Recently, someone told me about a problem she had with her new house. Very shortly after moving in, she decided to have a bath in her new tub. It was in the evening, after work and supper, so she thought she would relax a bit before going to bed.
Before she went to sleep, she went to the kitchen to get a drink. Once she reached the bottom of the stairs, however, she could hear water dripping. She turned on the light and discovered that water was dripping from the ceiling of her new kitchen and dining room.
It turned out that the drain for the tub had never been properly connected, so all the water that had been in the tub ended up in the ceiling below.
No one expects a new bathroom to offer such trouble. But sometimes things are either done in a hurry or overlooked or just done by the wrong person. Perhaps that was a practice tub installation.

One of the bathrooms in my house needed some swift changes when I moved in. The floor had been done with simple white ceramic tiles. The walls were covered with simple sky-blue tiles. I would have to say that the tiles on the walls were technically done fairly well, even if they were too blue and there were too many of them. They were on all the walls, from floor almost to the ceiling. I imagine the guy who installed them was not quite tall enough to reach to put the last two courses.
The tiles on the floor would have been acceptable but for the fact that every grout line was crumbling and a large percentage of the tiles were actually broken. Furthermore, ants had started to move into the mortar. I guess the trowel left nice pathways for them.
Upon tearing out the floor tiles, I discovered that quarter-inch plywood had been fasten to the floor. Most of it was rotten, however, since everything in there was wet. I at first assumed the water was from the use of the tub. I noticed, however, upon pulling out the toilet, that the rubber gasket was not the correct thickness for a toilet reinstalled over a ceramic tile floor. It was likely the one that had been under the toilet when it was sitting on the original linoleum. So, with every flush a bit of liquid had seeped out. Wonderful.

I was very pleased to notice, however, that although the wood directly under the ceramic tiles had rotted, the linoleum under that had actually completely protected the original plywood floor. In fact, the original flooring looked pretty good. The only thing wrong with it was all the nail holes from the plywood installation. Linoleum just can’t be destroyed, I guess.
While I was in there, I decided to replace the vanity (which was 40 years old and not holding up very well). Unfortunately, the blue tiles had been done around that and it was situated in a corner. My new vanity was nowhere near as big so I had to remove the tiles from two walls.
When I removed the light fixture from above the sink, I noticed it was not mounted on an electrical box. The wire protruded from a hole behind the broken corner of a tile. Eventually, I discovered why. When I reached a certain point in my tile removal, I discovered a piece of cardboard taped to the wall. Under it was an electrical box. I discovered another matching box, also covered with cardboard. They were on either side of a patch which had been the location of the medicine cabinet. While those boxes contained proper wires for lighting, someone had run telephone wire to a new hole punched in the wall to mount the fixture I had just thrown on the floor.
As I broke off more tiles, I eventually found another box for an outlet that had been covered in a similar way. Ancient electrical tape covered the ends of the wires in that one. The wires, of course, were still live.

I must say, I never really finished renovating that bathroom. I simply needed it functional and safe for my kids to use. I will, however, one day get around to gutting the entire thing. The previous owners thought they would spruce up the bathroom by installing a tub-surround. It went over the existing tub and blue tiles. I wish they’d not done that.
Another bathroom tale I know came from a guy I worked with a few years ago. He said his father had renovated his master bath and done some rearranging in there. He had never liked where the tub was, apparently, so he moved it to a different wall. He then did the whole room in new porcelain tiles. After he was finished grouting, he decided to caulk the tub. Following the advice of a great many how-to books, he filled the tub halfway before starting to caulk. But once the water was in the tub, the joint looked a bit different. Along the long side of the tub, the space between the tiles and the tub had more or less completely disappeared. Confused, he decided to fill the tub the rest of the way.
Nothing too spectacular happened. The single floor joist under the tub didn’t break, but it did move and the tiles along the side of the tub popped as the tub slipped sideways.
But I always like to imagine it suddenly fell through, hit the floor below, and then smashed through that as well. Reality simply isn’t dramatic enough.

Nothing too spectacular happened. The single floor joist under the tub didn’t break, but it did move and the tiles along the side of the tub popped as the tub slipped sideways.

But I always like to imagine it suddenly fell through, hit the floor below, and then smashed through that as well. Reality simply isn’t dramatic enough.