[lost??]

Hi... I wanted to see what people thought was the best tile backerboard. I'm planning to retile my shower and was looking into Fiberock, but have seen mixed reviews. Any help is appreciated, thanks.

[manhattan42]

Hardibacker, by far.

[Bljack]

Hardibacker, by far.

By far? For what particular reason?

Lost?? properly installed, they will all perform exactly the same. Which is best will be a opinion of the end user, just as there are those that swear by Chevy trucks and those that swear by a Ford truck, Mapei thinset or Laticrete thinsets.

Here's where they are all the same...


1) They are used as a backing for tile in wet areas because they are impervious to the effects of water, meaning they will not swell, deteriorate or change dimensionally when exposed to water; however, see and understand #2. Being impervious to the effects of water has lead many to think cbu's waterproof the installation, though they do not.

2) All of them readily absorb water and allow it to pass through. They offer no waterproofing to the tiled installation, letting water pass through to the studs and wall cavity/insulation behind.

3) All of them, when used as part of a wet installation, need separate waterproofing. 15 lb roofing felt or 4 mil plastic sheeting installed on the walls prior to installing the cbu and overlapping the flange of the tub or shower pan or the upturned liner of a site built mud pan is one waterproofing option. Surface waterproofing such as Laticrete's Hydroban or Custom's Redgard are surface waterproofers applied to the face of the cbu instead of using the felt or poly. In cases where you can't get a continuous unbroken moisture barrier like the seat area of a bench, a wall niche or the top of a knee wall, you could use a combination of both or just go with all surface waterproofing.

Once you get past that, then it's just what do you prefer to work with. I answered a thread like this at another forum a couple months ago...

Hi Fran. Back from vacation and I've used all those products as intended. With the exception of special applications where the specific properties of one type of board is more desirable than that of another, it comes to personal preference. In your case, shower walls, they're all just a bonding surface, they'll all perform identical. What drives one person nuts about Hardi in that is draws the moisture out of thinset so fast is what makes them use wonder or durock and what drives someone nuts about Durock or wonder in that cuts can be crumbly is what makes them use Hardi or fiberock. A lot also goes into marketing. Fiberock is Portland and gypsum. The gypsum is autoclaved rendering it an inert filler, but Hardi stamps their pallets with "Contains no Gypsum" though Hardi contains cellulose which is a wood product but also inert, though USG doesn't pounce on Hardi for that. Go figure.

Each board has its tricks to make its use a little bit easier. Someone mentioned Hardi as waterproof, but it's far from that. They all let moisture go right through, thus the need for the roofing felt or 4 mil plastic behind it or the surface membrane.

Hardi and Fiberock are harder to cut without shears or a grinder or carbide blade in a jig saw for your shower controls and the dust is very harmful.

Wonder, permabase and durock cut the mesh, snap, cut the other side, for shower controls, cut the mesh on both sides and tap out with a hammer.

It's easy to blow the screws through wonder, perma and durock if you use the robertson drive screws, not so easy if you use the phillips head screws. It's almost impossible to countersink the phillips head screws in the other boards.

Denshield is an animal all on it's own. It's a sheetrock product with a treated gypsum core that will essentially. Just like any other wall board type product, if you blow the screws through the face, you loose the strength. It used to require factory edge on the bottom, sealant over screw heads and at the inside corners or any cut edges, not any more, but how much of that is a trade off expected gain in market share by making it more user friendly vs. claims for warranty purposes? When it seems most people think their shower fell apart because they forgot to use sealer once a year, go figure.

I'm going to you another option that even though you did not list it, it should be available to you locally. Custom Building products has a product called "Easyboard." It's a 1/2" rigid fiberglass foam board with a cement coating on both sides. Each 3'x5' panel weighs about 3#. It cuts with a utility knife to any shape you want, you can handle it as one person, holding it in place easily as you fasten it, no splitting at the edges when it shares a stud with adjoining wall board, just a great product to use. Now specifically when using it, I will install a section of regular 1/2" cement board where a soap dish will go if I am not using just corner shelves or using it to build niches, but since I do believe you will be building niches and using redgard, it's a non issue, right?

Any other questions, let me know.

[lost??]

Thanks for the responses. I wanted to use the fiberock because it it paintable. I'm tiling 60" up from the tub and painting the rest of the way up the wall. I was going to use plastic behind the backerboard as a vapor barrier.

Also, I had a question on the mortar and grount to use. Should I use the ready to use products or should I use those that you have to mix?

[Bljack]

All of the cement boards are paint-able, it just depends on the degree of finishing you would need to do. In the case of all of them, you only need to run them to the height of the shower head and from that point you can go with green board or better yet would be the paperless glass mat sheetrock. With those, you run your last row of tile over the joint between the cbu and the sheetrock and you won't have any joint to finish; just scrape thinset, embed the tape, comb lines, set the tile and done.

I was going to use plastic behind the backerboard as a vapor barrier.

If you have an exterior wall in this installation or you are using insulation behind the walls of the surround to cut down on the noise of the shower transferring to adjoining rooms, you need to use unfaced insulation or make lots of cuts through the facing of faced insulation batts as you do not want two vapor barriers. Mentioned in my first post was the requirement of a "moisture barrier" not a "vapor barrier." CBU manufacturers seem to like the misconception of their products being "waterproofing" and in general if you call their tech support or read their install instructions you will not see the requirement of a moisture barrier for wet areas and the mis use of the term "vapor barrier" for "moisture barrier" will lead to a misleading or inconclusive response from their tech support lines. If you ask,"Do I need a vapor barrier in my tub surround?" the correct answer is "Only if the wall is an exterior wall and the local jurisdiction requires one behind the board." Climate will determine if a vapor barrier is to be used and where in relation to the walls framing and sheathing it is to be installed. They should always qualify their answer by continuing with, "in any case, a moisture barrier is required behind the cement board or a waterproofing membrane is requried on the surface." 6 mil plastic is a vapor barrier, 4 mil plastic is not.

Your setting materials should always be from a powder that you mix on site for wet ares. If you continue the tile around the walls into the dry areas, you can switch to mastic if the tiles are smaller than 8x8 and not stone, but only for the walls in the non wet areas. You also don't need to use cement board on the walls in not wet areas either if you plan on tile for those.

Good luck. :)