Shower Shelves

On September 9th I wrote about the shelves in the shower enclosure that give it its rigidity, and how I was missing a gasket and a grommet.  I contacted the manufacturer and ordered a spare bracket set (the smallest component they sell) but unfortunately when they came the bracket was different.  I was a little surprised because the ordering process required me to give them a "glass code" read directly from the shelf, so you wouldn't think anything could go wrong.

To cut a long story short, I had 2 or 3 discussions with them, by phone and email and it transpires that the shelves were redesigned to eradicate the problem of offset between the slotted bracket and top plate which I also wrote about on September 9th.  With the new shelves it is the glass that has the slot to provide the lateral adjustment, not the bracket.  In the end, out of the blue, a complete set of new shelves and brackets arrived without charge.  They aren't as curvy and rounded as the originals, but at least the bracket and top plate are aligned properly :



There were some other finishing touches to do, including doing final fix of the glass into the U-channel by way of 4 self tapping screws, through the U-channel front directly into the aluminium bar bonded to the end of the glass.  Its not very clear, but here is how it looks with the bare screw :

And then after popping the plastic cover on the head :



Last of all the job that I loath more than any other in the DIY world - applying the sealer.  I was told by a small backstreet ironmongery store in Fratton that unless a sealer smells of pickled onions it won't be any good.  The pickled onion smell comes from the silicon, and those sealers that don't smell right don't really have the silicon in them.  This information is 10 years old by the way, so may no longer be accurate or relevant, so don't take my word for it.

Anyway, I have a history of always messing up this job.  The "good" sealants do not take kindly to being interfered with after application.  If you watch an expert, they do it in a single strike, with a smooth flowing motion that produces a perfect even bead.  That's not what happens with me, and I can't resist going back and tampering, using white spirit wetted finger, blunt old knife, anything that is vaguely the right shape.

As usual, on this job, I ended up with silcon all over me, a far from even finish, and an empty tube before I was done.  The seal between the bottom of the tiles and the shower tray is so bad I am going to have to buy some of those ceramic quadrant tiles to cover it all up.

By the way, the guidance for sealing the glass to wall and tray boundaries is that the sealant goes on the outside of the shower, so that any water that gets into the framework gaps is free to flow back into the shower tray, not onto the floor.  On no account should you do both sides.....