I want to replace a bathtub. The existing one is a five footer, fourteen inches high. It's wedged into three walls.

I talked to a contractor about it yesterday, and he claims that if he removes the tile, that it can be lifted up at one end, stood up on its side, and then taken through the door. I guess that I can believe this is possible, since the diagonal is only about 61.6 inches, and there's probably enough slack and play in the drywall to scrape it by with tiles removed. What I have more trouble believing is that I'll be able to get the new deeper whirlpool in without major wall surgery. If I go with a depth of 21 inches, that makes a diagonal of 63.5 inches, which seems like too tight a squeeze to me. I'm trying to avoid having to (temporarily) remove studs and move it in through the closet on the other side of the wall.

Does anyone have any experience with this?

The other question is, how do I disconnect the drain without making a hole in the wall opposite? Or is that unavoidable?

C'mon Rand. It's not rocket science.

Just kidding.

Hey Rand,

I just finished remodeling my bathroom about a week or two ago. And, in fact, I replaced the existing tub with a Kohler whirlpool that was a bit shorter and taller than the old tub.

The simple answer to your question is that it depends. The more complete answer is that you will almost definitely have to remove both tile and drywall to permit a slightly taller tub. When you start throwing shims under the tub blocks for proper leveling (an absolute must for proper draining and shower door use), the new height of the tub will likely exceed the previous height. And that means (at the very least) cutting away at the bottom of drywall to permit the taller tub.

As you indicated, you might need to reframe (temporarily remove studs) as well, but that depends on the fit. I needed to remove the tile, drywall, and needed to reframe. My reframing was to make it a bit shorter, as the old tub (circa 1938) was about 5 inches longer than the standard 60 inch tubs of today.

As for getting to the drain, the answer depends on who's doing the job. An extemely talented contractor might be able to pull that off without going through the back wall. If you're doing it yourself, then you'll likely have to break through the wall to get at the drain from the other side, and depending on the setup you may need to go through the floor as well. Put it this way, it's a helava lot easier to do drain work when the wall is out.

Additionally, you may want to consider this. When I finished setting up the tub, I realized that routine maintenance like snaking the drain, would require removing the overflow face plate. But getting the plate back on properly, and checking for leaks would require going through that wall again. So, I created a service door from press board and wood molding. If you do break through that wall, check the nature of the connections. If you think that you might want to access to the hardware in the future, a service door is easier that busting through the wall again.

If you do have to break through the wall to get to the drain, you might want to consider replacing the hardware (faucet, shower head, valve body, etc). But if you do that, it will require sweating the pipes. And if you do go that route, then to keep the place up to code will likely require a construction/plumbing permit from your town construction office. Some people do it on the sly, without a permit. As I live next to a member of the local gov't, I took the legal route.

I know that this was probably not what you wanted to hear, but home construction is a bitch. That's why good contractors are flush with cash nowadays. I hope this info helps.

Regards,
Evan

One thing I've found about Big Projects like this is that you'll always end up wishing you'd just torn the whole thing apart and redone it from scratch. Unless there's something you really, really like about the existing wall--and it's something you don't think you can reproduce--you're going to go to extreme lengths to preserve something that you don't care about.

It's the "heritage" issue all over again--you spend as much time fitting the new stuff onto the reused stuff as you saved by reusing stuff...

Also: The issues with "not up to code" are that you can't list the area in deeds or sale documents, and damage to that area (or caused by a malfunction there) probably won't be covered by insurance. So if you try to sell the house and you did the bathroom without a permit, you can't say "upgraded bathroom"--or even list the bathroom at all! And if a pipe in the non-code bathroom bursts and floods out the room below, you can't claim insurance money for it.

DensityDuck,

You're absolutely right about both issues.

Personally, I'm of the mind that, if you're going to remove the tile, you might as well remove the drywall. Existing sheetrock and be replaced with the mold or water resistant drywall that's available nowadays. Paint a layer of "Red Guard" onto the new resistant drywall, wait one day, and you're ready to start tiling the shower walls.

As for your comments about permits, you're right. Those were the same arguments I made to my wife prior to construction. I ended up getting three permits (general construction, plumbing, and electrical). My wife thought I was being to being too "law abiding" and anal, but when I told her that spreading out our liability to the insurance company and the town might make good sense, she stopped complaining about it.

Getting the old one out is no huge deal; worst case, it can be pulled out of position as he describes and sawed (hammered?) into pieces. No telling what you'll find at that point, though...

In my (older) house, this same project revealed the floor joists were 2x6, 18" apart (I believe current code is 2x8, 14" apart?). With 4" diameter holes cut through them at various points for the toilet drain! My contractor thought it was remarkable that the subfloor had distributed weight and kept the old tub out of the kitchen below; we reinforced those joists, and..., and...

With references to all the discussion of floor joists, and leaking into rooms below, it's on the first floor, on a slab.

Hate to go off topic, but bathtubs should be the least of your concerns, especially for the chickenhawks at this site who in some measure created the momentum for this mess, so let's get on with it.

[rest of off-topic nuttiness from yet another cowardly anonymous troll snipped by site administrator]

Hate to go off topic

No, you apparently love to go off topic. I've deleted most of your idiotic (as evidenced by the "chickenhawk" nonsense) trollish post. Next time you want to demonstrate your rude manners and lack of critical thinking, pick a post where the subject is relevant.

Pull the drywall off on one side so that you are looking at studs. The 60" x 21" portion is probably only a two-dimensional plane on the front (bathroom-facing) part of the tub. If you can roll this two-dimensional plane in using the 14-inch-wide space between two studs, you'll have about 63.5 inches, just barely enough. I did this about two years ago, replacing a tub at the back of a 60"-wide bathroom with a new one that was about six inches taller and about four inches wider. It only caused a ~1/8" x 4 inch gouge on the drywall that was not visible from the other side.

This tub (and shower surround) was designed to attach straight to studs, so removing the drywall was necessary anyway.

After reading kayawanee's first post, I think you would be better off just buying a new house.

"...buy a new house..."

No. But DensityDuck has it absolutely right: you will waste time, money, knuckle-skin, and your hope of Paradise (from the profanity) trying to save the old wall.

Rip it out. Install the new gear in the comfort and convenience of plenty of free space, then put the wall back using modern materials. You will spend more for parts and materials, but if you value your time at over ten cents an hour you will be money ahead.

And very, very much second the recommendation of adding an access door. It doesn't have to be fancy -- most of the ones I've built have been a chunk of drywall with molding tacked/glued around the edge; 1/4" plywood backing optional. Hold in place with a couple of screws. The ability to get access to the supply and drain fittings without having to get out the Zipsaw (or fire axe) is priceless, and there are few rooms where such a construct can't be hidden behind a dresser or chest of drawers.

Regards,
Ric

In all seriousness, I agree with Ric.

We are adding on to our house now and all the plumbing will have convenient access. Ripping out a wall to get at a leak?

Been there, done that but never again.

OK, I just did this a year ago on a 1950's house.
Rip it out. Rip it all out.
1. there is no way to 'tilt' the tub out unless its to roll it out towards the open space. Not fun. Since it was my first time at this kind of remodel I tried the 'just do the minimum damage first' method. On the second extremely frustrating day I went Gengis Kahn on the bathroom and was happy once more.
2. Access panel. Yep.
3. Beware the contractor who says he can tilt a rectangle between two fixed vertical planes.
Draw a rectangle, measure it. Then tilt it 45 degrees. Measure the distance between the two opposing corners. That's how much the wall must flex to meet your dreams.

Looks like we have a lot of people who have done this to there own house.

The original question is do I need to remove a wall to get to the drain and that is no. The drain should have a slip joing going down that slides out. You must not have access below the tub as you mention slab. Although there could be crawl space access to below the tub somewhere. Access through the wall is for the faucets that fill the tun or to access the diverter valve that runs the shower. If you have a contractor that thinks he can get it out without out removing to much stuff I would trust him as he would have seen similar setups at other house that could have been developed at the same time as yours. I live in a neighbor hood that was built in the 50's by two developers and they used 3 basic plans.

Thats my 2 cents, anyway.

There is no home improvement project that cannot be easily accomplished with the proper application of dynamite.

> spreading out our liability to ... and the town might make good sense

Permits don't make the town liable for anything.

In a sane world, they would, anyone whose approval is required should be liable, but we don't live in a sane world.

I don't think I saw mention of anything going in over the drywall and under the tile. I'm finishing up a major master bathroom remod. Pretty much laid bare the entire inside of the bathroom. If you take down sheet rock, make sure to photograph the underlying stud and pipe arrangement, too. You can avoid the problem of guessing wrong when you think your stud-finder has found a stud and not a pipe. And put a cement backer board over the drywall in wet areas. In my case, the tub sits inside the drywall perimeter, but the backerboard sits ON the tub or shower pan. So, your contractor will have to rip out the tile, which is mortared to the backerboard, which is nailed and probably glued to the drywall.