Hi all,
Last week I went to lay a vinyl tile floor only to find termite activity. I had to postpone the tile job until this is taken care of, obviously.
Anyway HO calls exterminator who says pull up damaged floor down to the cement so they can do there thing. I cut out damaged floor and discovered it is built on 2×3’s. They don’t seem to be PT and I don’t recall ever seeing pressure treated 2×3’s. These 2×3’s are really water logged as was the ply.. you could put pressure on them and they oozed water.
Can’t tell where the water was coming in. There is no obvious water trail right now. It’s on the edge of the foundation grd level and at the bottom of a hill. The HO said rain used to be a problem until he had landscaper redirect the water.
My plan is to dry out area with dehumidifier/ fan for 1 week, try to observe where the water might still be coming in at, then see where the bad ply stops and cut more out if necessary, remove there sleepers and lay down PT 2×4’s in place put down new ply and cover the whole Bathroom (about 4-6′ x 12′) with 1/4″ luan. Does this sound about right??? any suggestions on alternitive ways of doing it would be appreciated.
One more ???. There did seem to be seeping around the bottom edge of the toilet. Could a bad seal over a number of years have caused this big of a water mess??
Thanks for your comments in advance,
Dan
Replies
Yeah, IMO. The last bathroom I did had some water damage that I was aware of by the tub. No big deal. Well, as I got into the demo I found that the tub had leaked since it was installed 18 years ago (bad plumbing, terrible caulk seal, gotta love homeowners).
Anyway, I ended up replacing the entire floor and most of the exterior wall. Water left unchecked can make a big mess.
Good Luck and have fun.
Leaking seal will leak water ( amoung other things) and with vinyl over things, it can't dry, so where else would it go?
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I had a leaky toilet wax ring in my half bath. No water was ever evident around the toilet but stepping on the floor near the far side of the toilet indicated a spongy floor. Pulled up the linoleum and found dry rot about half way through the 2x6 subfloor in a spot about a foot in diameter. Scooped out the damaged material and filled it in with epoxy. My half bath was rarely used, so I could see a bad wax ring causing the kind of damage you are talking about.
Thanks for getting back guys,Anyway, just got back late today from this house; the exterminator had been there so I went back today not knowing what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that the rest of the floor et. al. had dryed out pretty well so I could proceed with demo/rebuild and not lose any time, since this was the only job I had scheduled for today.While talking with the H/O I found out this (and others around it) house was built by a contractor using the local Vo-Tech as his help.Nothing wrong with that, as far as it goes, but you would think that the contractor would have a certain obligation to check on what his help was doing before sealing up the floor in a critical area such as a bathroom....NOTWhat I found was that the toilet had been bolted directly over the waste pipe with a wax seal, but there was no closet flange over the waste pipe. Just bolt her down and hope for the best. In this case the seal didn't hold, and it was leaking into his floor for about 15 years give or take. This explains why the electric baseboard heater, right next to the toilet, was covered with rust spots. The humidity level in that bath was probably akin to spring in Florida the whole year around.Oh, BTW I found out there is no such thing as PT 2x3's and that they had used just plain old kiln dried 2x3's as the sleepers (which rotted) and I also learned that the nails they shot in with a 22Cal nail gun pretty much disintigrate (sp) after this period of time.Hopefully the advanced search function has been fixed so that if someone else comes across a similar problem, they can learn from what I learned on this job.Thanks Again Guys,Dan