this. Not sure what he would charge you but having a true tile pro look at it might be worth it's weight in Gold.

Sorry you are having such a hard time. It is for this reason why I wrote the featured article for Houzz "Why Marble Might Be Wrong For Your Shower". Have you read that? And all the KaBillion Comments? Lots of useful info there. None of which will make you happy for your tile selection.

How thick is the tile? Can you show us?

Take two plates and on one lay some paper towel 2-3 plys. Soak the paper towel with water. On the other plate do nothing. Run some water over the tile for say 2-3 minutes and then place 4-5 tiles on the dry plate and 4-5 on the paper towel. The next morning take a look at the two samples. What do you see?

John, I will get new pictures up later today, and I will also find and test the leftover samples. They are 3/8" thick, and here is the link where I ordered them:

http://www.thebuilderdepot.com/cabian1x1hexhon.html

Tundra, if you looked at my floor without ripping it up, would you be able to see anything? My contractor and I and have spent hours staring at it. If there is something you can glean without doing anything invasive, that would be worthwhile. Since I got a 10-year warranty with my reno, I don't think I should disturb anything.

John, what is the proper grout for marble? I know that we did not use epoxy.

Thank you, Tundra. My husband is insisting that I quit drying out every speck of water after I shower and just let it do its thing. After a few weeks if it keeps getting worse, we might have a better chance at convincing the contractor that there might be a drainage problem.

I chose marble because it is classic, and I didn't want to have to "update" the bathroom in 20 years if we need to sell. This one will never look dated.

We just moved to this house and completely renovated most of the upstairs. I haven't yet tackled either of my other two bathrooms, but one has a cracked sink and the other has a tub that is discolored and both have hideous floors. I will be much more knowledgeable this time around, thanks to everyone here.

Sooo....I don't want to hijack teri's thread, here, but she was told to use a different tile, and while I am learning a great deal from these threads, I don't want to rush into my own project with only half the info I need.
I'm wondering, if the problem with marble in a shower is often not actually the material itself but an incorrect installation, does that mean that the same installation would also be incorrect if used with a different material, say, porcelain tile? Or put another way, does the installation need to be different from marble to another material, or does marble simply more easily expose an incorrect installation? (And if this seems like a "duh" question, I'm sorry--I have gone all my life blissfully ignorant of such things, and now need an education on all things bathroom-remodel-related.)

Marjie, 1- Yes if the shower was built wrong the same thing would happen with porcelain or any tile but you just wouldn't see it as fast. Luckily in this case the porous nature of the marble alerted us early to the underlying problem. 2- Since marble is a porous material, if a customer can't live without it, we install a different waterproofing method where there is no weep hole, no 2 inch thick layer of cement under the tiles. Its called a surface applied membrane such as kerdi, hydroban, aquadefense, and many others. The huge advantage is the tile assembly is much thinner and therefore can dry out much faster. 3- should have been answered in 1&2, if not keep asking.

My contractor emailed me back this morning to say he watched the video that Cabot and Rowe sent. He verified that yes, they always use pea gravel.

So now I guess I need to focus on asking about the preslope. Can anyone tell me the angle it should be?

Minimum of 1/4" per foot of slope measured to the farthest corner. A little more is also fine.

In this photo I am double checking my own work. This is self inspection. The level measures four feet in length. I have two pieces of 1/2" dryall on the left and none on the right. If the level reads "LEVEL" then I have the proper 1/4" per foot slope.

You can add shims under the level up to 2" with a four foot level. That would be the make shower slope in a shower. 2% is a 1/4" per foot. 4% is 1.2" per foot.

Great information. I feel fully prepared for my conversation next week.

Now, for the dumb question: is the tile floor on the top also sloped the same amount, or do they level it off when they are setting tile? In other words, when I check the slope of the finished tile, is it likely to give me a good indication of the preslope ?

I have a 2' level. When I center it over the drain (lengthwise, parallel to the curb) and measure from the metal drain up to the suspended level, there is a 1/4" - 3/8" gap. I then turned the level to measure going from the back of the shower to the front shower door and the gap from the drain to the bottom of the level was 1/2". Diagonally across the drain the gap is probably 1/4" I need to find a board to lay the level on to measure from any edge just to the drain since my level isn't long enough.

Is there an easier way to do this, or am I on the right track?

I was afraid of that. I will follow up with you next week after meeting with my contractor. I am assuming it is standard procedure to photograph the stages of construction.

Regarding the problems with the preslope, are there other potential problems other than just not being sloped enough?

if there are low spots, often called 'birdbaths'

It's almost enough to make me want to keep my nasty tub. :)

You know, Marjie, I am trying to chill a bit about it and assume that it will be fixed. In the meantime, I am using it and enjoying the heck out of it. It is so beautiful and my towels can hang in the shower and not get wet, and I have a robe within reach without having to step out. Not a big deal now, but the Minnesota winters get so cold. Oh, and then there is my heated marble floor when I step out.......

These pros on this thread have been so helpful that I think you could make a checklist of items to verify at each step of the way. What tiles are you thinking of using?

After the tile is laid, is 24 hours enough time before you apply grout?

That depends on the use of a sealer and the type of grout used. There are too many Ifs involved to give a detailed answer, but you can figure it out by reading the instructions for both the sealer and the grout, tying the two together.

24 hours is a joke. Now where near long enough. A tile job should be left 1-4 weeks before grouting and then another 1-4 weeks before use.

Unless of course you believe everything you read on the side of a package.

Concrete by nature takes roughly 4 weeks to cure.

Why would they put one set of info on the package if it isn't right? Are they trying to fudge the time, hoping you'll buy their product that says a shorter wait time over someone else who lists a longer wait time? (And it's not good news, anyway--we have one full bath in the house, and 7 people. Two months plus without a shower?! Argh!)

And those are two of the many reasons I sometimes want to throw up my hands about the whole thing and keep the nasty bathroom the way it is until I die.

In any court of law the manufacturer's instructions reign supreme (certainly over internet advice)

marjie1059 companies must compete with each other to sell product. Take Mapei for example. Most of the info on their packaging says you can grout the following day. But where I shop(ped) for supplies the show case a Mapei Technical Bulletin that advises with larger tile a longer dry out period is needed.

Type of tile. Size of tile.Topical waterproofing - not topical it all adds to the cure times. GraniRapid says it cures in a few hours - but technical recommends it does not get wet for a week after install.

Your fixing the shower. Don't rush these times. Tile guys hate to come back. They want to do their end, grout and get paid. This does not mean it is the best way.

Also, my contractor did not apply the sealer for several weeks after that, but the place where I bought the tile said that he should have sealed before grouting as well as after. He said he doesn't do that because he doesn't want to interfere with the bonding of the grout to the tile, which made sense to me.

I had a long discussion with my contractor about the preslope and the construction of the shower and drain. He was very specific about the steps and the slope does meet the minimum requirements. One of my friends (who has built many showers himself) was here during the reno and observed the work. He is incredulous that I am having these issues with the shower since he said the tile setters did absolutely beautiful work building the shower.

So, I think I have ruled out the preslope as the problem, and the weep holes were protected by pea gravel. In reading your article, John, I noticed that nugget about using tiles with a webbed backing. I do know that some of the mesh had fused to the tiles below and left a sticky residue on some of the sheets that went into the shower. These sheets were at the bottom of the pallet, and it seems that the weight of the tiles above was too much for them. We did get the residue off before the sealer was applied. I wonder if the mesh backing could also have interfered with the application of the thinset and the 95% coverage you speak of.

After showering for a week, there are more tiles that are dark outside of the large ring around the drain, but none of the unaffected tiles within the ring have darkened yet. I am doing a soak test of some loose tiles that I found.

Are there differences in methods when constructing a shower with marble than with ceramic or porcelain?

That was the wrong picture. Sorry. I can't get the right ones to load. The one above is a new dark spot near the entrance to the shower.

Hi Teri.

There is so many "What If's" in this business.

A small tile like yours will allow the thin-set to cure quickly. I would have waited a good week myself. The mortar bed is the big deal. That should have been 1.5" - 2" thick of reinforced shower deck mud.

What type was used? Was it hand made? Was it set on Wednesday. Tile Set Thursday and then grout on Friday? A typical shower pan should cure a good week before tile is installed.

Trapped moisture can not just leave. It takes time.

Then the What if of the glue. I think this stuff is awful. Lets see what the soak test reveals before guessing at anything. ALWAYS SOAK TEST A TILE SAMPLE

As for the pea gravel. Most guys go out for a smoke and grab a few loose rocks. Most plumbers do not hook the drain up right at and block the lower weep holes with their glue or silicone.

Could have been a lot of things.

One thing for sure is that concert shrinks and cracks. There is an outside chance that with a full year of service your shower might magically get better and start t dry out better.

Or it will be the opposite and continue to get worse.

I like what your husband said. Go on and enjoy it for now. We are all guessing at this point.

For anyone reading along this is why the basics need to be checked, spec'd and documented. Then there is no guessing what so ever.

I know this won't make Marjie feel any better, but in my last house, we had a leak coming down the kitchen ceiling. It took many months (years?) and several plumbers to find the source. When we had the kitchen remodeled, they traced it to the tiles above the cast iron tub upstairs. It was a hundred year old house, and there was space between the tiles and the outside wall. The water had been getting through the grout for years and traveling all over the place. We had to replace insulation in the outside wall and had mold remediation.

The joys of home ownership.

I am pretty sure that the shower pan was built long before I had settled on what tiles to buy, let alone shipping time. As for the thickness, I will ask.

Thank you, teri, for reminding me of one reason for us to get rid of the tub. No gory details of our boring saga, just one comment that since we moved in 30 years ago there has been a spot (or hole, depending) of varying size on our LR ceiling that is directly under the tub drain. Will the ceiling come crashing down into the living room? Depends on how many more decades it will be till we tear it all apart.

"....The water had been getting through the grout for years and traveling all over the place. We had to replace insulation in the outside wall and had mold remediation...." - teri_b

This is why in Australia they plan for just this. And why the outside of a tub gets waterproofing as well. This is also one of the reasons in a high risk shower build I would use a crack isolation membrane like Noble Company's CIS or Ardex Company's 8+9. The cheaper options that just are uncoupling membranes do not fully block water migration if water travels into a crack - because of a air space or voids.

I feel for you, Marjie. It sounds like you have a leak that you need to address. But with only one full bath in the house you cannot afford the time for the whole shower pan construction. I bought my house in February, and they started the construction right away. I am still waiting for a few final details to be done, not to mention the correction for the shower problem. But at least we had a basement to live in while it was going on (complete with full bath!). Btw, our tub downstairs is that all-in-one construction (fiberglass? acrylic?), which I know isn't the dream shower you were probably thinking of, but one could probably be installed in a day or two without any tile work since it goes up the walls. It has nifty ledges on it. I'm curious what our pros on here think of that type of solution. You could still have a beautiful tile floor which wouldn't have the same waterproofing concerns.

I spent a lot of money of my master bath, and I love my design, but the aggravation has not been worth it. And there is still no consensus on what is wrong, or the proper fix.

Oh, and another thing. I prefer my new $36 shower head in the basement to the $500 one in the master bath that is too hard for me to turn the settings for the jets because my hands are too small. It wasn't like I got to see it before he installed it. This one does everything my expensive one does except that it doesn't have the slide bar:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00JV5HO3G?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00

Actually, it does more. You can run the rain shower head and the hand held at the same time.

John, when we added on to that house we discovered that what they used for insulation looked like rotting burlap. And our mud room was literally a mud room - they had no floor, just a piece of outdoor carpet. We worked on that house for over twenty years. It was a beautiful old Tudor, but built before there were any standards like today. The bats in the attic seemed to find it very habitable, though.

What is considered a "high risk shower build"?

teri_b, would you share what the final resolution was to your shower floor problem?

Yes, Nancy. I am using the shower and we haven't had the contractor replace anything. As time goes by, it is starting to look more normal. It doesn't look like a ring around the drain, but there are dark tiles here and there like you would expect from a natural stone. It is happening slowly, and I don't really understand it, but it seems to be rectifying itself. My contractor is willing to replace the floor, so I still have that option open. I will post a new picture next week after I buy a new computer that will let me upload.

I'm interested in seeing the floor as well!

updated picture:

Back in May:

The last picture from May was when I had only showered once and freaked out, and was waiting for it to dry. After my contractor told me to start using it again, it never got worse, and ultimately got lots better, as you can see from the previous picture, labeled updated. If anyone has an explanation for this, I would be very interested. Someone mentioned the cement cracking and allowing it to dry, so I am assuming that is what is happening.

Wow, thanks for the update. It looks like you have had a satisfactory outcome, and that is great! I hope it continues to improve and that your contractor continues to stand by his work, no matter how long it takes for this to settle into a final state.