This epic saga began with a toilet that constantly ran. It drove my husband crazy. Sure, it was only $40 to replace the “guts” of the toilet, but since we were going to renovate that bathroom anyway, why not buy a whole new toilet? And if we were going to buy a whole new toilet, why install it over the floor we were going to replace anyway? And thus begins our journey, with literally countless trips to Lowe’s and tile stores and plumbing supply houses and three weeks of very late nights.

Why the title “A Bathroom and a Birthday,” you ask? Well, we started this project on our wedding anniversary, April 25th, which also happens to be exactly one month prior to our daughter’s first birthday…when six people are staying at our house and need that bathroom and thirty people are coming to a party and, yep, you guessed it, need that bathroom.

Why the late nights? Because we have an 11-month-old and its either work during 1-2 hour nap chunks or after she goes to sleep at night.

STEP ONE: I am now convinced Hell is covered in vinyl floor tiles

The Cliff Notes:

1. Do not use a blow torch like some on YouTube promote.
2. A clothes iron and putty knife will work. Use the steam setting but be careful around wood moulding you want to keep.
3. A better method is a reciprocating saw with a scraper attachment – like this.

The Full Story

After becoming “experts” by watching YouTube videos on how to remove vinyl floor and considering everything from an industrial scraper to a blow torch, we landed on using cheap clothing irons from Walmart – or these – and old putty knives. Skipping to the end of the floor demo process, this was NOT the best choice. We spent a couple of the first nights crawling around this 60 square foot bathroom ironing the floor off. The irons do work to soften and loosen the mastic that holds the tiles to the subfloor (in our case, a concrete slab) but it is a lot of work. Crank the heat all the way up and use steam the whole time – but be careful around wood elements you don’t want to ruin and warp, like MDF moulding. Set the iron ahead on the section of tile and scrape under the vinyl tile where the iron is sitting slowly as it softens. Just push the iron along the floor like this. Refrain from gouging your eyes out in frustration when tiles break apart in multiple pieces.

 

On our 1,456 trip to Lowe’s, we found a scraper blade for a reciprocating saw, which made quick work of the tiny bit of vinyl left around the toilet flange. GRRR.

STEP TWO: Forget the vinyl tiles, Hell is just covered in the glue under the tiles

The Cliff Notes

1. If you are cool with chemicals, consider an industrial mastic remover
2. If you are not cool with chemicals, wear a mask and use an angle grinder

I thought removing the vinyl tiles was going to be the worst. It turns out removing the glue still on the concrete subfloor was worse. Since we want to tile this bathroom, the glue has to go. Maybe we went overboard cleaning this up, but I wanted to ensure a good clean surface for the thinset to bond to later. We tried so many stupid things to remove this glue, including:

• Hydrogen peroxide. Someone in some forum said you let it soak in and it works great. Its cheap and not toxic…but it ultimately took too much effort and basically evaporated before it did any good.
• Goo Gone. Yes, this was just silly. Skip.
• Trigger spray adhesive removers – like this one. It said it worked on construction adhesive. Debatable. While it kind of worked, there was nowhere near enough to do the whole floor, it was expensive, and took too much time.
• A giant container of industrial remover – like this one. We purchased one at Home Depot, but after reading how to use it, we decided to try something less toxic first.

Look at all this glue…

We ultimately landed on the trusty angle grinder. We purchased this Bosch and have been very happy with it. We used Rust and Paint remover disks…I think 5 of them because they wear down. We used the angle grinder without the guard attached. This is against manufacturer’s instructions and can be dangerous if you are not careful and don’t wear thick, leather gloves. Do this at your own risk. We wore full face respirators (like these) and taped up the seams of the door to keep the dust out of the house. This worked. It still took time, but it was much more satisfying, effective, and quicker than anything else.

STEP THREE: Removing all the other crap

The Cliff Notes

1. Wear long sleeves when cutting up anything remotely fiberglass.
2. Make your husband soak up the toilet water in the bowl before removing it. Helpful tip: Don’t later forget that you used that sponge in the toilet and use it for other things…
3. TAPE TAPE TAPE your frameless mirror before removing it.

The fiberglass shower stall was pretty nasty to remove. It must have been installed when the house was in the framing stages because it had to be cut with a reciprocating saw to fit out the door. Fiberglass is nasty stuff – I made Chris wear long pants and a long-sleeved shirt. Watch out for cutting on the plumbing wall!

The toilet was easy to remove. You basically just cut the caulk seal with a sharp razor and remove the two bolts that attach it to the floor (usually under plastic caps). Just rock it back and forth gently. It’s always a good idea to remove the tank on the back and  sponge up the water in the bowl (eww, Chris did this).

So, being completely honest, removing the frameless mirror SUCKED. I was so worried the entire time about it shattering. I used most of a roll of packing tape to cover the front to keep the pieces together if it did crack. We made some very thin wooden shims using a jig and our table saw and proceeded to very gently tap them down behind the top of the mirror. We did the complete width of the mirror one shim thick, then went back and added more until we heard the glue start to tear the sheetrock paper. After that, it was just a matter of tearing the mirror away and not dropping it! Here is the area with the mirror and vanity removed.

The moulding was kind of an afterthought. We removed most of it during demo, but for some reason left a few pieces, like the trim around the exterior door, until later. I just removed it with a crow bar. Sometimes it helps to cut the caulk line with a knife first to keep the paint from peeling back with the trim.

All-in-all, demo was not that terrible, except for the floor. That sucked. But it was great having a blank canvas. I guess the only other general advice I could give would be clean up each night. We noticed that the particles of glue and debris from the angle grinder wheel got sticky and were difficult to remove later on because they would cool down and harden to whatever they were unceremoniously flung onto.

Alright, next step…squaring up the shower stall!

Note: Music credit for the first video is “Mischief Maker” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)