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Eventually we would like to redo our shower in the bathroom,
here is my floorplan
I'd love to removed the wall between the tub and shower
and have one of those 'glass' walls put in.
Plus extend the shower out to the end of the wall, which would bring it out about 8-9". and where the shower doors are, install a hinged glass door.
only problem is the pipes in the wall, I think they are for venting, as they go straight up to the roof. Here is an image from construction. this is the wall between the tub and shower, the one I'd like removed and replaced with glass.
First you would have to rerout the venting to the outside wall. It appears that there is some plumbing on the lower floor directly below this. That will have to be rerouted as well but most importantly you want to be sure this isn't a load bearing wall. If you can get to the attic. Look for support beams that may sit on that wall and go up to your ridge. If there isn't any, you should be ok removing the wall. You will stilll have a knee-wall up to the tub where your water feeds will remain.
On reason i wanted the glass ... kinda like those "frameless" showers,
is the shower itself is kinda dark, the window is over the whirlpool tub... and I personally hate using lights when it's day light .... so removing that wall with give natural light.
and yeegads... i dont think i'd like a mirrored wall in the shower.
Moving the plumbing vent pipes can be done but will probably be very expensive and may require tearing up a lot of the house to do so. Which means all of that would then have to be repaired. And it has to be done right or you will have plumbing problems including a risk of sewer gases in the house.
Maybe instead of a mirror, you could have the glass block on the sides of the plumbing and do a neat tile design on the wall where the vent pipes are.
I think money may be an object [we were planning on doing this last year, but now DH is off of work for health reasons.]
originally I wanted to do glass block ... all of this was before i started looking into the construction photos and saw all those pipes.
I wonder if the pipes could be moved closer to the wall, then say stick in a 90° elbow sort of pipe and reconnect it back to the pipe that goes out the roof.
would that work? That way, I could do glass or glass block with the exception of say the corner 6-8 inches.
I really hate the shower they put in .... seems cheaply done and really not very big.
You really need to get a good plumber to look at the whole venting system to tell you whether it is a reasonable thing to do.
For my money, I would extend the shower out like you said but only put the glass block on the exposed area next to the vents.
Is there roof overhead? If so, you could put in a solar tube to bring natural light into the shower area. It would cost you a whole lot less than messing with the plumbing.
Perhaps a plumber can cite a definitive yes or no, but I would be hesitant to put a 90 degree turn in a vent line for the simple reason that if something were to fall in the pipe it would lodge and block the vent more easily than if it were a straight or even a slanted drop to the sewer line. I know that spider webs and accumulations of debris will sometimes restrict even a straight vent pipe, a right angle would surely clog much more easily.
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