Contractor Talk - Professional Construction and Remodeling Forum banner
Status
Not open for further replies.

Glass mosaic shower

19K views 150 replies 43 participants last post by  BamBamm5144 
#1 ·
I'm working on all the tike work In a beautiful 4500sf log cabin. Yea it's my first time ever tiling, time to test the skills
 

Attachments

See less See more
3
#5 ·
Top to bottom waterproofed, shower pan is definitely sloped and to code, glass tile is almost perfectly laid, non sanded grout, all I got left is to install shower head and components. Customer is amazed, and no they did not know it was my First shower build however I assured them with references and paperwork. Million dollar general and I'm licensed. Tons of construction experience and a bachelor's degree in construction management. I love this work the complexity level is a personal opinion. There's a new generation of contractors emerging, young highly intelligent professionals at whatever we choose along with hustle and drive taking us to the top. I'm doing the basement shower now next week 2 mosaic bathtub surrounds and will be my first time on the tub as well. Salute to all the guys being of true service and doing the right thing it's time customers learn to trust and love their remodel pro again. God bless and let's get it!!!
 
#17 ·
... There's a new generation of contractors emerging, young highly intelligent professionals at whatever we choose along with hustle and drive taking us to the top...
Hey kid, you didn't exactly reinvent the wheel....

New generation????...WTF????

College degree, great, the only good education comes from the school of hard knocks.....

Young highly intelligent professionals, you just described a good many of us when we started out....:whistling

Oh yea, before you were born....:thumbsup:
 
#10 ·
No offense but it if I can see where the mosaic sheets begin and end, it's wrong.

Watch out for those picky customers that want things done correctly or you'll be getting twice the experience real quick.

If you think you can master a trade your first time out make sure you take lots of pictures of your work, and in ten years if your still in the business go back and look at them and you'll laugh at how naive you were.
 
#11 ·
I'm definitely no master not even close however I am very excited about the end result considering I bypassed the typical 4 years of being a helper and jump to lead installer and business owner so I'm no amateur and I imagine you can see where the sheets end it's not grouted in these pics, I assure you good sir that's just a careless flaw regardless of experience level, just lazy. Yes a few lines are a little wide, no I don't like the color Combo either. They went with black tike black grout on the bathroom floor, it's a brown wood log home but hey it's there money, which at the end of the day they love it, paid extremely well, just labor alone for the shower build and tile finish about 160sf brought me $6500 took a week, create value and abundance in the lives of those around you and it will be created in yours as well. I'll walk away with priceless experience, all the customers satisfaction and happiness and about 14 grand for 3 weeks worth of work and I'm just getting started will make six digits easy and take off in August til the new year with work booked up. So show me love or hate either way we re all stars down here just how it is
 
#15 ·
Good job jumping right in to a difficult project (mosaic plus shower), but there really are a lot of things that can go wrong with a project like this.

Waterproofing: How did you treat the pan to wall seam, did you do two coats of Redgard to proper mil, did you tape the seams so they don't move and possibly break the seal?

Tile setting and layout: It looks like the grout joints vary far more than industry standards. Is there half a row on part of the top and then just a thick grout line on the rest? Did you use the proper modified thinset for glass, did you mix it right, embed right, work fast enough to avoid skin over?

Grouting: unsanded cementitious has been working for decades, but most higher end jobs are using more advanced materials these days. Are the plane transitions caulked? Did you seal the grout?

Guarantee your work and be ready to redo it all, read the TCNA book, watch some more videos, and hang around here for a while and you might end up being a good contractor.
 
#16 ·
If you were just trying this on your house or at a friend or family members house then I'd take it a little easier, but you're not. You charged full freight with no idea what you're doing and seem to think it turned out perfect.

You didn't use edge profiles on the exposed corners which is a major problem. There's no going back and adding them without the risk of compromising the waterproofing. The pics are blurry so I can't tell what's going on in the last pic but I don't see any Redguard, maybe that's a protective cover? The area around the niches is pretty rough, I can see where you scabbed in a course of ripped down tiles for some reason. The joints vary hugely throughout, especially over the top niche. There is also an area where the pattern goes off so that the tiles don't align with the sheets above and below them.

I hope the grout was very close to the tile color.
 
#44 ·
Just sucks that your customers have no idea and you are using them to experiment and learn.

This isn't ego or internet gangstas, but highly skilled and highly experienced professionals who don't think it's amusing calling saying that you were testing your skills on this one, when you don't actually have any yet.

About the only ego here is yours and charging people to play around with their most expensive investment so you can, how did you put it, "keep hitting home runs".
Yea sorry I didn't need to load tools and cut tiles for 10 years til I felt comfortable to take on a project and do it right, is it perfect no but neither is your best work and the customer is present the whole way with a owners rep a real professional, not self proclaimed like yourself, inspecting all my skills every step of the way so sorry but yea it's going great. You got all these skills yet your observations are on unfinished work but don't worry I'll be done soon and upload the finished product so you can feel how professional you actually are
 
#23 ·
I appreciate all the feedback guys good and bad and I'm aware of the flaws there ain't a contractor out here that does perfect work. On the edges I smoothed them down with masonry stone I'll update pics I'm grouting now and yes I know the pan liner and pan along with moisture barrier are the core and have to be perfect. And yes your damn Right I charged full price I put 1000% dedication and hard work in this Project. What I lack in hands on experience I make up for in multiple project areas as well as owner client report. Again I appreciate all the feedback and never meant to offend all the ol school guys but **** if the shoes fit where em. I'm located in Arkansas huge market but way out dated methods so I've been super busy winning with eddm sent 5000 flyers got 85K 8 months booked
 
#25 ·
Just sucks that your customers have no idea and you are using them to experiment and learn.

This isn't ego or internet gangstas, but highly skilled and highly experienced professionals who don't think it's amusing calling saying that you were testing your skills on this one, when you don't actually have any yet.

About the only ego here is yours and charging people to play around with their most expensive investment so you can, how did you put it, "keep hitting home runs".
 
#26 ·
$85,000 is 8 months?

I'm not old, old school, or an internet tough guy. My name and businesses are clearly used.

How did you address the matting where the tile terminates? Caulking between the tile and substrate?

What did you use for a pan?

What are you going to do when the client see's their bathroom on here and all the issues it has and all the potential issues in the near future?

Please, I implore you, please upload more pictures.
 
#32 ·
We have all made mistakes. There was no waterproofing tub walls years ago and I am sure 10-15 years ago some of us built showers that are nowhere near what we do today.

The issue with this thread is the OP says he is using the newest and best and is nowhere near that level. He goes as far as saying he is knowingly using this client, without their knowledge of his inexperience and ignorance.

Its all fun with the OP but the client is clearly a victim. If he waterproofed and installed a proper pan, the issue is not systemic but the shower is fugly, the exposed edges and grout lines are wrong, and the shower is going to have issues. I am not positive but I assume 'white' thinset is from a bigbox and not correct for glass. I am positive this is a shame.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
You have insufficient privileges to reply here.
Top