Moisture and water always finds its own way beyond the tiles and no matter how good you close the curtain some of it still goes over.

Tile Grout also is a cement based material and is not completely waterproof so if you don't have proper tile backing material or if it's installed incorrectly the moisture and the water is absorbed into the grout and surrounding area and this is the outcome.

Form the few pictures the tub seems to be in a good condition, looking at the edge of the tile it looks like there was no bull-nose tile installed along the side of the tub and that is where most of the damage is.

At this point I would open everything up, dry it out, install proper tile backing, fix the sub-floor install waterproofed underpayment and re-tile everything.

Good luck

3Kis not nearly enough to rip all of that out, and redo every bit of plumbing, tile, and fix all of the moisture damage. Try 3x that figure. And no handyman either. You’ll just keep having more d lanai e damage happening if you go the cheap route that produced that mess in the first place.

So I got a contractor to remove the bath tub and hunt for the source of leakage. But it's still not very obvious. I can see wood damage on the floor (right next to the nails). But it's not very obvious where the water came from. My contractor says it's from the leak of the tub faucet. It had a bad seal apparently.

But

1. How is the water coming out to the corner? I would have expected it to be in the middle.

2. How is so much water on the timber (on the left side of the picture)? Can the water rise so much?

Thanks for your inputs. I don't want to close this out only to find out this problem has reoccured. Any ideas?

There is not a single indication that the faucet was leaking behind the tile, therefore it was leaking over the tile, and the water was traveling along the tub edge and was penetrating the wall between the tile and the tub right at the end of the tubs flange and some of it traveling along the tub down between the floor tile and the tub.

As the rising of water goes, the water doesn't rise, the moisture does... The wood absorbs all that moisture and gets saturated and begins to rot.

I just did a deck repair, the wood siding was done over the masonry foundation ledge without flashing... and as you can see the sheeting is completely deteriorated at the bottom and absorbed moisture continued to deteriorate the sheeting up the wall almost 3' high.

Is that an exterior wall? And was fibreglass insulation installed without a vapour barrier? You realize where this is going, don't you?

I'm sorry, you have an expensive renovation in your future. The entire wall needs to be opened up, all the wet insulation and rotten wood replaced, and proper vapour barrier installed. And remember to insulate particularly well behind all the plumbing, both supply and waste. This moisture problem could have been caused by condensation on incorrectly insulated pipes.

This is way beyond the skill level of a handyman.

That's shower curtain drip damage.

@Concrete Engineers thanks for your reply. I actually I am not sure what you are referring to "And was fibreglass insulation installed without a vapour barrier? You realize where this is going, don't you?"

This house is in CA which has strict construction codes and the house is relatively new and built to those codes. So I don't expect basic things like that to be not implemented. What exactly is the reason you are imagining? Please let me know.

@Joseph Corlett Thanks for you reply. That's the root cause I have been thinking all along. But it's hard to believe it can be so MUCH. Especially since we took care of not letting any water leak from the shower in the past 12+ months. Can it be SO BAD?

Condensation didn't concentrate at the main rot, dripping shower curtain water did and got wicked up the framing. Fix everything and install some sliding doors, please. Problem solved.

Curtains rarely contain the water without strict supervision.

Shower doors are better but dont work well if the far door isn't completely closed when shower heads point that direction.

Aftermarket hand showers often "lean" pointed at these unattended gaps in doors and curtains.

100% of the "tub leaks" I've seen are one of the above, whether a clients home or my own.

I’m not sure where your leak is coming from, I just wanted to tell our experience so you can gauge whether it might be a possibility in your case. One of our guest bathrooms had a leak that we originally assumed was from the shower. We hadn’t lived in the house for very long, and we hadn’t even used that shower yet when my sister came to visit. She stepped out of the shower and realized that water was squeezing up between the tiles when she stepped on them. Naturally, she informed us. My hubby had the entire bathroom completely gutted in half an hour! (It was a small bathroom with a Fiberglass shower, the tiles popped up like toast out of a toaster, and he’s just a beast... lol!) we see evidence of long term damage and provide my sister with another bathroom to use for the remainder of the visit. We didn’t start the bathroom remodel immediately, and when we did start it was slow going. We were very fortunate because we had barely started the remodel when we got another weather front move in with a whole lot of moisture... (It has been snowing a lot during her visit) and that’s when we realized the bathroom was leaking from another source! Hubby again ripped up the bathroom, and this time ripped out part of the wall that is on the exterior and that’s when we realized the leak was coming from outside. It took us a bit to figure out but we finally determined (with outside help) that it was because that wall was directly against an exterior chimney that had not been flashed properly. We left that bathroom unfinished for quite a while while we fixed the chimney problem, and waited for some more really good rain storms to make sure it was indeed dry before we finished our bathroom remodel. We were just fortunate that we have a lot of other bathrooms and this was just a guest bathroom. Anyways, I hope your issue isn’t something like that!

Wow this was so helpful - provided me a different perspective which I was looking for.

I feel the same right now - I am not convinced that it's coming from the shower. It might have in the past but not lately since we've been extremely careful to prevent any leaks. I was hoping to rip it off to see where it might be coming from but nothing seems obvious. Incidentally, it's not been raining but it was still damp on the walls. If it rained it wouldn't be damp for so long (the last rains were in mid-May just for a few days).

I'll have the contractor take a look to be sure it's not some other source. We did have roof leaks in another part of our home a couple of years ago. So this could be related.

Thanks a lot for a different perspective!

Now a days, one puts something between the drywall and the studs. Around here I think they have gone to something like Tyvex or 3mil plastic sheeting. The drywall (green board) is kept about 1/4" from the top of where the tub (or shower pan) would be to prevent this wicking. action. I think the plastic is put down to and over the lip on the tub (shower pan). The tile covers it. Not sure about that outer corner.

Jake The Wonderdog. Your explanation sounds very solid. Really appreciate for taking the pains to explain it with a picture. And i really like your idea of extending the tile out a bit so it's not the dry wall that gets the brunt of the moisture. Shower door too is a good idea. I am actually replacing it with a shower pan instead of a tub but your point still applies. Thanks again!

AK here is a visual to give you an idea how that area becomes saturated with water and eventually starts to deteriorate. Area in red is the most common area prone to rot due to water penetration between the tile and the tub when calking fails and it doesn't take much all you need is a small separation... Area around the tub always must be maintained.

GN Builders, or anyone, the above picture showing the read area is exactly the problem I'm having in my bathroom I had redone 20 months ago. I've fixed the drywall twice but it keeps getting wet. I've confirmed the issue by doing my own testing with some trash bags and packing tape (see pic). That keeps it dry. The issue with my caulk, though, is it keeps pulling away from the wall. We had onyx panels installed but if you push on them at the base, they move in causing the caulk to not seal properly. It's a never ending issue no matter how many times I recaulk. Seems like it may not have been installed properly.

My question is, can I go after the contractor to get him to fix it for free? Wondering if theres anything I can do so I don't have to pay for it to be repaired....again! Thanks!

You need to start a new thread to get your questions answered, not piggyback on an 18 month old thread.

I disagree. It is silly to repeat virtually the same diagnosis and repairs.

Brad:

Show your contractor this thread. It may be 18 months old, but it predicts his future perfectly.