Shower Pan Removal

[Thalweg]

I'm trying to remove the shower pan in my '62 Tradewind. The aluminum trim around the tub edge is firmly attached to the wall. I'm hoping to avoid damaging the tub, trim, or wall. Judging by the trim along the bulkhead wall that I have removed, it looks like the trim must be placed on the tub edge before it is installed, and therefore not riveted to the wall. Does anyone know if they glue the trim to the wall, or is it attached in some other manner? I've read some other threads that discuss the pan being glued to the floor. I don't thing that is the case here as there does seem to be some movement at the bottom of the pan.

I thought I should ask some of your thoughts before I start applying more force.

Thanks Much,
Brent

[Thalweg]

I had pretty much given up on getting the tub out, but I figured I'd try one more time. I want to get it out so that I can install new flooring throughout the trailer. The tub is loose except for the aluminum strip along the wall. It seems as if the strip must be riveted to the wall. However there is no way it could have been riveted with the tub in place.

So, I've developed a theory and I was hoping some of you could confirm or disprove it. There is some 3/8" thick cedar shakes underneath the tub. So I'm thinking they put the strip on the wall a little higher than the edge of the tub, then they placed the tub in place and lifted the tub lip under the strip, and pushed the cedar shake underneath to hold it in place.

I've tried pulling the shakes out, but it seems like I'll probably have to destroy them to get them out.

Alternately, I'm wondering if the shakes could just be there to provide slope to the tub for drainage purposes. If that's the case, I'm officially befuddled.

[ragin-cajun]

Sorry, but I'm not much help. I've got a leaky shower pan on my '61 Bambi so I'll be tackling it this winter. I'm hoping you get yours figured out so I can learn from you! :-)

[aluminitus]

Yes, that tub was a bear to get out. We didn't care about keeping the strip intact so we took a pry bar to the strip and found that there were pop rivets holding the tub to the wall or the strip was pop riveted to the wall and the edge of the tub slid underneath the lip of the metal strip. (It's been a few months). If you wind up destroying your tub, you are more than welcome to come get ours!

[Thalweg]

Thanks for the replys. I gave up on that idea. It was just too risky. I layed new sheet flooring in the trailer and thought it would be nice to put it under the tub, but it wasn't worth breaking the fiberglass. I'm going to refinish the tub, and it would have been nice to do that in the garage, but I'll do it in place instead. That will be hard on my knees, but it'll give me something good to complain about for a couple of days.

[aluminitus]

I went back and looked at ours again and the rivets go through the tub and are covered by the metal strip, which was mangled in the process of prying it up to get to the rivets. I hope your tub refurb goes well!

[Jesann21]

No advice, but good luck... This is in our future as well.

[ragin-cajun]

I got my pan out and found out that my leak was just from the drain gasket--or lack if gasket, actually. Someone had been in there before I got him, so they'd drilled out all but 4 rivets on the wall. The rest of the tub was held with screws. The pan has quite a few surface cracks, so I'm going to fill them with a 2-part epoxy and then use the epoxy paint to give it a fresh look.

By the way, I really enjoy the sense of community on these forums!

[ragin-cajun]

Here's the finished product! I reinstalled it this morning!