How to Add a Shower to a Claw-Foot Tub | Ask This Old House

so upstairs we have four bedrooms and one bathroom we're using this space as our master bedroom we've refinished the floors looks terrific yeah round molding installed yeah I'd like to turn this space into a master bath now this looks like it used to be a sleeping porch it does it does we found this tub at a salvage yard and had it totally refinished where the finish is terrific thank you I'd really like to have a shower though and the tub well that I can help you with great so Melia this tub harkens back to when plumbing first came inside the building about the time this house was built this was the tub of choice it's a clawfoot tub there's four legs it stands up proud and it was really the only choice as a bathing well you could fill that tub it was nice and deep but it fell out of favor it gave way to the modern tub which could be built into the wall much shallower but it allowed you to put tile all around so all the shower water would go down into the drain but many people love these tubs because a nice and deep as you do so there are manufacturers that make a kit like this that gives you a beautiful chrome-plated tub filler so you get hot and cold and now it fills the tub but it has the modern convenience of nameless divert right here and now the water would leave through here and go out through a shower arm that goes up to here a nice chrome-plated oval ring for the shower curtain you can have a modern shower with the old look what do you think that's fearful all right so now with these things there's no wall to hide the pipes so everything back here has to be chrome-plated and look finished and the kit includes all that so for us we now have to transition and tie on to the hot the cold and the drain okay we need to tie on to the hot and the cold lines we're going to end up with these chrome escutcheons and that'll cover the connection right above it is this shutoff valve and that's a threaded female connection and when we're done it's going to look like this well to transition to the carpet we're going to need to cut in a male adapter and solder it on so we'll start by making my mark so we market there and I want to lift it up and hold it up there's some locking pliers now I turn the hot and the cold water off before I started and now I'm going to cut it with a small cutter called an imp that'll make a nice clean cut I now clean the fitting apply flux to both the inside of the fitting and the outside of the tube and now I'm ready to solder when soldering apply the heat to one side of the fitting wait for that flex to bubble and then apply the solder to the opposing side the heat will draw the shatar right around I'm going to use teflon tape to ensure a watertight seal the new shutoff valve just threads right on by hand and I snug it up with a wrench okay so we have the water back on the solder connections held all right okay now we have to do a very similar thing to the drain connection now here's the drain piping that comes down from the tub and there's the PVC but look at this there's a nut that has to sit underneath this discussion the discussion is only this deep so it means that I have to actually cut this pipe just about below the floor so I've drilled a hole and now I've got to cut this pipe on that mark right there without scratching your floor okay now I just clean and glue the PVC pipe and fitting great all right so now we're ready to make our drain connection of the tub here's the assembly right here now that's going to sit below the tub but you can see down at this hole right here we'll have the bath shoe and that's where the water is going to go down and then right out to the drain but there's a pipe behind the tub right here and that connects to what's called the overflow now this is really important if the water ever continued to rise you weren't paying attention and you'll fill in the tub it would go into this overflow and right down the drain and not onto your floor right alright so now we're going to put a little bit of putty on this connection so we make a nice watertight seal now I just need to hook up the water supplies alright so once I have this secured it'll really help us establish where that curtain rods gonna go is anything I'll sit right good alright so here is this curtain ring you can see it's going to be perfect above the tub but in order to establish exactly where it's got a sit we have to start by securing this now normally we come right off the back and go right to the wall but you've got a window so what I did is I ordered this with a little elbow and once we get that shower arm exactly plumb we'll just secure this ceiling bracket right there to the ceiling we'll be all set just put that on the riser that means check it for plumb that way for me okay good I just turn it towards the back and just see how we are front to back hold it right there and I'm going to secure it to the ceiling now we just need a couple more ceiling supports to hold the shower curtain rod in place all right Malia we've got a few more things we've added one is a hand shower look at this you can use it to clean the tub and everything that sits right there that's great all right we've got a shower curtain to your new curtain rod but it is time for you to try it out oh wow do the hot the cold and will come out through the tub spout okay shot now let's leave it on okay now turn the diverter all the way up and we'll come out of the shower it's straight up look at this you have a shower Wow alright so turn it back down so it doesn't spare all over the place and then shut it off right there and you have a new bathtub and a shower

Channel: This Old House

Views: 416,499

Rating: 4.8665915 out of 5

Keywords: This Old House, Ask This Old House, DIY, Home Improvement, DIY Ideas, Renovation, Renovation Ideas, How To Fix, How To Install, How To Build, clawfoot tub, shower, bathroom, bathtub, plumber, plumbing, construction, house, home repair, do it yourself, diy, richard trethewey, tom silva, roger cook, norm abram, kevin o'connor, tom silva this old house, tom silva house, tom silva construction, tom silva tools, tommy silva

Id: J1BiQzM0Upo

Length: 7min 27sec (447 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 09 2016