The Man with the Pan

Today, I venture into the unknown! Today, I use the right material for the job. Today, I got the pre-pan done! After last week's trial an error with the rapid set concrete mix, I went to the Tile Shop on Saturday and bought the concrete and ad-mixture they recommend for laying the shower's pre-pan. Sunday (today), I actually did it!

From the moment I sliced opened the bag, I knew this was going to go much better than last try. This stuff was more like sand, whereas the previous (unsuccessful) mix was more like powder. The video and materials I've watched/read about building a shower pre-pan said that the concrete has to be the consistency of wet beach sand and obviously this material seemed like it'd be just that after mixing in the water and ad-mix.

So I added the water and special ad-mixture they recommended, 4 quarts to one 80lb bag of the mix. The guy at the Tile Shop said that one bag covers 10 sq. ft. at one inch thick. After I poured out the contents of the bag into my wheelbarrow and put the water in, I gotta say I was a little nervous that I wasn't going to have enough. I have a 4x3 foot shower which means 12 sq ft, but the pan is only supposed to be 1 inch thick out at the edges. It tapers to 1/4" at the center where the drain is so that water can't just stand. It has to slope towards the center.

I grabbed my garden hoe and got cracking on mixing everything up. It only took a few minutes of mixing and a bit more water mid way through to get to the consistency I needed. Since the bathroom is quite small and I didn't want it to rain on my concrete, I had to do the mixing in the garage. This of course meant that I got to shovel the mix into a 5 gallon bucket and haul it upstairs! Joy of joys! Hauling nearly a hundred pounds of concrete upstairs in a bucket is one of my favoritest activities! Luckily I have two buckets, so I was able to haul the vast majority of it up the stairs in one trip. I was feeling pretty strong!

I got the stuff upstairs, and dumped it in place. My intention was to try and spread it out fairly well as I dumped it out, but trying to evenly pour 50lbs of concrete out of a bucket ain't exactly a walk in the park. Obviously, I knew I'd be spreading it out with the float in a minute, but in my mind at the time the less work I had to do at this point the better. Wouldn't it be great if the stuff just formed itself into a perfectly sloped pan when you pour in place?

I kept one of the buckets nearby while I got to work on molding the pan just in case there turned out to be extra material that needed to be removed. Somehow, I just didn't think that'd be the case though. Once I spread things out, knowing that you're supposed to pack it down, I was still a bit worried I wouldn't have enough. Beforehand, I had marked a chalk line one inch up from the floor on the studs, so I knew how high the edges had to be. Once I had the edges filled and packed to an inch high I worked my way inward towards the drain.

A couple minutes into it, I felt like I was getting that hang of it. This stuff was really quite easy to work with. Even for a newbie like me. I'm sure glad I remembered to put a sponge in the drain. I would've had a lot of concrete in the drain had I forgotten to do that!

This was my first shower pan and I'm pretty comfortable saying that I'm the first Eaton in my immediate family to attempt this. (I could be wrong though, my family's got a history of being pretty handy.) If this shower turns out, which I think it will, I'll make Eaton family history! Even if it doesn't turn out, I'll still make Eaton family history, just not in the way I wanted to.

The whole process only took me 1-2 hours. Oh yeah, remember how nervous I was that the 80lb bag wouldn't be enough? I ended up with about an inch of material in the bottom of the 5 gal bucket! I'd say that's pretty much perfect!