This Schluter Kerdi Shower FAILED!!!- But Who's to BLAME??? 

Yeah installer error

Idk in the last two years the majority of the showers we have pulled out have been schluter systems, I personally install both but preferr wedi. I have never pulled out a failing wedii system

Sounds like my profile exactly. Over 40 years in the trade, been using Schluter for over 20 years, never a failure. I've watched a bunch of these videos, and can find installer error/non Schluter approved methods of installation in all of them. I suggest all installers take a Schluter installation seminar before their first install. Should they ever have a question, Schluter's tech guys are great. This trade (at least in my area) is plagued by bucket and trowel hacks that couldn't carry water for me.

My middle daughter is new to the industry but she goes to every Schluter “show” and it’s a hands on show so everyone is actually putting the system together including the mud/membrane application.

Douglas, I have Schulter in a remodeled bath. Dry as a bone. No issues. The only problem is it is very expensive. 💰💸💸

How can you fuck up the install?Im not a tile guy by trade but I just watched the video online and did three showers in my house and 7 years later I don’t have a sign of any water leaking anywhere..Serious question as a person with experience what are you seeing people fail at when installing Kerdi systems?

@@Halfdead211 Part of it is that floor and wall framing can be sub-par, too flexible, not properly fastened or partially rotted from a previous shower setup. This can cause excessive movement of the materials from different forces acting on the shower enclosure. Some of these can be like when houses get moved around by high winds - you can hear your house groaning nad making little crackling sounds when a hurricane gust smacks it, especially if it's older than the 60s before plywood was used as exterior sheathing or floor sheathing. Those older homes have less resistance to flexural, rotational and diagonal movements that plywood in modern homes prevents. Also, a heavy person - or two people - inside the shower... the momentary weight on weak framing can slowly cause failures. It's not anything people normally think of is it? But it's a reality. Also, Kerdi and other systems made of expanded foam are not perfect. That foam substrate will not age well in instances of impacts. Dropping heavy objects on the sill, for instance. Even if the tile didn't crack, there may have been a minute joint failure somehow. Things can happen in substrate materials and methods that are at a microscopic level not visible to the naked eye, but boy does water love travelling those capillary pathways! Something I still have to grapple is the use of a putty knife in the corners to "tape" the seams. I'm curious how waterproof that mud material really is. And not everyone springs for the more expensive epoxy tile grout, the semi-flexible waterproof kind which helps prevent water from getting behind the tile in the first place. Grout is your first line of defense - don't cheap out on it! A final comment is installers: Not every person who has chosen the path of being a contractor/installer of materials has the emotional or mental strength to put in the extra time and effort to nail the details. I've seen so much hack work in my career. It may not always be hack installers - it might be a zealous manager who's trying to push guys on tight deadlines and budgets for maximum profit and the end result is poor install quality leading to ultimate failures. There are so many reasons a specialized system like this can fail.

I've seen plenty of screwed up PVC pan installs. The problem is with pride, ignorance, or a combination of the two pertaining to installation. The bulk of the problem usually lies with the installing contractor.

I’m not sure what the lack of your faith has to do with Schluter… With it, you need to follow the same general rules of waterproofing like with any other system. If you screw up Schluter, you are likely to screw up with any other product too. But Schluter provides a LOT of support, and warranty, unlike other products.

I have seen plenty of failed shower pan liners. You are just an old school installer who installs pan liners right.

@@forensic8385 The shower pan liner at my place failed because the installer screwed through it to attach cement board to the curb...

@@paul_price Yup, or they dont fold the corners correctly, or they dont attach it to the drain assembly correctly, or they dont integrate waterproofing on the walls to the liner correctly.....

I'm with you on pan liners.done correctly never leak.instalers always rush to get liners covered fast.leads to problems down the road.instalers should be made to replace at there cost not homeowner.maybe they will learn to slow down and do it correctly.

@@fixerman6404 yep. Was never a problem with the packed liner system, only bad installations. Unlike today's stuff: bad systems AND bad installs. NOPE! Liner n pack all day. Done right it's bullet proof.

It was a polished turd - nothing bulletproof about it. Once he actually got through the granite and showed the spot bonding they used, the verdict was in that it wasn't a failure of the Kerdi - it was a failure of the installers who polished that steaming pile and called it good.

@@joek5161 Bro that failure had very little if anything to do with spot bonding. No weep holes, and the curb wasn't even waterproofed. Case closed. In the same way that you're supposed to trowel towards the drain, so the grooves provide drainage in the right direction, more space would mean faster drainage if it was weeped properly.

nope bad tiler... especially with natural stone. i can talk on that cause my house is filled with travertine and i installed it and i learned all the tricks to it. he should be banned from natural stone

@The Creature from the Seventh Chamber ....yeah SOOOO beautiful fucked up

Doesn't really suit that crammed corner.

@@dushk0 I agree. It is kind of tacky looking. Better off with some lighter and brighter

got a link to your project?

With pre-slope?

How did the install last? I hope perfectly well.

Landberg Tile TV not a Schluter problem...we need better training in the trades to prevent this from happening.

@@codyburgess7034 absolutely agree!

@@LandbergTileTV Insane is the word, thanks for your reviews of the tile levelling systems a while back btw.

@@codyburgess7034 : Ignorance in every trade. I just saw a flooded retail location: 5 years since build out, plumber set utility room drain so high that an after hours failed faucet flooded 40 feet in all directions. Carpet, walls and merch soaked. Ridiculous the stuff I've seen in these places. HOW DOES THAT PASS INSPECTIONS?? I'm an electronics guy, yet even i know the floor drain shouldn't be built like a kids model volcano!

Looks like they fabricated the floor out of a single slab of granite, with some tight grout lines. It likely would have been a ton of work if not impossible to get full mortar coverage underneath considering the size of the pieces. Unless you make the mortar super runny. If they would have waterproofed the curb and perimeter, it likely would have lasted a whole lot longer.

The kerdi system was not AT ALL installed properly. Nothing wrong with Kerdi, but there is if you don’t install it properly. You did watch the whole video, right?

@@justinhc123 yes I watched it all. I have also watched the kerdi testing that has been done by Issac. I just prefer to paint the membrane on because it has never failed me. I have even started painting over the kerdi as Issac has shown to speed up the water testing.

@@ryancoulter7681 correct. Redgard all the way. Never had a problem

@@abewilcox4560 redgard, aquadefense, hydroban, ardex 8+9. It's all the same. Hydroban is readily available to me so I use it. I have used the 8+9 on request and love it as well. I have to order it so it takes a few days to get it but it's nice. The redgard and aquadefense I am a bit unsold on because it is so mass production being in Lowe's and HD.

@@ryancoulter7681 I've used the Superior Pro Shield Plus, and it was exactly the same as redgard. Even smelled the same, probably comes from the same factory, so I have full faith in redgard at this point, at least until I have a reason to not believe. Plus it's readily available at almost every corner. Lowe's here on the east coast is now carrying Mapei, and i know they carry a similar product, so that is even an additional option. The 8+9 seems like a cement based product, which I would think may effect it's elasticity, but I haven't used it so I don't know.

I will use this video but 4 month from now. How do I cancel now?

There are no weep holes on a Kerdi drain. You must be talking about traditional drains. I use small stones for those so they never get clogged.

That's what I did in my shower, combined with Redgard on the Hardie walls as a vapor barrier. If I had to do it over again, I would do a preslope covered with 3 coats of Redgard (no vinyl liner and additional mud bed), so long as I can get the water from on top of the Redgard into the drain via weep holes. Be sure to check out floorelf.com, which is where I got a lot of my shower wisdom.

Preslope, hotmop, gravel around weep holes, mortar bed, set tile, done. Thats the floor process

How would you have prevented water from getting under tiles in the first place?

I bet you sold the house because you realized what a shity idea linear drains are. So you take the worst part of a shower, the drain. And make it really really big so now you have more of the most crappiest part of a shower. Ya I will and have put them in but am laughing the whole time, YOU GET TO CLEAN THAT. Linear drains were the brain child of a dumb ass designer who thought they are the shit. "They are all going to laugh at you".

All that meets the eye, cheap out on the rest. Better do a solid installation and save on the surface.

I'm redoing my bathro and I literally just said to myself "ok I'm going with a solid prefabbed shower pan" after watching this video. Lol!

Or u could dive a little deeper and find out why they failed. Perhaps they used the wrong type of thinset?

@@ryanspence7239 or avoid the bs and just get an insert with some kind of design you like

Lol at these replies. Or you could hire an actual professional. If you can’t afford one, prefab it is!

robert warner you do your due diligence and ask the proper questions, do your research, pay attention to how they’re doing things, and get several bids. Don’t just let someone come into your expensive house and just start pecking away cause he says he knows what he’s doing

Its not kerdi man. Its installer error. Got cheap and half asked that expensive job

Not a Kerdi problem they didn’t use it right at all especially in the floor to wall transitions

Doubtful they could ever match it.

He didnt pay for it really. It was part of an issue when they bought it

Yeah it made me cringe when he just started whacking that thing with a hammer. As bad as the install is, that stuff probably would have popped out with a little persuading. I've done a ton of demos though and I'm always looking to see how I can salvage original stuff wherever possible. I hate to second guess the guy actually doing the work update: Yeah there's no way in hell that stuff was coming out in less than 1 million pieces. Nice work!

@@titusdaniel That was my thought. As always. As homeowner, I would have insisted on that.

@@jasonlalonde171 He didn't?. It wasn't included in the cost of the house?? LOL

I used to also but PVC pans are passé. Nothing beats a well-installed Schluter Kerdi job.

@@MrGreggallman Hardly passé, they are still around and work just fine.

please tell me what is the difference with modified vs non modified thinset and second question might be, that information is shown in every bag of thinset? Thanks I didnt know anything about it

@@alfonsoaguirre183 modified has added polymer to it's more flexible. Schlluter used to recommend unmodified but now they recommend modified and sell their own thinset which is modified.

@@joshjones9878 From what I've learned watching Schluter company videos, they say to use modified thinset for the underlayment (Ditra to subfloor), and un-modified thinset for the tiling on top of the Ditra. Is this not correct?

@@seeburg220 following

Pete Roe thats how it is done in Sweden. Kerdi like membrane on all of the walls and floor

@@antonioakiki3716 good to know I meet Ikea standards

@@Jessica-to8um Correction *"Everyone he has seen that had standing water issues"*

I'm schulter certified installer. This is what happens when you use their product. They offer a ten year warranty... if installed correctly. Which still fails consistently. Ya must be the contractor.... easy out.

I've been installing kerdi since 2002, never had the issues he has had in Michigan. I don't know if it's ever been mentioned, but there shouldn't be 1/4 inch of thinset between membrane and flange. This was a clueless installation, and has nothing to do with him personally or the system done properly.

T.E.M.P. Racing PLEASE, there is no such thing as a certified Schluter installer !!!!

@@tophatt5706 Agree. Horrible install...Looks good, but as they say the most important part of any construction project is the foundation. What is underneath is nothing but shit

I caught that too.

Maggie, even at 71 you could do it but you have to have the tools. Mortar mixing drill, tile saw. Can you lift a 5 gallon bucket half full of mortar? If so, then you can do this job. All the info you need can be found at Floorelf.com. He has how-to books for sale if you like, but he has all the instructions you need to do a professional job for free on his website if that is all you can afford.

@@odomn Thanks so much! I lift 50 lb sacks of feed for the animals still and I have a 2 wheel cart that can help move heavy things. I have all the tools except a mixing drill. I'll read more. I'll let you know how it goes.

@@odomn Well the pre-slope is in. Load of work mixing and pushing the mud around in the pan. Pushed me to the limit of my strength on hands and knees making a 5 X 5 open shower floor beside the tub. It would have been nice to have had help mixing mud while I worked the floor. And toward the end I was running out of steam. Soldiered through. Will rest a few days before the next step. I was thinking, "I don't care what it cost. It would have been worth every penny to have paid someone who knew their job to do this!"

@@msmaggie57 Wonderful!! You said "pre-slope" so I know you did your research. Did you get the drill and the mixing paddle? Any old electric drill will do, and even a paint mixing paddle will work if you don't want to spring for the big boy mortar paddle. It is SO much easier to mix with a drill. And you need a lot of mortar. www.homedepot.com/p/Wal-Board-Tools-24-in-Quick-Mixer-43-001/100390691 or www.homedepot.com/p/Husky-5-Gal-Spiral-Mixer-SM5-HUS/310955154 I'm right there with you sister in wanting to just watch someone else do it. But when you know they are going to charge at least $5000 then it is amazing what we can do! (if you were in Oregon I would come help you)

Wouldn't tell me how would you. And if you have a minute. Why are some shluter pans presloped and others not. Do you not need a preslope with these systems

@@davegordon6943 All schluter pans are sloped. It's just some have the linear drain on one side giving it the appearance of a flat floor.

@@nicholassartell7421 thanks man. Appreciate it

I can't be saved, cause the wall has to be waterproof at least 8" high from the shower floor. Unless he cuts the granite all around enough for wall to be waterproof, then tile it with something else. It will save that granite, but lots of work and difficult, cause the cut has to be done by hand with grinder and it has to look straight and clean

@@amariza21 Some neutral color like black might be used to create a bottom border and floor and look good.

@@KameraShy oh yeah, definitely worth saving

Schluter IS NOT a "new system" dumbshit Schluter products have been around more than 50 years. Their bonded flange drain that you are hating on, has been used since 2001 (almost 20 years) and their Kerdi Material has been used since 1987 (33 years)

@@Archangel0804 I been using kerdi since 2001 ill never use anything else I warranty my work for the as long as the homeowner lives there .. just to hard for some to simply follow directions or watch a video .. no failures in my past and dont see it happening in the future either ... .. 1975 is when the schulter company was started

@@Archangel0804 I know captain obvious but your mom isn't either.

@@TopNotchTile Actually it started in 1966 when Mr Werner Schluter a master tile installer, had his own tile company. Here you go: www.schluter.com/schluter-us/en_US/history

@@Archangel0804 thank you for the timeline I was just going off memory of what I was told long ago.. great products far above others !!

jeffostroff why?

@@codyburgess7034 I like the idea of waterproofing around the drain better, rather than relying on the thin set under the kerdi to waterproof it, which is not really water proofing it. People always mistakenly think that thinset will waterproof a system, but thinset is a sponge for water.

jeffostroff totally agree that thinset is a sponge for sure but I just know that a proper install of Kerdi around a drain with proper coverage you should be fine 🤷🏼‍♂️

jeffostroff also remember the Kerdi system is reliant on water never getting behind the Kerdi thus the two inch over lap rule on all seams. Ideally, the thinset should never get wet if installed properly

Did my first Kerdi shower around 2012. Have done several since. Recently started adding Redguard to the overlaps for added insurance. I still like Kerdi, will continue to use it.

you are the thomas edison of the tile

that is a good question about the non modified thinset

thinset is going to wick. and fail. So he uses the ardex aware of that flaw

The good thing about Laticrete is it doesn't have that fleece over the flange. And, if doing it right, you use hydroban over everything, including coating into the flange. So any sitting water runs down into drain. And it's not like pieces are thinsetted down. Thinset mortar is not waterproof. But with Schluter, it is used to adhere the waterproof materials. Coat the whole shabang in HydrBan and sleep easy. You can coat a sneakerbox with it and it will hold water.

I don't think so, those problems at the curb would have still produced a leak, but I have always wondered how the Kerdi System, with its reliance on thinset mortar to bond two waterproof membranes together would perform if water backed up on it since as we all know cement, mortar, grout are not impervious and can wick water in certain situations.

It's not the manufacturer's fault. There are videos on how to install Schluter. Follow the instructions and it will last.

I forgot to add prior to paper and wire the ancient Chinese secret is tie wire for a flatter wall and less mortar

I'm sad to see even the best contractors sub'ing out to total novices. So hard to find a real professional that enjoys his craft. That is why so many do it on their own. A real pro is too expensive and a contractor gives you super low quality.

Dave C. Maybe your too cheap? You get what you pay for , to say a pro is too expensive what do you expect? Do you see tile contractors driving Porsche’s ?

@@terrybloom3777 No, i see them driving $80k trucks, but that isn't the point. Paying more doesn't always get you a pro that knows what they are doing. Like i said, frequently they just sub it out to the cheapest guy even if the customer paid top dollar.

Dave C. I live in SoCal and tile contractors are not driving 80k trucks unless they have a huge outfit and use cheap labor

this makes total sense to me, tile would slope to the drain, not stone slab

My guess is that they did it wrong in particular because they bid the shower extra to the granite install, so weren't used to doing showers. Probably didn't go out of business cuz it wasn't their main installation bid. I assume they spot bonded on purpose also thinking the water would flow past the blobs of bonding (waterproofing membrane would "save the pan/floor), so no need to waste the layer of protection the black film was supposed to provide. My guess anyhow. Made me wonder if there wasn't a clear-coat epoxy or something to externally use on that gorgeous granite that could have served as waterproofing protection as well, though that still wouldn't solve the drain no-weep points issue. Not that external waterproofing would ultimately be sufficient due to house settle and/or wear over time. Sad to see such a beautiful job go to waste esp given the obvious work pit into the project...not as if they legit tried to cut corners as much as they obviously didn't know what they were doing/lacked expertise and were in over their heads.

eww...

Please share! tilecoach.com

My insurance agent specifically puts in insurance for long standing leaks in our policies because she says this and long roof leaks are really common claims. I am so thankful

..lol Well the "Kerdi" Lego~Land systems are keeping us in the N.W very busy, you know, doing tear-out & remodels. You never go wrong w/ a shower-pan, using the TRUE, TRIED & Time working method of a concrete dry-pack, and tar or synthetic tar waterproof!! (',

@@ourd0gseven Good feedback, thanks.

Let's hope so because that would be a real shame.

Very unlikely, since pan and curb needs rebuild along with waterproofing of walls at least 6in up. Those walls seem full size slabs, and were installed all way down to floor. You can see at 13:28 on video that walls were not cut off to ogle curb, but curb was put in between walls, whoever built it had high hopes on epoxy to seal seems and not realizing that natural stone is water permeable.

Natural stone should just be kept away from showers, it loves to take in water and also mineral buildup on the surface. One-piece shower pans metal or fiberglass, porcelain on the walls, and you'll be care free for decades!

I was about to say, the color doesn't look like what the kerdi recommended which is gray for Unmodified Thin-Set Mortar

So, more of a stand space or basement?

The issue is also the drain wicking up the thinset. Unless a drain is always working flawless and the weep holes are clear the wicking on the kerdi will occur since they use thinset and not waterproofing.

Weep holes are in a liner/flange/dry pack drain system. The schluter systems need to drain water after each use to work correctly. The foam pan might not have been installed on a level floor either which wouldn't help.

Babette Small I am cheering for you!

question is, does that void the warranty?

Well, it's been over or approx. a year by now... So, did your shower fall through your floor yet and end is your basement..??