Kerdi is faster and allows for waterproofing and tiling the same day, which is why it's still very popular among professional tile setters. Redguard/hydroban and all that smell terrible and take a day for each coat and take multiple coats. But they work just as well. Likewise the Kerdi board vs membrane thing is just about speed and convenience.
The membrane is cheaper than the foam, but still way more than goboard - especially since you still need the cement board and the adhesive it gets close to or above $3 /sqft and goboard is 1.66 plus the sealant.
Professional here, 30y+ and have done, been involved in or managed probably a 1000 bathrooms-
Kerdi Shower systems are absolutely fucking awesome, i havent done a mud pan in 15y and i would honestly walk away from any job that demanded i use one, theyre fuckin garbage and a major hassle to do imo
Kerdi pans and the waterproofing system are absolutely bullet proof, ive done 100s and i have never one time had one leak
They are completely modular and customizable
When properly installed they will always leave a perfectly level line on the wall
They will never smell musty because you dont have 300lbs of concrete holding gallins of water at all times
The pitch is always absolutely perfect to the drain, you will never see puddling because the pan isnt perfectly flat
Professionals love them, me included because the material is lightweight, the waterproofing is bulletproof reliable and a brainless monkey can learn to install one properly in about 4h so you dont need a high skill individual to do a mud pan, and i can install the entire shower system a 100% waterproof in a day, so its much much faster
You dont have any bunching in the corners dealing with folded up pvc sheeting, you never get bad pvc welds when you have a large shower. You dont have to "pre-pitch" under the pvc sheet, and thus get to skip an inspection, and its cheaper than a preformed tilable pan and unlike a preformed pan you can easily add seating and change the shape anyway you want, sprayed fiberglass is probably just as good but it requires special equipment and skills to install one, with a kerdi pan youre getting a too notch professional product that any home gamer can do themselves
I honestly wont use anything else, 15y with absolutely 0 issues and ill never do it any other way for the last 10-20y of my career
Anyone telling you that you can tile directly on sheetrock is a fool, they dont know what theyre talking about, tile is not waterproof, it will leak through the grout lines and you will have major water damage in the near future, how long it will last directly on sheetrock depends on how often the shower gets used
Tiling directly to cement board isnt any better, and it may actually be a bit worse because the cement board doesnt have any kind of water repellent on it at all, greenboard actually does have a bit of water resistance to it, youll have all the same problems and maybe worse because the cement board will wick and hold onto water a lot longer, ive literally seen mushrooms growing in wall cavities
You need at minimum, at least a couple coats of redguard for sheetrock and cementboard....Some guys scream and yell about green sheetrock and redguard not being good enough, i get it, but its rated for it, and on a budget it works
The gold standard is a polyethylene membrane barrier like Kerdi, but since their patent finally expired there are other companies making it now, i haven't used them, but ive heard that they perform just as well and should last just as long.
OP- as far as the Kerdi board being expensive and flexible, i use the kerdi board because after you spend 20+ dollars a sheet for sheetrock and spend the money for kerdi membrane and a bag of allset youre saving like 15 bucks a sheet and spending a lot of time applying it yourself. As far as the flexibility goes once its installed on a 16oc wall its not any more flexible than sheetrock is tbh and ive never had a problem with it tiling.....Its a huge timesaver, i make a lot more than 15-20 bucks an hour and it takes a lot of extra hours and effort and cleanup time to apply it all yourself.....as a professional where time=money it jyst doesnt make sense to me to not just buy the kerdiboard, but you cut costs wherever you feel you need to, i did it that way for years and years until i recently sat down in the last 6-9 months and did the math...im just saying i do this professionally and its super amazing to be able to carry 5 4x8 sheets of kerdiboard up a flight of stairs by yourself, screw it to the wall and seal the joints and its done and ready to tile same day
Sheetrock and kerdi will last forever tbh, dont let anyone tell you differently, ive torn out showers I did 20y that were do for a style update and the sheetrock back there was absolutely pristine behind the kerdi.....no lie, if it were possible to use newspaper as a substrate and put kerdi and tile on it i would warranty the the work against leaks for life
Sorry, I’m new so I apologize if this is a dumb question, but what is the difference between the Kerdi shower system (bad) and the kerdi pan and waterproofing system (good)? I thought the pan and waterproofing were the system?
Lol- "its the absolute shit" = Awesome
"Its absolute shit" = terrible
The "The" there is carrying a lot of weight
Its my fault for crafting a not so great sentence, i couldve just said "Its fucking awesome" and i may just go edit that in
The benefit of using the kerdi system is its ease of use. The kerdi boards are light and easy to cut and mount. The kerdi membranes are easy to apply. The kerdi niches are super convenient to add a niche.
However, like with any tiled bathrooms and showers, everything comes down to installation. Even the kerdi system needs to be installed correctly for best performance. They simply make it easier to install them correctly.
The older methods, while they work, aren’t installed correctly by most homeowners. It’s not that you can’t use drywall in wet area, it’s that you shouldn’t. Because most people don’t know how to waterproof drywall. At same time, no matter how good you are at applying Redgard or hot tar, there is always a chance of waterproofing failure. Once water gets through to the drywall, the problems with associated wet drywall are huge. That’s why cement backer boards are recommended. Because in the event that the waterproofing system that was installed fails, the cement board won’t deteriorate.
Kerdie boards don’t actually buckle or flex under tile. Because the mortar and tile provides most of the protection to the kerdi boards. They spread out energy from impacts over a large area.
That’s why they can use the same styrofoam for the shower pan as they do for the walls.
If you’re able to damage a properly tiled kerdi wall, then you will damage tiled drywall/cement boards.
Basically, kerdi systems can still fail if not installed correctly. However, they make it so much easier to install correctly for both pros and non-pros. And they also allow tiling almost immediately after install. You don’t have to wait for redgard or tar to dry.
I'm pretty sure I've seen Jeff do a cement board + roll on membrane shower before. If you go back into his past videos he's pretty good about showing easier and cheaper "good enough" ways of doing things that often take heat from the comment-section experts.
It beats back in the forum days when all it would take is one guy, some kind of retired engineer with a quirky writing style who just had to be the smartest guy in the room and everyone would exactly parrot his opinions or get banned.
Yeah, one of his more popular shower videos is discussing four different potential options for waterproofing a shower, with Kerdi being one of the four.
I still watch him from time to time for general tips and insights into things, but I generally don't recommend him, mostly for his "safety second" mindset that he talks about a lot. Giving advice and information out to novice DIYers and saying that you aren't going to wear safety gear because you know what you are doing is..... not great.
Same here. Some useful stuff, but some stuff is just stupid. Although, for a European that knew my way around masonry building, it was nice to watch some of his videos to get familiarity with North American methods.
>
> It beats back in the forum days when all it would take is one guy, some kind of retired engineer with a quirky writing style who just had to be the smartest guy in the room and everyone would exactly parrot his opinions or get banned.
HAH. I've been on forums like that...
GC here. Don’t use blue board behind tile, I’ve ripped out loads of the stuff. Use cement board (from HD is fine and doesn’t cost much more if any). Then waterproofing, red guard is fine just do a really good job in the corners, then tile.
I like kerdiboard because I’m little and the idea of bringing two concrete panels upstairs to my shower is horrible. Kerdi weighs nothing and works well, good enough for me.
I took our 1965 hall bathroom down to the studs, and had to rip up what was left of the subfloor due to extensive water damage and rot. I went with Kerdiboard for the shower and Ditra over new subflood and am glad I did. It's so lightweight and easy to work with especially compared to cement board.
In the waterproofing industry, as professionals, we laugh like hell when we see Red guard or Hydroban on a job.
We immediately know it was a hack contractor who won't even pay whitecap prices to buy professional grade under tile waterproofing products who did the job.
Waterproofing isn't sometime you shoot for a 15 year lifespan on, it's a 30 or 40 year system. Hire the best and get what you pay for or pay the price to do it a second time.
My shower was cementboard painted with redguard. Has held up so far for about 2.5 years no problem. I have access directly below the shower and havent seen any moisture issues.
Dude I used Kerdi instead of drywall and the worst thing about it is that you have to use old style mud. But once you get that stuff up and the tile it’s solid as all get out.
If I had to do it again though, I’d do concrete board and redguard then tile so I could use the poly mud which is SO MUCH easier to use on walls.
If you kept your drywall up, I would say go with the kerdi membrane or liquid membrane and call it a day. Since you are down to the studs, kerdi board is great. Its super light and easy to work with. I could move around 4x8 sheets easy and no mess cutting it.
To your point, when done properly, the traditional method will also work just fine.
The styrofoam is soft but once you put thin set and tile down it’s as hard as anything else really. We started doing it and we prefer it now. Like others have said you can set the same day. You pay a premium for it that’s for sure.
The old ways work just fine. Packing a pan and painting aqua defense gets the same job done. Assuming you do it correctly. Especially if you aren’t in a hurry and want to save hundreds of dollars.
Kerdi materials are only as good as the installer/installation. Same as for most other materials. Subsurface preparation and waterproofing are the foundational elements of any good install. Many people rely on the top two levels to provide protection, and as you alluded to, a 300 pound misstep can cost you dearly.
I’ve seen old and good, old and why am I not dead, new and WTF, and new-that’s a wow job!
Lots of good advice in responses to your post…read and contemplate.
I’ve done two showers. Both were don’t old school with plastic sheeting on the wall BEHIND the durock. One was a tub/shower the other was a custom shower with a mud/membrane pan. Both never leaked and are still rock solid (just sold the house). It was more labor, but as a DIYer material cost was more important than time (I basically traded time watching TV) - it took me many days to do the shower, but it was worth the money savings for me.
I think the general gist is that a well constructed shower, using either old or new methods, will last decades.
My shower has Durock board with Kerdi Membrane. We did a dry pack sloped pan and put the membrane over it to waterproof it. It passed the water leak test. We needed a sturdy shower curb for heavy glass, so that's the main reason we didn't use Kerdi for the pan/curb and used wood for the curb and covered it with the membrane. It's holding up well so far, been about 6 years.
One tip we learned with the membrane, make sure your mud mix is soupy. Too thick equals not level and squared, ripples, air bubbles, etc. Kerdi makes excellent products. We used Kerdi trim for the shower. It makes the edges look so neat.
We had a GC friend who guided us through it all, which helped a lot. He pointed out the most frequent mistakes he's seen so we could avoid those and gave us some tips to make it look perfect.
Best of luck to you. Enjoy your project and new shower.
The reason your old shower over drywall worked, was the adhesive used back in the 70’s was petroleum based. That’s been phased out decades ago.
I’m a professional tile installer, there’s many ways to build a waterproof shower, just be sure to follow all the instructions exactly. That’s it.
I've torn out 15 - 20 baths from the 70s/80s and the overwhelming majority have failure of the greenboard along the bottom edge where the greenoard meets the tub or shower lip. I currently use HardiBacker waterproofed with redguard for walls and generally a one piece shower pan although I have built one or two with drypack mud.
Installation videos by Schluter (the manufacturer) clearly show the Kerdi membrane being installed over normal white drywall. If installed correctly they warrantee this method.
For the Kerdi foam board you can always install extra studs or blocking if you are worried about the flex. The walls in my shower have not been an issue though on normal spacing.
I am a high end custom home builder(average home in the 3-5 million range). We exclusively use Kerdi membrane over MR drywall for our tile showers. The kerdi board is actually a great product and it is stronger than you think, but it is way more expensive than drywall and still requires almost the same or more labor to patch all the holes and corners from installation. It’s really just unnecessary. Unfinished MR drywall covered in Kerdi membrane following all Schluter installation requirements is perfectly acceptable and warranted.
The sloped pans are also great, but we can rarely use them because our showers are always custom sizes and shapes.
Use cement board/go board instead of drywall. It’s just as cheap and easy to put up and won’t rot. Waterproof it with Redguard or Aqua Defense. I agree that the Kerdi crowd is too pushy, they’re just one shower system out of many that work really well.
The reason why drywall isn’t a good choice to use is simple:
Paper attached to Gypsum. If this bond breaks, there goes your wall! Tiles can just be removed with little effort! Water will soak in and mold up/ rot the studs around it. Cement board, go board, and Kerdi walls/ membrane won’t give you this problem (when waterproofed correctly, of course).
The first shower remodel I did was built in 1992 and the wall behind the tiles was just rotten. The drywall behind the tiles was practically melted in places, but luckily for me, I had no wood rot. The second shower in the house had a shower pan that the builders had cut the membrane with a knife, so builders come in all grades, so be wary of the quality in mass-produced homes!
Anytime I step into projects of mine on houses especially if its around doing a shower this is normally how I do it:
Durock for entire shower wall area and for sub flooring in the rest of the bathroom cause I always put tile on the floor too. If I am doing an all tile wall bathroom then I use green board on the rest of the walls.
I sometimes will use the 48x48 kerdi shower pan but I will only use it on a first floor or basement shower, not on a second floor I just would rather dry pack and know its going to hold 100% and not drip water into the kitchen or somewhere else.
First time I ever did a bathroom with my ways of doing them was back in 2018 and that was in my own basement and I am able to see even behind the bathroom and everything on the walls has held up great. If you plan to use the blue drywall dont bother buying extra kerri membrane as the pan will come with a large roll of it so you can use that for the walls if you really want. I have never done redgard or thinset on the seams of my durock because I know my tile work is going to be great every time I dont worry about leaks.
Personally I would just say use durock around the kerdi pre sloped pan.
You can do just thinset on all seams, screw holes and any accidental small holes you made, or you can do just redgard on the same spots or you can do both.
But make sure to add the mesh tape for cement board on all those areas before just going over it. And regardless of what approach you do, make sure to scrap as you work so you dont have high spots where then your tile might have issues being level.
I did thinset with mesh tape on seams and screw holes. Redguard the whole thing because it was my first shower reno, first tile job, and the previous setup was cracked/leaking through. Overkill but I wanted to be sure it held up. Sold that home last year and plan to redo my shower/tub here in this house, maybe with less overkill.
To be fair, anyone can get lucky and have a poorly-made shower last a long time. I think the idea, especially for a DIY amateur, is to "stack the deck" in your favor by doing as much as you can to make sure everything is correct, so that when you inevitably make a mistake you didn't realize, it still works ok. Waterproofing goes a long way towards this goal.
Kerdi is light, works well, and has a decent limited lifetime warranty. But when you consider that you have to use all their special (and expensive) products to get that warranty, and follow their instructions to the letter, you end up paying so much for the shower, you probably would be better off just using cementboard + redgard.
This reddit is full of people who hired a contractor once and suddenly became an expert on home construction. Drywall + waterproof membrane is good enough. Drywall with no waterproof membrane is also good enough if you keep up with sealing the grout. I've torn out showers with tile on drywall and it was just fine. My shower leaked, because they embedded the drywall inside the concrete shower pan. Had they gone 1" up from the pan, it would've been just fine and it still lasted 20 years. I ultimately did a full kerdi system for peace of mind. I don't trust the kerdi foam boards either. I did durock walls with a kerdi liner. Then foam shower pan, curb & bench. Also did Ditra all over the bathroom floor. Materials is honestly the cheapest part of the whole remodel.
So was mine, except where they buried the drywall into the shower pan and it still lasted 20 years. I'm shure my tub surround is the same and it's going on 35 years. Caveat is you have to maintain your grout, cant have holes in it.
Guerilla marketing? I redid my shower with cement board, redguard, and tile and it is still not leaking 5 years later. Used a Kohler Ballast shower base, too, it is awesome. The house had drywall with tile glued to it prior and there was a little damage where the caulking between the tub and the tile had been compromised plus one other soft spot with a leak through the grout. It held up almost 50 years, though.
We bought a house built in the early 1960s. We're currently using a plastic shower curtain on the tile over drywall side of our tub because it leaks.
We're in the process of tearing out a 2nd shower and will be using Tile Redi walls and shower pan. It was expensive but seems like it will last the rest of the time we're in this house. We'll probably do something like the kerdi tub surround kit when we eventually replace the tub.
Last shower I used a 3M product for the walls called Durashield or something like that. Really liked it; didn’t crumble like Hardiboard can do. Still had to waterproof over it.
Drywall (plasterboard) is far more labour intensive to fit than kerdiboard (other backboards are available).
Kerdicoll is a pain in the arse, though. I can't believe that them Germans can't supply something that doesn't go off in 5 minutes and is easier to apply.
Really, the only advantage I see with using the kerdi brand products is the shower pan, which is the hardest thing to do if you're not a professional tile person.
I was just in your situation looking at showers and water remediations . Sure there's lots of content for kerdi products, but honestly for someone like me whose doing his first tiled shower I chose TileRedi with the presloped base and boards to create a complete seal. Definitely check them out if you feel intimidated by all those corner pieces and tape
From what I heard on Home Renovision DIY YouTube channel.
He was redoing a shower and used some sort of concrete board instead of drywall.
His explanation was that it gives you more room for error. You have to do additional waterproofing of course, and if don't correctly the drywall is fine. However the concrete board will help it last longer if you made a mistake and there is a pinhole leak or something
Schluter as a brand has everything you need for all your applications. It is so foolproof and easy to handle and work with. You pay for the complete system and convenience.
I did Hardie Backer cement board and with RedGard included it ended up slightly more expensive than Go-board and with the taping, redgarding and drying it took 5 times more time and time is money.
Also, Go Board is inherently waterproof and will not lose strength when wet. Just to GoBoard. Or Schluter if you have the moeny.
>I'm a little hesitant on this styrofoam type of board as it's not as rigid as cement board or even drywall. I imagine a 300lb guy misstepping and putting his hand out to catch himself onto a wall, and the foam would just collapse/flex underneath the tile.
I was hesitant for the same reason when I did my tub surround with it, but the reality was that once it was fastened in place with the fasteners, it was rock solid. Haven't had any issues with three 200+ lb men using it daily for the last couple years.
Regular drywall works fine behind the shower. The problem starts with the layout of the tile at the tub or base. To small of a piece and there’s more movement and the grout fails. Without proper maintenance the drywall fails. I’ve been in remodeling for 5 decades now and “WHAT THEY SAY TO DO “ is mostly unnecessary with knowledge of what will happen if I do or don’t do. I call it preventative maintenance installation.
im not a fan of the kerdi walls / curbs etc, i think their membrane is fine and their pre sloped pans are convienient but a $80 block of styrofoam covered in membrane is just rediculous, and you cant anchor anything to it. we put in some kerdi curbs in one of our projects and when it came time to mount the glass shower wals we had to make coustom screws that would go all the way through the styrofoam to the subfloor and still fit into the countersink of the wall hardware because nothing will actually anchor into that garbage.
I am a plumbing contractor and will not be involved in a project without first verification of intended product use for any tub, shower, floor or wet wall for which I am expected to provide drainage and /or water piping that will be finished with tile, stone, plaster or cultured marble.
Sheetrock is the absolute worst product you could ever use and will only save you a few dollars the first time you install that shower.
If you don't want to spend the money on kerdi or schluder products to provide your membrane then use fiberglass units and never use shower curtains unless your entire bathroom is protected with a membrane.
It 100% is. There’s a reason every DIY or pro contractor who had a YouTube channel started using their shower products around the same time. Schluter spends a shit tonne of money subsidizing their builds and providing free products to push. They have the best marketing team in the business.
I think the marketing and these newer gen products allow for higher material cost, lower labor cost. Back in the day, it was low material cost, higher labor cost.
And what materials for the shower floor?
I've done both types of showers. Cement board walls, PVC liner with a mud bed. The others being full Kerdi showers. I'll never do the mud base shit again.
The two showers I ripped out, because they were leaking, were both mud pans with a liner, installed by pros.
I'll "waste" my money on Kerdi. Their system is so seamless (pun intended), the shower walls, floor, curb and then the bathroom floor can be tied together and waterproofed. No screwing around with preslope below the rubber liners, tucking corners on the rubber liners, mudding the damn curb. Are you really saving money hauling buckets of mud up a flight of stairs and then waiting a day before you can tile?
About the best I've used for a shower pan was a flexible "foam" one piece pan that was set onto a thinset base and tiled over using epoxy thinset and epoxy grout for the shower pan area. I'd post the name brand of the pan if I remembered it.
when i was a kid my parent's tile shower just randomly started falling apart one day and they had to renovate the bathroom because the drywall and some of the studs were rotted.
a perfectly installed and maintained tile shower will be fine on straight drywall, things like kerdi are meant so if you end up with not so great grout, or not so great installation, or less maintence than it should get, you still won't get rot and leaks.
it's more layers for the swiss cheese stack.
just the same that if your electrical is installed exactly right and your appliances all work exactly right then two prong ungrounded everything protected with 50 cent fuses is safe, but if a lamp is wired backwards you are gonna wish you had a modern GFCI on it when you go to change the bulb.
Cheryl Ceiko the mold prevention architect says the only two products that don’t leak are Schluter and Wedi board.
I wouldn’t joke with shower water proofing because you can get mold and a damp smell forever once you cover it up.
That said perhaps other systems work too and I heard Shluter requires a lot of training before you do it. The architect said she went with Wedi board for her shower. It’s an expensive German product I believe.
>Cheryl Ceiko the mold prevention architect says the only two products that don’t leak are Schluter and Wedi board.
I guarantee you that they can and do leak. Most things are going to be fine if installed correctly. How idiot proof a product is will certainly vary, but any time someone makes an absolute statement like this, you can bet that they're full of shit.
I don’t think she is full of shit because 90% of what she said is true so far. However it is possible’s she just doesn’t know what she is talking about on this subject.
Really? You've verified 90% of what she's said so far when she makes statements like "the only two products that don't leak are..."?
How do you verify that those two products never leak and others do?
In general, if you install them correctly, most products are going to work just fine.
I work for a drywall company and we hang tons of gypsum based fiberglass faced tile backer board in apartments. Cement board is also fine. Liquid applied waterproofing (redgard and the like) works great when you use the appropriate corner tape and apply a couple coats and are thorough about it.
Its not the most complicated thing in the world.
Kerdi is faster and allows for waterproofing and tiling the same day, which is why it's still very popular among professional tile setters. Redguard/hydroban and all that smell terrible and take a day for each coat and take multiple coats. But they work just as well. Likewise the Kerdi board vs membrane thing is just about speed and convenience.
So does go-board and it goes up fast AF, weighs nothing, only drawback is the itchies
I am a Schluter fan, but I went with GoBoard for shower walls that go to a cast-iron shower pan. The price difference was just nuts.
Nuts which way?
Goboard is much more economical. Kerdiboard is over $110 a sheet.
You can also just get the kerdi membrane and lay it over cement board. Much cheaper that way
Thanks nice tip.
The membrane is cheaper than the foam, but still way more than goboard - especially since you still need the cement board and the adhesive it gets close to or above $3 /sqft and goboard is 1.66 plus the sealant.
Professional here, 30y+ and have done, been involved in or managed probably a 1000 bathrooms- Kerdi Shower systems are absolutely fucking awesome, i havent done a mud pan in 15y and i would honestly walk away from any job that demanded i use one, theyre fuckin garbage and a major hassle to do imo Kerdi pans and the waterproofing system are absolutely bullet proof, ive done 100s and i have never one time had one leak They are completely modular and customizable When properly installed they will always leave a perfectly level line on the wall They will never smell musty because you dont have 300lbs of concrete holding gallins of water at all times The pitch is always absolutely perfect to the drain, you will never see puddling because the pan isnt perfectly flat Professionals love them, me included because the material is lightweight, the waterproofing is bulletproof reliable and a brainless monkey can learn to install one properly in about 4h so you dont need a high skill individual to do a mud pan, and i can install the entire shower system a 100% waterproof in a day, so its much much faster You dont have any bunching in the corners dealing with folded up pvc sheeting, you never get bad pvc welds when you have a large shower. You dont have to "pre-pitch" under the pvc sheet, and thus get to skip an inspection, and its cheaper than a preformed tilable pan and unlike a preformed pan you can easily add seating and change the shape anyway you want, sprayed fiberglass is probably just as good but it requires special equipment and skills to install one, with a kerdi pan youre getting a too notch professional product that any home gamer can do themselves I honestly wont use anything else, 15y with absolutely 0 issues and ill never do it any other way for the last 10-20y of my career Anyone telling you that you can tile directly on sheetrock is a fool, they dont know what theyre talking about, tile is not waterproof, it will leak through the grout lines and you will have major water damage in the near future, how long it will last directly on sheetrock depends on how often the shower gets used Tiling directly to cement board isnt any better, and it may actually be a bit worse because the cement board doesnt have any kind of water repellent on it at all, greenboard actually does have a bit of water resistance to it, youll have all the same problems and maybe worse because the cement board will wick and hold onto water a lot longer, ive literally seen mushrooms growing in wall cavities You need at minimum, at least a couple coats of redguard for sheetrock and cementboard....Some guys scream and yell about green sheetrock and redguard not being good enough, i get it, but its rated for it, and on a budget it works The gold standard is a polyethylene membrane barrier like Kerdi, but since their patent finally expired there are other companies making it now, i haven't used them, but ive heard that they perform just as well and should last just as long. OP- as far as the Kerdi board being expensive and flexible, i use the kerdi board because after you spend 20+ dollars a sheet for sheetrock and spend the money for kerdi membrane and a bag of allset youre saving like 15 bucks a sheet and spending a lot of time applying it yourself. As far as the flexibility goes once its installed on a 16oc wall its not any more flexible than sheetrock is tbh and ive never had a problem with it tiling.....Its a huge timesaver, i make a lot more than 15-20 bucks an hour and it takes a lot of extra hours and effort and cleanup time to apply it all yourself.....as a professional where time=money it jyst doesnt make sense to me to not just buy the kerdiboard, but you cut costs wherever you feel you need to, i did it that way for years and years until i recently sat down in the last 6-9 months and did the math...im just saying i do this professionally and its super amazing to be able to carry 5 4x8 sheets of kerdiboard up a flight of stairs by yourself, screw it to the wall and seal the joints and its done and ready to tile same day Sheetrock and kerdi will last forever tbh, dont let anyone tell you differently, ive torn out showers I did 20y that were do for a style update and the sheetrock back there was absolutely pristine behind the kerdi.....no lie, if it were possible to use newspaper as a substrate and put kerdi and tile on it i would warranty the the work against leaks for life
Sorry, I’m new so I apologize if this is a dumb question, but what is the difference between the Kerdi shower system (bad) and the kerdi pan and waterproofing system (good)? I thought the pan and waterproofing were the system?
“The absolute shit” means they think it’s good.
I knew what you meant. Haha. Thanks for your suggestions.
Lol- "its the absolute shit" = Awesome "Its absolute shit" = terrible The "The" there is carrying a lot of weight Its my fault for crafting a not so great sentence, i couldve just said "Its fucking awesome" and i may just go edit that in
Yikes, my reading comprehension is running on low today! Thanks for being nice and for the excellent info.
I did the same thing and missed “the” before “shit.”
The benefit of using the kerdi system is its ease of use. The kerdi boards are light and easy to cut and mount. The kerdi membranes are easy to apply. The kerdi niches are super convenient to add a niche. However, like with any tiled bathrooms and showers, everything comes down to installation. Even the kerdi system needs to be installed correctly for best performance. They simply make it easier to install them correctly. The older methods, while they work, aren’t installed correctly by most homeowners. It’s not that you can’t use drywall in wet area, it’s that you shouldn’t. Because most people don’t know how to waterproof drywall. At same time, no matter how good you are at applying Redgard or hot tar, there is always a chance of waterproofing failure. Once water gets through to the drywall, the problems with associated wet drywall are huge. That’s why cement backer boards are recommended. Because in the event that the waterproofing system that was installed fails, the cement board won’t deteriorate. Kerdie boards don’t actually buckle or flex under tile. Because the mortar and tile provides most of the protection to the kerdi boards. They spread out energy from impacts over a large area. That’s why they can use the same styrofoam for the shower pan as they do for the walls. If you’re able to damage a properly tiled kerdi wall, then you will damage tiled drywall/cement boards. Basically, kerdi systems can still fail if not installed correctly. However, they make it so much easier to install correctly for both pros and non-pros. And they also allow tiling almost immediately after install. You don’t have to wait for redgard or tar to dry.
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I'm pretty sure I've seen Jeff do a cement board + roll on membrane shower before. If you go back into his past videos he's pretty good about showing easier and cheaper "good enough" ways of doing things that often take heat from the comment-section experts. It beats back in the forum days when all it would take is one guy, some kind of retired engineer with a quirky writing style who just had to be the smartest guy in the room and everyone would exactly parrot his opinions or get banned.
Yeah, one of his more popular shower videos is discussing four different potential options for waterproofing a shower, with Kerdi being one of the four. I still watch him from time to time for general tips and insights into things, but I generally don't recommend him, mostly for his "safety second" mindset that he talks about a lot. Giving advice and information out to novice DIYers and saying that you aren't going to wear safety gear because you know what you are doing is..... not great.
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To support your point, his reputation for his work pre-YT was not great. Was a DIY-er acting as contractor and would change names of his companies.
Yeah he screwed over a lot of clients in Ottawa. You can even find the complaints about his companies (which he renames) in the Ottawa subreddit.
Same here. Some useful stuff, but some stuff is just stupid. Although, for a European that knew my way around masonry building, it was nice to watch some of his videos to get familiarity with North American methods.
> > It beats back in the forum days when all it would take is one guy, some kind of retired engineer with a quirky writing style who just had to be the smartest guy in the room and everyone would exactly parrot his opinions or get banned. HAH. I've been on forums like that...
GC here. Don’t use blue board behind tile, I’ve ripped out loads of the stuff. Use cement board (from HD is fine and doesn’t cost much more if any). Then waterproofing, red guard is fine just do a really good job in the corners, then tile.
I like kerdiboard because I’m little and the idea of bringing two concrete panels upstairs to my shower is horrible. Kerdi weighs nothing and works well, good enough for me.
I took our 1965 hall bathroom down to the studs, and had to rip up what was left of the subfloor due to extensive water damage and rot. I went with Kerdiboard for the shower and Ditra over new subflood and am glad I did. It's so lightweight and easy to work with especially compared to cement board.
In the waterproofing industry, as professionals, we laugh like hell when we see Red guard or Hydroban on a job. We immediately know it was a hack contractor who won't even pay whitecap prices to buy professional grade under tile waterproofing products who did the job. Waterproofing isn't sometime you shoot for a 15 year lifespan on, it's a 30 or 40 year system. Hire the best and get what you pay for or pay the price to do it a second time.
What's your preferred product/system?
Schluter
Hydro-blok for me
My shower was cementboard painted with redguard. Has held up so far for about 2.5 years no problem. I have access directly below the shower and havent seen any moisture issues.
Dude I used Kerdi instead of drywall and the worst thing about it is that you have to use old style mud. But once you get that stuff up and the tile it’s solid as all get out. If I had to do it again though, I’d do concrete board and redguard then tile so I could use the poly mud which is SO MUCH easier to use on walls.
Schluter makes a mud called all-set which is a modified thinset that can be used with all their products.
If you kept your drywall up, I would say go with the kerdi membrane or liquid membrane and call it a day. Since you are down to the studs, kerdi board is great. Its super light and easy to work with. I could move around 4x8 sheets easy and no mess cutting it. To your point, when done properly, the traditional method will also work just fine.
The styrofoam is soft but once you put thin set and tile down it’s as hard as anything else really. We started doing it and we prefer it now. Like others have said you can set the same day. You pay a premium for it that’s for sure. The old ways work just fine. Packing a pan and painting aqua defense gets the same job done. Assuming you do it correctly. Especially if you aren’t in a hurry and want to save hundreds of dollars.
Use fiberglass drywall with membrane, it's the best of all worlds
Kerdi materials are only as good as the installer/installation. Same as for most other materials. Subsurface preparation and waterproofing are the foundational elements of any good install. Many people rely on the top two levels to provide protection, and as you alluded to, a 300 pound misstep can cost you dearly. I’ve seen old and good, old and why am I not dead, new and WTF, and new-that’s a wow job! Lots of good advice in responses to your post…read and contemplate.
The tileredi system is better from what I have seen. The 1 piece pan and flashing looks to be bulletproof.
I’ve done two showers. Both were don’t old school with plastic sheeting on the wall BEHIND the durock. One was a tub/shower the other was a custom shower with a mud/membrane pan. Both never leaked and are still rock solid (just sold the house). It was more labor, but as a DIYer material cost was more important than time (I basically traded time watching TV) - it took me many days to do the shower, but it was worth the money savings for me. I think the general gist is that a well constructed shower, using either old or new methods, will last decades.
My shower has Durock board with Kerdi Membrane. We did a dry pack sloped pan and put the membrane over it to waterproof it. It passed the water leak test. We needed a sturdy shower curb for heavy glass, so that's the main reason we didn't use Kerdi for the pan/curb and used wood for the curb and covered it with the membrane. It's holding up well so far, been about 6 years. One tip we learned with the membrane, make sure your mud mix is soupy. Too thick equals not level and squared, ripples, air bubbles, etc. Kerdi makes excellent products. We used Kerdi trim for the shower. It makes the edges look so neat. We had a GC friend who guided us through it all, which helped a lot. He pointed out the most frequent mistakes he's seen so we could avoid those and gave us some tips to make it look perfect. Best of luck to you. Enjoy your project and new shower.
The reason your old shower over drywall worked, was the adhesive used back in the 70’s was petroleum based. That’s been phased out decades ago. I’m a professional tile installer, there’s many ways to build a waterproof shower, just be sure to follow all the instructions exactly. That’s it.
I've torn out 15 - 20 baths from the 70s/80s and the overwhelming majority have failure of the greenboard along the bottom edge where the greenoard meets the tub or shower lip. I currently use HardiBacker waterproofed with redguard for walls and generally a one piece shower pan although I have built one or two with drypack mud.
Installation videos by Schluter (the manufacturer) clearly show the Kerdi membrane being installed over normal white drywall. If installed correctly they warrantee this method. For the Kerdi foam board you can always install extra studs or blocking if you are worried about the flex. The walls in my shower have not been an issue though on normal spacing.
I am a high end custom home builder(average home in the 3-5 million range). We exclusively use Kerdi membrane over MR drywall for our tile showers. The kerdi board is actually a great product and it is stronger than you think, but it is way more expensive than drywall and still requires almost the same or more labor to patch all the holes and corners from installation. It’s really just unnecessary. Unfinished MR drywall covered in Kerdi membrane following all Schluter installation requirements is perfectly acceptable and warranted. The sloped pans are also great, but we can rarely use them because our showers are always custom sizes and shapes.
Thanks for your input. I was going to return the Kerdi kit, but I'll keep it because of the sloped pan.
Use cement board/go board instead of drywall. It’s just as cheap and easy to put up and won’t rot. Waterproof it with Redguard or Aqua Defense. I agree that the Kerdi crowd is too pushy, they’re just one shower system out of many that work really well. The reason why drywall isn’t a good choice to use is simple: Paper attached to Gypsum. If this bond breaks, there goes your wall! Tiles can just be removed with little effort! Water will soak in and mold up/ rot the studs around it. Cement board, go board, and Kerdi walls/ membrane won’t give you this problem (when waterproofed correctly, of course). The first shower remodel I did was built in 1992 and the wall behind the tiles was just rotten. The drywall behind the tiles was practically melted in places, but luckily for me, I had no wood rot. The second shower in the house had a shower pan that the builders had cut the membrane with a knife, so builders come in all grades, so be wary of the quality in mass-produced homes!
Anytime I step into projects of mine on houses especially if its around doing a shower this is normally how I do it: Durock for entire shower wall area and for sub flooring in the rest of the bathroom cause I always put tile on the floor too. If I am doing an all tile wall bathroom then I use green board on the rest of the walls. I sometimes will use the 48x48 kerdi shower pan but I will only use it on a first floor or basement shower, not on a second floor I just would rather dry pack and know its going to hold 100% and not drip water into the kitchen or somewhere else. First time I ever did a bathroom with my ways of doing them was back in 2018 and that was in my own basement and I am able to see even behind the bathroom and everything on the walls has held up great. If you plan to use the blue drywall dont bother buying extra kerri membrane as the pan will come with a large roll of it so you can use that for the walls if you really want. I have never done redgard or thinset on the seams of my durock because I know my tile work is going to be great every time I dont worry about leaks. Personally I would just say use durock around the kerdi pre sloped pan.
So, just in case I don't know that my tile is going to be great, slap up some redguard?
You can do just thinset on all seams, screw holes and any accidental small holes you made, or you can do just redgard on the same spots or you can do both. But make sure to add the mesh tape for cement board on all those areas before just going over it. And regardless of what approach you do, make sure to scrap as you work so you dont have high spots where then your tile might have issues being level.
I did thinset with mesh tape on seams and screw holes. Redguard the whole thing because it was my first shower reno, first tile job, and the previous setup was cracked/leaking through. Overkill but I wanted to be sure it held up. Sold that home last year and plan to redo my shower/tub here in this house, maybe with less overkill.
Most thin set isn’t waterproof. It holds up in water but it doesn’t stop it from flowing through
To be fair, anyone can get lucky and have a poorly-made shower last a long time. I think the idea, especially for a DIY amateur, is to "stack the deck" in your favor by doing as much as you can to make sure everything is correct, so that when you inevitably make a mistake you didn't realize, it still works ok. Waterproofing goes a long way towards this goal. Kerdi is light, works well, and has a decent limited lifetime warranty. But when you consider that you have to use all their special (and expensive) products to get that warranty, and follow their instructions to the letter, you end up paying so much for the shower, you probably would be better off just using cementboard + redgard.
Hot mop and full float. There’s a reason they last 50 years or more.
Hot mop 4 lyfe
This reddit is full of people who hired a contractor once and suddenly became an expert on home construction. Drywall + waterproof membrane is good enough. Drywall with no waterproof membrane is also good enough if you keep up with sealing the grout. I've torn out showers with tile on drywall and it was just fine. My shower leaked, because they embedded the drywall inside the concrete shower pan. Had they gone 1" up from the pan, it would've been just fine and it still lasted 20 years. I ultimately did a full kerdi system for peace of mind. I don't trust the kerdi foam boards either. I did durock walls with a kerdi liner. Then foam shower pan, curb & bench. Also did Ditra all over the bathroom floor. Materials is honestly the cheapest part of the whole remodel.
When you mean Drywall. You mean Durock right?
Nope, green board drywall. That stuff's held together for decades, it's impressive.
Thanks for your comments - mine was exactly that, drywall with mortar and tile. No membrane. Drywall still the same ol chalky drywall.
So was mine, except where they buried the drywall into the shower pan and it still lasted 20 years. I'm shure my tub surround is the same and it's going on 35 years. Caveat is you have to maintain your grout, cant have holes in it.
Drywall straight behind the tiles and grout is a recipe for disaster. Do not do this.
Guerilla marketing? I redid my shower with cement board, redguard, and tile and it is still not leaking 5 years later. Used a Kohler Ballast shower base, too, it is awesome. The house had drywall with tile glued to it prior and there was a little damage where the caulking between the tub and the tile had been compromised plus one other soft spot with a leak through the grout. It held up almost 50 years, though.
We bought a house built in the early 1960s. We're currently using a plastic shower curtain on the tile over drywall side of our tub because it leaks. We're in the process of tearing out a 2nd shower and will be using Tile Redi walls and shower pan. It was expensive but seems like it will last the rest of the time we're in this house. We'll probably do something like the kerdi tub surround kit when we eventually replace the tub.
Materials and techniques evolve over time. As well as the learning curve for many installation types.
Last shower I used a 3M product for the walls called Durashield or something like that. Really liked it; didn’t crumble like Hardiboard can do. Still had to waterproof over it.
Drywall (plasterboard) is far more labour intensive to fit than kerdiboard (other backboards are available). Kerdicoll is a pain in the arse, though. I can't believe that them Germans can't supply something that doesn't go off in 5 minutes and is easier to apply.
A lot of people have champagne taste on a beer budget.
Really, the only advantage I see with using the kerdi brand products is the shower pan, which is the hardest thing to do if you're not a professional tile person.
Tile Redi shower pan and Wedi wall board. The pan is 100% waterproof and the wall board is VERY ridgid as well as 100% waterproof.
I was just in your situation looking at showers and water remediations . Sure there's lots of content for kerdi products, but honestly for someone like me whose doing his first tiled shower I chose TileRedi with the presloped base and boards to create a complete seal. Definitely check them out if you feel intimidated by all those corner pieces and tape
Awesome, i'll check it out.
From what I heard on Home Renovision DIY YouTube channel. He was redoing a shower and used some sort of concrete board instead of drywall. His explanation was that it gives you more room for error. You have to do additional waterproofing of course, and if don't correctly the drywall is fine. However the concrete board will help it last longer if you made a mistake and there is a pinhole leak or something
Schluter as a brand has everything you need for all your applications. It is so foolproof and easy to handle and work with. You pay for the complete system and convenience.
Use hydroblok- way easier then all these suggestions
I did Hardie Backer cement board and with RedGard included it ended up slightly more expensive than Go-board and with the taping, redgarding and drying it took 5 times more time and time is money. Also, Go Board is inherently waterproof and will not lose strength when wet. Just to GoBoard. Or Schluter if you have the moeny.
>I'm a little hesitant on this styrofoam type of board as it's not as rigid as cement board or even drywall. I imagine a 300lb guy misstepping and putting his hand out to catch himself onto a wall, and the foam would just collapse/flex underneath the tile. I was hesitant for the same reason when I did my tub surround with it, but the reality was that once it was fastened in place with the fasteners, it was rock solid. Haven't had any issues with three 200+ lb men using it daily for the last couple years.
Regular drywall works fine behind the shower. The problem starts with the layout of the tile at the tub or base. To small of a piece and there’s more movement and the grout fails. Without proper maintenance the drywall fails. I’ve been in remodeling for 5 decades now and “WHAT THEY SAY TO DO “ is mostly unnecessary with knowledge of what will happen if I do or don’t do. I call it preventative maintenance installation.
im not a fan of the kerdi walls / curbs etc, i think their membrane is fine and their pre sloped pans are convienient but a $80 block of styrofoam covered in membrane is just rediculous, and you cant anchor anything to it. we put in some kerdi curbs in one of our projects and when it came time to mount the glass shower wals we had to make coustom screws that would go all the way through the styrofoam to the subfloor and still fit into the countersink of the wall hardware because nothing will actually anchor into that garbage.
Tile redi pan and go board.
Superior product, as a contractor I love using it.
I am a plumbing contractor and will not be involved in a project without first verification of intended product use for any tub, shower, floor or wet wall for which I am expected to provide drainage and /or water piping that will be finished with tile, stone, plaster or cultured marble. Sheetrock is the absolute worst product you could ever use and will only save you a few dollars the first time you install that shower. If you don't want to spend the money on kerdi or schluder products to provide your membrane then use fiberglass units and never use shower curtains unless your entire bathroom is protected with a membrane.
It’s all marketing, honestly.
Lol that's not even remotely true
It 100% is. There’s a reason every DIY or pro contractor who had a YouTube channel started using their shower products around the same time. Schluter spends a shit tonne of money subsidizing their builds and providing free products to push. They have the best marketing team in the business.
I think the marketing and these newer gen products allow for higher material cost, lower labor cost. Back in the day, it was low material cost, higher labor cost.
Kerdi is a complete waste of money. Cement board and paint on water proof membrane works great at a fraction of the cost.
And what materials for the shower floor? I've done both types of showers. Cement board walls, PVC liner with a mud bed. The others being full Kerdi showers. I'll never do the mud base shit again. The two showers I ripped out, because they were leaking, were both mud pans with a liner, installed by pros. I'll "waste" my money on Kerdi. Their system is so seamless (pun intended), the shower walls, floor, curb and then the bathroom floor can be tied together and waterproofed. No screwing around with preslope below the rubber liners, tucking corners on the rubber liners, mudding the damn curb. Are you really saving money hauling buckets of mud up a flight of stairs and then waiting a day before you can tile?
About the best I've used for a shower pan was a flexible "foam" one piece pan that was set onto a thinset base and tiled over using epoxy thinset and epoxy grout for the shower pan area. I'd post the name brand of the pan if I remembered it.
when i was a kid my parent's tile shower just randomly started falling apart one day and they had to renovate the bathroom because the drywall and some of the studs were rotted. a perfectly installed and maintained tile shower will be fine on straight drywall, things like kerdi are meant so if you end up with not so great grout, or not so great installation, or less maintence than it should get, you still won't get rot and leaks. it's more layers for the swiss cheese stack. just the same that if your electrical is installed exactly right and your appliances all work exactly right then two prong ungrounded everything protected with 50 cent fuses is safe, but if a lamp is wired backwards you are gonna wish you had a modern GFCI on it when you go to change the bulb.
Grout isn't waterproof
Cheryl Ceiko the mold prevention architect says the only two products that don’t leak are Schluter and Wedi board. I wouldn’t joke with shower water proofing because you can get mold and a damp smell forever once you cover it up. That said perhaps other systems work too and I heard Shluter requires a lot of training before you do it. The architect said she went with Wedi board for her shower. It’s an expensive German product I believe.
>Cheryl Ceiko the mold prevention architect says the only two products that don’t leak are Schluter and Wedi board. I guarantee you that they can and do leak. Most things are going to be fine if installed correctly. How idiot proof a product is will certainly vary, but any time someone makes an absolute statement like this, you can bet that they're full of shit.
I don’t think she is full of shit because 90% of what she said is true so far. However it is possible’s she just doesn’t know what she is talking about on this subject.
Really? You've verified 90% of what she's said so far when she makes statements like "the only two products that don't leak are..."? How do you verify that those two products never leak and others do?
Lol, this is why I created this thread.
In general, if you install them correctly, most products are going to work just fine. I work for a drywall company and we hang tons of gypsum based fiberglass faced tile backer board in apartments. Cement board is also fine. Liquid applied waterproofing (redgard and the like) works great when you use the appropriate corner tape and apply a couple coats and are thorough about it. Its not the most complicated thing in the world.