Workerbee

Hello! I'm turning my tiny bathroom into a wetroom and I had a couple of questions I hoped you guys could help with. Current floor is concrete slab, with 50mm EPS then chipboard, and previously had a shower cubicle with raised tray. I'm taking it back to the slab and hope to put a wetroom shower former where the shower tray used to be, electric ufh and stone tiles. First question is about supporting a wetroom shower former and floor tiles on a floating floor. Having done research and spoken to insulation and shower tray manufacturers, I've got a few possible solutions I want to run past the forum: 1) Phenolic/PIR insulation (preferably 75mm), then cement board (22mm?) - insulation manufacturer thought this would be fine to tile on, and would be my preferred option insulation-wise, but I'm aware tilers sometimes say tiling a truly floating floor isn't a good idea. I'm also unsure how I would then install the shower former, as I presume it couldn't just rest on insulation. 2) XPS tile backer board - maybe 90mm for most of the floor as I could do away with the chipboard. Leave a rectangle out for the shower former, and drop in 30mm XPS then 38mm screed, then place the 22mm former on top to bring it level with the rest of the XPS floor. Advantage is better compressive strength with XPS and it could be stuck to the slab, so creating a more mechanical fix between tiles and slab than a usual floating floor. Worse insulation, though. 3) Phenolic/PIR fitted between wooden joists screwed directly to slab, mimicking floor joists that the shower former could slot between. Advantage is high strength; downsides are large thermal bridges throughout the floor, and wood in a wetroom floor, where it could rot. Second question is about how to deal with the current shower tray slab and drain. I've attached a few pictures. Where the raised shower tray used to be, there is a horseshoe-shaped concrete slab on top of the concrete floor slab, that came level with the insulation and chipboard on the rest of the floor. I'm thinking I should chop this out with an angle grinder and start again from the floor slab, using one of the above floor buildups. The drain is resting on sand, as there is no slab in this part of the floor. Can I keep it like this and just connect into the existing drain? Thank you for any advice.

Has anyone else used clay plaster, and were the advertised benefits over gypsum worth it?

That must have been annoying! With it being based on natural products, I feel there must be a way of making some. What was it like to work with, and what was the end result like?

Hello! Does anyone know how I could make up some clay plaster to experiment with? I'm interested in trying it, but nowhere near me sells it, and the idea of paying delivery for one bag - and then having 20kg left over when I realise it's not right for me - doesn't feel right. I'm thinking I could get a small bag of clay powder, and add marble powder, but would it need anything else? And would it matter what type of clay? I'd prefer white that I can pigment, but there are different types of clays available online for different purposes. Also, has anyone here used clay plaster before? Does a skim of it help with moisture buffering, condensation, better indoor environment etc or is all of that overplayed? Thank you!

Thank you, yes you're right, but I'm putting a stone floor down in the kitchen so I'm keen to have something to take the chill off it just in that room. So that's why I'm wondering about whether to go electric ufh just as a secondary heat source, or install wet ufh (in combination with a thermal store that does heating) which can potentially be upgraded to a primary heat source if I get a heat pump one day. For primary heating, storage heaters definitely make most sense, but I've actually been looking at oil filled radiators, partly because I haven't found any storage heaters I like the design of (daft, I know, because it'll end up costing me), and partly because I always think of the bad rep of storage heaters of old. But I presume they're a lot better now? You mentioned about a uvc lasting all day - what sort of size would I need? Plumbers I spoke to suggested around 150l for 2 people. So I'm thinking maybe the 210l if I went the thermal store route, to make up for the different way it loses heat. I suppose you can always increase your stored hot water by increasing the temp, but I'm feeling it would be better to oversize than undersize a cylinder, whatever type it is.

Thank you for the reply. I will have a look into the specs you mention, particularly things such as standing heat losses, but it is good to know thermal stores are not old tech. The fact uvcs seem far more prevalent made me suspicious that thermal stores must have some major flaw, particularly as they seem to carry benefits such as potential self-installation. Do you find 200l is more than enough? It would be supplying two of us having showers. There was also a thread I found that mentioned thermal stores need to be oversized compared to uvcs. I suppose for those thermal stores that can supply heating as well, it would need to be even bigger. That's another puzzle: whether to get wet ufh and a compatible thermal store, to hopefully have a future proofed setup I can add a heat pump to in the future, or just focus on dhw and have separate electric ufh, and lean into being a 'dry' electric house and hoping battery tech moves forward, solar becomes more efficient for my small roof etc.

Hello everyone, I'm replacing my vented direct dhw cylinder in a one-bed all-electric house and I was planning on having an uvc installed. But then I came across the idea of a thermal store. This would still give mains pressure hot water - important for a good shower - but also seemed to provide additional benefits: - no g3 requirement so I could install it myself - no annual service - some of them can run ufh as well as dhw. So rather than installing electric ufh, I could maybe put in wet ufh which might future-proof me if I ever want a heat pump etc. But: - I've read people saying thermal stores have had their day and they've been superceded by uvcs - It sounds (from a different thread on here) like I'd need a larger size compared to an uvc because of the way they lose heat A lot of the YouTube videos I've found about thermal stores seem to be about 10 years old. Am I looking at old tech or might it be a good fit for me? Thanks!