Cheryl Siegel explains why grout cracks and fails, then shows renters how to rig extra shower curtains and rods to keep water away from gaps around 0.5 inches wide. Grout isn't waterproof and has no flex, so it splits when walls move. The curtain method stops mold growth without requiring repairs.
Tips for large gaps in the grout and this was in a rental. She said she just got out of a moldy home and rented a brand new apartment and they did a bad job of the grout. There's crack grout and a half inch gap between the tub and the wall on two sides that she knows she needs to fill before she can use the shower. Well, I just want to emphasize. Foreign. Hi everyone, I'm Cheryl Siegel with emoitingmold.com thanks for checking out my YouTube channel. I did a mold bathroom mold episode and there was a question about tips for large gaps in the grout and this was in a rental. She said she just got out of a moldy home and rented a brand new apartment and they did a bad job. The grout, there's crack grout and a half inch gap between the tub and the wall on two sides that she knows she needs to fill before she can use the shower. Well, I just want to emphasize that grout is not waterproof. It's not the waterproofing membrane. When moisture, even humidity gets behind a wall, especially in a shower, the wood substrate, which is usually what it is, expands and contracts and so it moves. And grout doesn't move, it can't move, it has no flex and tile has no flex. So something has to give and that's usually where the cracks come come from is that there's movement. There can be other reasons why there's movement in a building. It could be tall buildings, it could be anything from wind currents and wind loads from the outside. It could be settlement of foundations. It could be all kinds of things, none of them good. But if you, if someone's building a shower, just know there needs to be a moisture proof layer behind the tile and the grout that's not the moisture proof layer. And I have other videos about that. But for rentals, this is my solution. My solution is to get extra, extra shower curtains. So I'm assuming it may have a shower door that would be fine. If it doesn't have a shower door and you have a shower curtain, then I would get extra shower curtains and I would use those shower curtains strategically, at least on three sides. So you have one shower curtain that prevents water from dumping out into the bathroom that you know that you access. I would put another shower curtain on the other wall. You can get one of those compression shower rods. Very easy, very inexpensive, expensive. The shower curtains, just make sure you get one that's non toxic, doesn't off gas, some bad stuff that some plastics do get those very inexpensively. Then I would get a third shower rod. And it can be a short one and you can get. It could be any kind of rod, to be honest. And you're going to lay that across the other two shower rods and then buy another shower curtain. So you'll have three shower curtains. If you have a shower door, you'll have two shower curtains and a shower door. And then you put that across where your controls are and where your tub spout is. And you can cut a hole for those if you want to. Or you just reach behind it to turn the water on and off for a shower. You would put it under the shower head probably. And that way you get the water to not even approach going into that juncture between the wall and the tub. And that is usually where things leak. And even if you got, you could caulk it. But my experience has been it doesn't really last that long. But you can. I mean, it's a rental and I don't know how much work somebody wants to do. But caulking is fine, you can caulk it. It's actually good that it's got some space right now and that it's drying out because dead mold may be better than being exposed to than live mold, which is actually growing and multiplying every minute. But that's my solution for people living in in rentals. And I have children that have been in rentals and that has been my solution for them as well is just in invest in three shower curtains and a couple extra shower rods. Rig it up so that your walls are covered by shower curtains, so that the water goes into the drain and nowhere else.
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