Bathroom Renovation - Contractor Screwup

[skyking1]

We never cut the stud, as it is a structural member. My drywall neighbor calls it "prelimming" short for preliminary work, and he puts strips on the studs and uses a 6' level across the studs to get a good product. The preferred material is thick cardboard, as it does not split while fastening it, unlike wood strips.
For a bad outward bow I have seen him shave a stud with the skil saw and a straight edge.

 

[Music Lover]

We never cut the stud, as it is a structural member.

Not always. It could be part of an interior non-supporting wall.

That being said, I'd either bend it into place against another (as someone pointed out) or cut it for short pieces.

 

[ERD50]

Send it back for credit? Really? It comes off 18 wheelers on pallets.

I could be wrong, but I thought that sometimes, when buying in bulk, the seller will credit you for X% of out of spec material. Just part of doing business.

-ERD50

 

[skyking1]

Not always. It could be part of an interior non-supporting wall.

That being said, I'd either bend it into place against another (as someone pointed out) or cut it for short pieces.

I grew up in a rough household with big boys. I would not want a half sliced stud in any wall.

 

[COcheesehead]

We just built a house and moved in a year ago. I can probably point out a dozen or more things in the house that aren’t straight, square or off in some way. 99% of the people coming in would never know, but I know and it used to drive me nuts. But there isn’t an easy solution for any of it. So I learned long ago if you can’t change something, change how you think about it.

If you want to see how unsquare a house is, install glass shower doors, blinds, etc and look at the voids around these things. Nothing in a house is square.

My wife suggested installing a mesh drain, not tiled, it would hide it better.

 

[Ronstar]

I wonder how many times a routine framing carpenter (not working on super-high end stuff) has ever done that. I never recall seeing a shim added to fix a bow (clever fix though).

More likely, if the stud is bowed, they send it back for credit, or cut it for where shorter pieces are needed, or as a jack stud, where they can nail it to two straight studs to pull the bow out, or anywhere else they could 'sister' it..

-ERD50

I took time off work in 1984 to help frame our first house. I learned this trick and a lot more from the carpenter who had about 40 years of experience.

Back in those days, we never sent any lumber back. It was generally straight. If we found a bowed piece, we found a place we could use it as a shorter piece like you said. But I had a few studs that had to be fixed.

 

[Vincenzo Corleone]

We just built a house and moved in a year ago. I can probably point out a dozen or more things in the house that aren’t straight, square or off in some way. 99% of the people coming in would never know, but I know and it used to drive me nuts. But there isn’t an easy solution for any of it. So I learned long ago if you can’t change something, change how you think about it.

If you want to see how unsquare a house is, install glass shower doors, blinds, etc and look at the voids around these things. Nothing in a house is square.

My wife suggested installing a mesh drain, not tiled, it would hide it better.

Regarding the boldfaced part above, this is pretty much where my wife and I are. There just seems to be too many other things that can go wrong while attempting to implement the right fix. We don't think it's worth the risk. Overall, we know the whole end result will be great.

 

[euro]

Sometimes an adult beverage can help your situation
...look up rather than looking down
...bring DW in the shower with you...and if you are still looking down, well then, I cannot help you.

Well put!

 

[Jerry1]

Regarding the boldfaced part above, this is pretty much where my wife and I are. There just seems to be too many other things that can go wrong while attempting to implement the right fix. We don't think it's worth the risk. Overall, we know the whole end result will be great.

Me and DW have had similar situations in the past. It’s rare for a job to be perfect and some of that is our propensity to be pretty anal. Once, we had a backsplash installed and it was pretty rough. Worst part was that one of the worst errors was right at the sink, where it would be seen every time the dishes were done. Contractor said he’d rip it out and do it again but we said no. Too much risk that something worse could happen like damage to our new wooden floor or the granite counter top.

In your case I’d definitely talk to the contractor and evaluate options, but once something is installed, there’s typically no good, risk free solution. FWIW, I always like the line where I look the contractor right in the eye and ask if that would be acceptable in their home. Of course they’ll usually say they’d be okay with it and give some lame reason, but it will help you get a measure of their character.

Good luck.

 

[COcheesehead]

We had a backsplash with a pattern installed in our new house. It took about six months to discover it, but my wife found one tile installed upside down. Now that we know it’s there we see it all the time. It makes for a good party trick though, asking guests to find the upside down tile.

We also had a house years ago where they screwed up the rise and run of the staircase. There was about a 6” deep by 36” wide bump out in the ceiling below the stairs and it broke the plane. Stuck out like a sore thumb. I used to ask guests if they could find the “glaring” error in the room. Most never saw it. I looked at it everyday. Poop happens.

 

[OldShooter]

... There just seems to be too many other things that can go wrong while attempting to implement the right fix. We don't think it's worth the risk. ...

Personally I would not come to that conclusion without at least seeing what the GC has to say.

 

[NgineER]

Personally I would not come to that conclusion without at least seeing what the GC has to say.

+1 Might give you a break on the cost of your project. Something like that is very eye catching and I would hate it...

 

[ERD50]

Personally I would not come to that conclusion without at least seeing what the GC has to say.

Agreed. He may look at it and agree with you that is isn't up to snuff. He might even want to get it fixed, so it doesn't reflect poorly on his quality (even if you decide you can live with it).

I've seen work that friends have proudly shown us, and I'm thinking to myself "Find out who their contractor was, and make sure to never hire them!" Something that looks OK to the owners might look awful to me.

Personally, I think that tile looks pretty bad, maybe the 'pie slices' against the wall more so than the drain. I would want it fixed.

-ERD50

 

[finnski1]

Agreed. He may look at it and agree with you that is isn't up to snuff. He might even want to get it fixed, so it doesn't reflect poorly on his quality (even if you decide you can live with it).

I've seen work that friends have proudly shown us, and I'm thinking to myself "Find out who their contractor was, and make sure to never hire them!" Something that looks OK to the owners might look awful to me.

Personally, I think that tile looks pretty bad, maybe the 'pie slices' against the wall more so than the drain. I would want it fixed.

-ERD50

+1 on all your comments!

 

[txtig]

We totally remodeled all four of our bathrooms about a year ago. Two baths had a diverter valve controlling the flow between the fixed overhead shower and a secondary handheld shower. The plumber installed both diverter valves incorrectly and it wasn’t discovered until the tile guys had completed their work. The fix was to rip out the tile and the concrete backer board, reposition the valve, and reinstall backer board and tile. The plumber picked up the cost of the re-work by the tile guy. No push back or arguments by any of the parties involved.

 

[euro]

We totally remodeled all four of our bathrooms about a year ago. Two baths had a diverter valve controlling the flow between the fixed overhead shower and a secondary handheld shower. The plumber installed both diverter valves incorrectly and it wasn’t discovered until the tile guys had completed their work. The fix was to rip out the tile and the concrete backer board, reposition the valve, and reinstall backer board and tile. The plumber picked up the cost of the re-work by the tile guy. No push back or arguments by any of the parties involved.

Nice - great outcome. But a bit different from the fully cosmetic problem with the OP

 

[pb4uski]

We had a backsplash with a pattern installed in our new house. It took about six months to discover it, but my wife found one tile installed upside down. Now that we know it’s there we see it all the time. It makes for a good party trick though, asking guests to find the upside down tile.

We also had a house years ago where they screwed up the rise and run of the staircase. There was about a 6” deep by 36” wide bump out in the ceiling below the stairs and it broke the plane. Stuck out like a sore thumb. I used to ask guests if they could find the “glaring” error in the room. Most never saw it. I looked at it everyday. Poop happens.

+1. When we had our tongue and groove bamboo floors installed there was one board where they screwed up on the nailing and jury rigged a fix that was never quite right and ended up with a 1/2" long blemish the width of a nail. By the time I saw it the floors were done and it would have been a big deal to tear it out to fix it. For a while, it seemed like that fault caught my eye every time that I walked past it. Now, I hardly ever notice it.

For construction projects, the serenity prayer is a useful tool.

 

[Vincenzo Corleone]

+1. When we had our tongue and groove bamboo floors installed there was one board where they screwed up on the nailing and jury rigged a fix that was never quite right and ended up with a 1/2" long blemish the width of a nail. By the time I saw it the floors were done and it would have been a big deal to tear it out to fix it. For a while, it seemed like that fault caught my eye every time that I walked past it. Now, I hardly ever notice it.

For construction projects, the serenity prayer is a useful tool.

I'm not really a praying man. As I type this, I'm having an Old Fashioned, which does the trick for me.

Thanks to all for your input. I'll try to get him to cut his price to compensate us.

 

[OldShooter]

... I'll try to get him to cut his price to compensate us.

Negotiation technique suggestion: Explain the problem to him, then go quiet and wait for his reaction and suggested remedy. Bring up alternatives only after you have explored whatever his proposals are and rejected all of them. By proposing a price reduction right away, you may end up precluding something better.

 

[COcheesehead]

Negotiation technique suggestion: Explain the problem to him, then go quiet and wait for his reaction and suggested remedy. Bring up alternatives only after you have explored whatever his proposals are and rejected all of them. By proposing a price reduction right away, you may end up precluding something better.

Yes, silence is powerful.

 

[aja8888]

We have been in our 2,000 SF house for 7 years and it's 22 years old now. The only upgrade we did was install granite countertops, a new double sink, some new plumbing fixtures and a special backsplash tile. After everything was done, and months later, I noticed a defective tile on the backsplash at the sink. Also, the sink faucet hot/cold lever hits the backsplash when moving to all cold.

And I have found other "deformaties" throughout the house that probably were the fault of the original builders.

I call all these abnormalities "character flaws" and let it go.

We don't live in a perfect world and all these houses we live in are not perfect if one looks close enough!

 

[RobbieB]

Y'all have heard of our "home improvements" for a long time now and with good reason. The only thing I've done since buying was "the mechanical plant"

Roof, toilets, sinks and faucets, HVAC. Everything else was over 30 years old. Paint, carpet and the dirt yard. Not to mention houses shift and settle. The granite guys had to caulk in a 3/8" gap from the backsplash to the wall. I'm sure the granite was flat.

Yeah 38 year old tract house, still going strong. Just a little "bent" in places -

 

[Ronstar]

I'm like OP. No way would I accept that drain and tile as in the pics. I have ocd when it comes to things lining up, and being plumb and level.

When we first built our house, DW hired a painter to do faux painting, etc. Part of it included a mural with fence pickets. The pickets were a little off plumb and I had her redo it.

And the kitchen faucet did not line up with the center of the window above the kitchen sink. That bugged me for 27 years until we remodeled. Now they line up.

A few years ago, we had a new roof installed. I could see where a few rows of shingles near a gable didn't look right. The exposed portion of shingles was not consistent with rows farther up and down. I told the owner of the roofing company and he fixed it.

My previous boat dock suffered from years of frost heave that made it about an inch or 2 out of level. That bothered me so much that I ripped it out last year and replaced it with a floating dock.

We were looking to move to Arizona a few years ago. DW found the perfect house for her. But a few things bothered me - I could see that the drapery rods were not level - off by an inch or so. We put in an offer for the house, but did not get the house. If we had, I would have redone all of those drapery rods before we moved in.

I have several pictures, photos and maps hanging on walls in our house. They are level. I had to re-level some pictures at MIL's again today. I don't know how they become out of level, but I have to adjust them about weekly.

So OP - don't fret over telling the contractor to fix the drain/ tile issue. If it doesn't get fixed, it will bother you every day for as long as you are living in the house.

 

[RobbieB]

Floating docks yes, OCD no.

 

[COcheesehead]

My wife is super anal on things that don’t really matter. Drives her nuts. Drives me nuts. Most things really do not matter.