Efflorescence on your shower floor - A lightening or whitening of the grout

There are many reasons a shower floor can look "Off".  Grouting complaints are in my opinion the number one reason for dissatisfied clients and frustrated Do It Yourselfers.  On of the things I like most about linear shower drains is the fact that large format tile and stone can be used in these busy wet rooms.

Be reducing the number of grout joints you give yourself more time to do a nice job grouting.  With larger tiles you need less time wiping down the shower floor and by this reduce the chance of over watering or removing the colour pigment that nets a "Washed Out" or "Lightened" shower floor.

There are a few products out on the market that make this even easier. Epoxy Grouts and Premium Setting Materials.

The best luck I have had in my years building showers is working with Mapei's "Grani Rapid" this product does not contribute to efflorescence at all - their is no portland cement in the mix.  No portland - No efflorescence.

I won't get into all the small details at this time but I will advice you to look closely into the linear drain and linear drain system you purchase before finalizing your showers fixtures.

Mapei, Custom, Latecrete and Nobel company are four suppliers who can help design a shower system that will stop Efflorescence in it's tracks.  You need Topical Waterproofing (most times) and premium grouts.  Insure you can use these modified setting materials over top of your waterproofing - a popular choice in North America is Kerdi by Schluter.  This would be a mistake in my opinion as Schluter does not allow this. "Non-Modified Thin Set" only over top of Kerdi is the instructions printed on a roll of Kerdi.

I'm digging up some reference material and will post more information here when I have more links.

Some further reading into the problem;

1). http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/remodel/msg1222404422522.html
2). http://www.johnbridge.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=76285\
3). http://www.tileforums.com/index.php?showtopic=3526
4). http://articlemonster.com/home-and-garden/home-improvement/efflorescence-causes-removal-and-prevention.html
5). http://www.thetilecleaners.com/sefflor.html

In a shower you are always running the water and the top layer of this efflorescence is removed.  But always growing.  The other flip side of the coin can be Latex Leaching - but that is a whole other subject.

Do your homework,  Do this once.  With large format tile and a oneway slope there is little chance of the shower floors getting soaked like they would with say a standard 4" drain opening and small 4"x4" tile.

Standard grout is roughly 17% porous this leads to heavy saturation in the floor mix.  Shower drains need to be installed properly and grouted perfectly.  A shower like this will offer up easy cleaning and not whiten out like so many jobs do.  Not to mention that there is so much less to clean...

Regards,

John Whipple
www.no-curb.com

(604) 506 6792