I've tiled my own two bathrooms and my kitchen backsplash, so when my adult daughter's shower sprung a leak at her "new" (circa 1950) home, DH & I came to the rescue. Ripped out the whole tub surround (it gave up without a fight), fixed the plumbing, reinsulated, added backerboard, taped, mudded and commenced to tiling. Got complicated around the tub; being an old steel tub, it has about a 1" flange around the top edges as though it's supposed to bolt to something? We ran the backerboard down to within 1/4th" of that flange, did the tape /mud/dry time thing and then commenced to tiling. When I got to the grout, I must say, the grout was a tad drier than I'd liked for it to be, but I worked quickly and thought I'd done okay. We spaced the bottom row of tile to cover that backerboard/flange gap, which it did okay. Then I left my daughters to finish grouting the normal 1/4th gap around the edge of the tub. I would have used caulk, but since the gap varied some, the girls used the regular grout to finish off that bottom edge and the corners. Are you with me so far? It looked really nice. Now I notice a lot of little tiny cracks in the grout all over and I'm thinking I'll be okay to just smash in another coat of it. (She hasn't used any tile sealer, yet.) EXCEPT.........she called tonite to say the whole bottom row of that grout is soaking wet, coming out in big soggy clumps and some of the tile with it. My thoughts are that she didn't let the tile cure enough before going in and using it, so now we need to pull out all the soggy stuff and redo it from there. So, the questions are: did we handle the backerboard/tile/grout around that flange right? Or is there just enough movement in a steel tub to disallow a grout (vs caulk) to flex. If that makes any sense.......And the second question is: am I on the right track to fix it? How long does it REALLY take for tile to cure enough to take a shower? Please tell me I don't have to take down this whole job.....this is a single mother with a TEENAGE daughter who will just DIE if she doesn't get to shower. Thanks for reading this far............. mm

I'd prefer that more grout had been left in the joints. They look dished out a bit too much, where too much grout was removed during the cleanup phase. I'd have preferred the grout to be more flush with the face of the tile. Looking closely at the first two photos, the darkened grout lines are all parallel to one another. In the first photo you can see the wet grout lines are all parallel to the edge of the drain. That leads me to believe that the "uphill" edges of the tiles are acting like mini dams and holding water, they are preventing water from easily flowing downhill to the drain. The second closeup photo, you see the same effect. All the damp grout lines are again parallel to one another. Again, to me that reflects a drainage issue. Not necessarily with the amount of floor pitch, but with the grout lines being so dished out that they hold water and slow drainage. Marble is porous and can absorb water. With the grout lines being a bit too raked out, the edges of the marble hexes are exposed. Water held against the tile edge can lead to absorption into the marble. The crack in the grout in that second photo, you also wrote that there are other cracks. That's usually a sign of too much water used in the grout mix, or that sanded grout should have been used instead of unsanded. Unsanded should be used in joints less than 1/8" wide. Cracks can also indicate movement in the floor, but that shouldn't be an issue with a properly set Kerdi Tray. As far as him having used a preformed Kerdi-Tray, if he did, it appears that is was certainly cut down in an awkward manner. The drain is no where near centered in the shower. So if he did some filling here and there with mud or thinset to even out the floor pitch or edge elevations, that could have be part of the problem. But that's supposition on my part. About the only other thing I could question is that often times with small tiles, when the sheets are set into the thinset, thinset can ooze up between the hex tiles and partially fill the grout lines. That thinset needs to be cleaned out so the grout lines can be completely filled with grout. If it's not, you can get uneven thicknesses of grout, think of it as a veneer of grout over a blob of thinset. That can result in uneven water absorption, the grout cracking, etc. All that aside...with this being your second go-around, he should have install the sloped Kerdi Tray and thinsetted it to the subfloor. Then he should have set the Kerdi drain. Then he should have thinsetted Kerdi Membrane (an orange colored sheet material) over the Kerdi Tray, then tiled on the Kerdi Membrane. I'd be interested in how he tied the Kerdi Membrane in with the wall membrane IF he used Kerdi Membrane over the Kerdi Tray. Best. Mongo

I know this is 4 years later but the missing grout is obviously why water has leaked under the tiles. Yes floor tiles will have the odd pinhole in the grout and also as you learned grout does absorb water and moisture/water does inevitably get under the tile but a large chunk like that would increase the amount of water under ur tiles. Even with weep holes, everytime your shower water will soak under the tiles and it'll never dry off. Your base is waterproofed but it'll also increase mold etc bc it'll never really dry. What I would've done was not use the shower until everything was dry. Maybe even use a shop vac and suck out as much water as you can from that one large area. Then regrout all the areas with holes and voids. But this would've been a potential temp fix as the entire grout job could've been bad and powdering if it wasn't mixed properly. I have mosaic floor tiles in my shower and I regret not getting larger ones because I hate all the grout lines. More grout lines means more maintenance and cleaning of it. 😑 But I do wonder how many people have shower floors that are constantly wet under the tile and not know it. I'm sure more people than not. Most people don't even realize whether or not their grout is in good shape or not. Btw. 4 years later, what did you end up doing?

I believe the difference in color is too great with the white and brown. Why? 3 reasons 1. The products that are cemented to the building you will not redo anytime soon. Messy , dirty, expensive and just not worth the trouble  2. When you add a product to the building structure. Windows , floors they must last a long time. Durability, wear and tear, and STYLE. All equal a story of when the home was designed.  The look over a period of time 10 years + and the home will become "out of date" Needs a face lift . 3. The homes we admire, the Museums, Churches, Libraries, Opera House have one common thread. At a glance they are timeless. Built in 1940, 1990 etc  The crystal clear item is not seen  For this reason I would not go "trendy". Generally our first choice is the right one. Simple and elegant  How do you change this ad time moves on. Color Bedroom a change of bedspread. Bathroom towels become a dark navy or  deep forest green. Yellow for spring  Paint a wall blue, hang a piece of art  The change is simple and your money well spent for resale  Take a moment to do another board  Remove the brown and replace with a neutral. Try an Odegard runner - There are so many options  Enjoy