Super disaster - water pipe burst, screed damp

That should - together with the evaluation - be the task of an expert or the union's specialists, to open carefully and selectively and to evaluate the findings.

Hello everyone,

first of all, thanks for the answers.

Of course, I don’t want to and will not regulate it myself. What should my insurance have to do with it anyway? The house was handed over to us 3 months ago, so if a burst pipe after 3 months is not considered a warranty case, then I don’t know anymore….

But the general contractor and the plumber have also made that very clear, there’s no discussion about that.

The cause was an incorrectly mounted safety clip on the bathtub inlet. We have a concealed valve for the bathtub (which is still leaking after the third attempt at repair, but that was not the actual problem), from there a pipe goes to the bathtub inlet. This pipe is attached with a quick-release fitting on the bathtub inlet and secured with a clearly visible, bright yellow clip. Or it should have been secured, if the (insert any harsh insult of your choice here) wasn’t too stupid to push the clip on properly. Let’s not even talk about intellectually incredibly sophisticated ideas like additionally securing this clip with tape. That would be completely beyond the horizon of these idiots.

Anyway, yesterday while filling the bathtub a large part of the water didn’t go into the tub but accumulated in the cavity under the tub and found its way from there. Definitely into the screed insulation and probably also into the screed itself.

The insulation in the bathroom is completely soaked, the water must be standing there. That also explains why water has run along the bathroom stack pipe down into the basement and why water came out of the ventilation openings of the ground floor ceiling. The affected openings are located in the bathroom when viewed from above.

There is probably water in the hallway too, initial moisture measurements have shown slightly damp walls there. That would be an indication that water has been escaping there repeatedly for some time, as within a few hours the porous bricks normally don’t absorb water up to 25 cm above the raw floor.

That may also explain why our parquet flooring in the upstairs hallway and bedroom has been creaking more and more recently. I had attributed it to changing temperatures and humidity, that was apparently wrong…

After consulting with my carpenter today, I removed the baseboards in the affected areas so that vapor can escape from the gaps between the parquet and the wall instead of getting absorbed by the parquet. And if the parquet edges start to lift in the next few days, it will be clear that it has to go.

The drying specialist was just here, but due to the 18 cm screed thickness, he can hardly measure anything. So drilling is first on the agenda.

We will therefore have drying equipment in the house for many weeks and the uncertainty whether it really is dry or if we will have mustiness and mold in the place later on.

Just great….

Regards,

Andreas