Worn Cast Iron Bath Resurfaced

Worn Cast Iron Bath Resurfaced

Below are some pictures of a standard sized cast iron bath that we ultimately resurfaced. This was a bath we worked on in Ealing, London. But this style of bath is very common the length and breadth of the country. This style would have  been installed in thousands of homes, especially during the 1950s-60s.

These were pretty good baths and they did the job they were designed for just fine. However, literally after decades of use the wear and tear can really start to show.

The bath below is overall in pretty good condition for its age, except at the tap end. The enamel around the waste is wearing thin and there has been a past issue with the taps resulting in stained and etching from the shoulder at the tap end down into the bath itself. You can get an idea from the pictures below:

Worn Cast Iron Bath

Worn Bath

In such circumstances, resurfacing the bath can give it a new lease of life and take something which has perhaps been letting the rest of the bathroom down into something that lifts the whole room. We are in and out in a day and the bath is usable first thing the next.

Here was how the bath looked when we had finished for the day:

Resurfaced Bath

Resurfaced bath

Fireclay Sink Restoration

Large Fireclay Sink Restoration.

This was an interesting project we did for a customer in Palmers Green in London.

He had on old (and very large) sink made from fireclay in his kitchen. Usually these sink are recessed into a worktop and only the top and front of the sink are visible with the rest of the sink hidden.

However, the customer wanted his sink to be sitting on a support without any worktop around it and as a result the sides of the sink, as well as the front and top, would be on display. 

Here is the bowl of the sink in question showing the wear typical of a sink of this type and age.

This picture shows one end of the sink and also what was unusual about this job.

When these sinks are made, one end never gets any porcelian glaze or enamel applied to it and also there are 4 circular holes just over an inch in diameter in this end of the sink, one on each corner. You can hopefully make out the two holes on the end of the sink closest to the camera.

The lack of glaze and the holes are part and parcel of the manufacturing process and generally it’s not a problem as this end of the sink is hidden from sight below the worktop.

However, it was a bit of an issue here with this sink what with it all being on display.

We filled and made good the holes on this end of the sink, as well as smoothed of the fireclay here as it was noticeably rougher than the rest of the sink which had been glazed.

Then we resurfaced the whole sink, including this end.

Here is the bowl of the sink. The bowl is now a uniform colour and the wear and staining has been dealt with.

Here is the bowl of the sink. The bowl is now a uniform colour and the wear and staining has been dealt with.

Large Victorian Roll-Top Bath with original plumbing Resurfaced

Roll Top bath before Resurfacing

A Roll Top Bath Before The Bath business Restored it!

We were asked to resurface the bath above which was in a farmhouse in the Reading area. What you can’t really tell from the pictures is just how much bigger this bath is compared to a modern standard bath. This one was a beauty!

The bath itself is a great example of an original Victorian roll-top bath which still had the original lead plumbing which you can see below:

Lead Pipeing

The taps for the bath have been removed by the owner to be restored offsite. We do tap restoration also. (Please note: We could have restored the bath itself with the taps on but it made sense for the owner to get everything done, taps and bath, at the same time)

The bath itself was in very good condition apart from the wear and staining below the taps and around the waste area. Here the staining was very noticeable and unsightly.

Below you can see the bath after it was restored and the staining sorted out:

Roll Top Bath after Resurfacing

Stained Cast Iron Bath & Soap Dishes Resurfaced

Stained cast iron bath with worn soap dishes circa 1930’s

This is a bath we restored in the Belmont Hill area of London. The bath, tiles and soap dishes were all original. The bath was a really good size and nice and deep.

The bath and one of the soap dishes however had had their enamel coating completely worn away back to the cast iron in places and the bath was also extensively stained and worn over most of its surface.

Large Stained Bath before re-enamelling

In the picture above you can see the staining which is over most of the bath. And around the waste you can black marks. This is where the enamel coating on the bath has been worn back to the cast iron below.

Worn Soap Dish

There were two soap dishes built into the wall above the bath. Like the bath itself, these were made of cast iron which was then enamelled. In the picture above you can see that the enamel on one of the dishes as been worn back to the cast iron through decades of use.

We were able to restore the bath and soap dishes in a day, and they were ready to use the next. You can find out more about our process here.

Here is the result of the bath being re enamelled.

The above picture shows the finished bath with the staining and wear issues all handled.

Lovely bath & Soap dishes after we resurfaced it.

And finally, here we have the bath and both the soap dishes after completion. What do you think?

A BLACK AND WHITE TOILET

We had an enquiry a few months ago from a Paul Lynch. He has developed some beautiful apartments in London and around the country.

In one of his Luxury penthouse apartments  www.kensingtonapartments.net  he had a black bathroom suite installed. It was striking. As we all know however black is notoriously difficult to keep looking clean. The lavatory was particularly impossible to keep looking clean. The owner wanted to keep the black bathroom suite and toilet so asked if he could have the interior re enamelled white.

Paul called quite a few companies to as k if they could change the colour of the toilet and re enamel the interior of the w/c. He was told it was impossible! You can’t change the colour of a toilet or bath. It can’t be done etc. When Paul called The Bath Business  he had all but given up! We knew we could help. Paul rushed the toilet down from London to our head office in West Sussex & we had it delivered to our workshop. Our skilled technicians did their magic & “VOILA”- A black and white toilet.

What do you think? We rather like it.

Let us know if you would like us to change the colour of your toilet, wash hand basin or bath. The most popular request is changing the sanitary ware to white but we can change it to any other colour you fancy.

BATH RESURFACING VIDEO ON YOUTUBE

So finally we have ventured into video and produced a video about our bath resurfacing services.

This video particularly helps explain all about our “ROLLS ROYCE” technique and why we are the UK’S leading bath resurfacing, re enamelling and repair company. Hopefully you’ll enjoy it.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Omtk6ZoQGHA]

There will be more YOUTUBE videos to come on our services and different tips and advice on caring for your bath. Do let us know if you want us to cover anything specific.

We currently re enamel baths and basins in London Edinburgh, Glasgow, Brighton and most major cities. We are expanding all the time so if you need help do contact us.

Bath Resurfacing, A Brief History

Bath Resurfacing, as a professional service, is a relatively new industry, dating back decades rather than centuries. The oldest company in the UK that is still resurfacing baths is in its 4th decade.

However, once bathrooms were pretty much ubiquitous, different industries and services came to be built up around them. One of these was Bath Resurfacing.

Bath Resurfacing itself is an off-shoot of the car refinishing trade. In fact, in America, the usual term used to describe the trade is “Bath Refinishing”; not “Bath Resurfacing” or “Bath Re-enamelling”, both of which are the terms mostly used in the UK. At The Bath Business we describe what we are doing as ‘Bath Resurfacing’ generally. We feel it best describes what is actually being done to your bath.

Although there are quite a lot of companies that do Bath Resurfacing professionally, and each of these may have their own system or materials they use, the one common denominator is that all of them spray on the new surface. And the techniques and methods used have been derived from the car refinishing trade. Bath resurfacing has been around long enough now that many who do it may never actually have sprayed a car (I’m one of them) but this doesn’t change where the industry itself sprang from. And fortunately as materials and techniques improve in the car industry, the benefits of this can be used when resurfacing a bath.

Many of the tools, equipment and techniques would be fairly familiar to anyone who has spayed cars, although there are some differences due to the fact of where you are working and what you are spraying.

Many of a car sprayers’ tools will be run by compressors. In other words, they are air driven. Not just his spray gun but other things such as polishers, sanders, etc are all air driven. But compressors are bulky, heavy items, even small ones; so for mobility purposes, most bath resurfacers will use electrical sanders and polishers.

Again, the primers used by a bath re surfacer will often be different as the surfaces he is spraying onto are not the same as a car sprayer. The Bath Business uses a primer or bonder that has been designed specifically to adhere the new surface to the enamel bath. Without this special bonder the new surface would not adhere, or if we did do something to make it adhere of the bath then chipped there would be a problem. Our special primer ensures that if you chip the bath at some point the surface is adhered so well that no water can then reach under the new surface.

The car industry is the major mover and shaker in the development of spray paints and systems. For example, in the mid 90’s BMW unveiled its development of a water-based, coloured base-coat with a clear lacquer sprayed over it. At the same time, other companies were spending a lot of money doing research and development of water-based systems for cars. A lot of bucks have been spent on this. And the result of all this is that today cars are sprayed with a water-based coloured coat with a clear lacquer on top.

These developments trickle down to the Bath Resurfacing industry.

The idea of putting a new surface onto a bath is, however, not a new one at all. In fact it probably pre-dates the cast iron enamelled bath itself.

The first enamelled cast-iron baths began to appear in the late 1800’s, around 1870 and 1880. (Interestingly, one of the figures credited with its development was David Dunbar Buick, who is much better known for going on to found the Buick Motor Company in 1903. The success of this company [although not run by  Buick himself by this point] went on to fund the formation of  General Motors.)

Prior to this the baths most people used  were made of galvanized metal. The kind of thing you see in a western movie where the hero is soaking in a tub with his hat on, smoking a cigar. Once he’d finished, the water would be tipped out and the bath hung back on the wall.

These galvanized baths began to get painted on the inside. I came across one of these baths which had been installed into a bathroom. The old man who owned the property told me that when he was a child, the bath was painted once a year and he was the one sent to get the paint. I got the impression that there was a specific paint which was used. Very like the DIY kits you can get today, of which “Mr Tubby” is probably the best known. They can be covered in layers and layers of old paint. Stripping this off is definitely not a job for the faint hearted.

The Bath Business delivers a professional bath resurfacing service. We resurface bathroom suites, baths, sinks, toilets and shower trays. We also deliver a professional invisible chip repair service again to baths, sinks shower trays etc. So we don’t sell DIY kits. We do suply a chip repair kit to our past customers and we are looking at supplying our materials and system to other professional bath resurfacing companies.

When exactly painting galvanized baths started as a practice is something I’m not sure of, but is does seem to be the earliest example of Bath Resurfacing, and as I said, may even predate enamelled cast-iron baths.

Bath Resurfacing as a profession is, today, practised in many countries, but to say it is world wide would give a slightly wrong impression. It seems to be based mainly in those countries with a strong anglo-saxon culture or bent. America, Australia, Canada, etc. In a lot of countries, the idea of having a bath is somewhat odd and not really part of the culture. Hence, no Bath Resurfacing.

There are some gaps in what’s been written here, and if anyone has some information that I’ve not, I’d really like to hear from you. Some of the things I’d like to know are: Where did Bath |Resurfacing originate as a professional service? When? What were the first materials and equipment used?

I’d guess that the answers to these are that it was North America, probably after WW II and that Epoxy Resin was what was sprayed. But there are guesses. If you know more about this, please e-mail me at thebathbusiness@live.com and I can include it here in this article. Thank-you.

If you want to know more about the services we provide at The Bath Business then please look at our website, https://www.thebathbusiness.co.uk

We operate on London, Edinburgh, Surrey, Kent, Brighton, Manchester, Birmingham,Glasgow and throughout the UK.

Services include: bath re-enamelling, bath chip repairs, bathroom suite, enamelling, bathroom renovation, re-enamelling, resurfacing, re-surfacing a bath, enamel repairs, chipped enamel, cast iron bath sales, bathtub refinishing,bath tub resurfacing,

A Bath Resurfacing project in Bridge of Allan

05/03/09

I went to Bridge of Allan to do a job. The main thing the customer wanted was a chipped area of the bath repaired. Apparently it had just had a little chip originally, but one time he was in the bathroom,  the area around the chip just started flying off the bath until there was a large area that was just exposed cast iron.

I went and had Lunch in Bridge of Allan itself. It’s not a huge town by any means. Just one street with shops and restaurants on it. Lots of restaurants. They were all very upmarket. I was quite surprised by this. I mentioned it to the customer and he said that Bridge of Allan had rail and road links to both Edinburgh and Glasgow, good schools and a rural location and as such was much in demand as a place for the affluent to live.Not fitting into this category I was unaware of this haven in the countryside. It certainly is a beautiful place.

It also started snowing again. I was planning to go to Helensburgh to visit some family after I’d finished work and wasn’t sure I was going to make it if the snow kept up.

Snowing in Bridge of Allan.

The Customer and his wife run a company called Bouvrage. They produce all natural berry drinks from raspberries and European Blueberry. You can visit their website at www.bouvrage.com if you’d like to know more.

Got the job finished and did make it to Helensburgh. Scottish weather can be a bit unpredictable and annoying at times but it never got in the way of getting the job done and seeing the family. That makes a nice wee change.

Finished job.

An Interesting climate change – Edinburgh to Melrose

04/03/09

I was in Edinburgh and travelled down to Melrose to resurface a bath. In Edinburgh it felt quite spring-like (as it should be) but as I travelled down you start to climb a bit and it eventually got quite wintery.

View from A68 looking down to the Firth of Forth.

Melrose itself is a very typical Scottish Borders town. Pretty but small. Lots of independent shops doing their own thing.A great place to visit and like most of the Borders town a very pretty place as well.

Melrose

The bath I was resurfacing was in a house that dated from the 1880’s, and the owners thought that the bath was original. It was a plunger bath and these are very old baths. It seemed very likely this bath was original to the house as there was a button above the bath that you could push to ring a bell for a servant. If the bath was original then it was one of the very first cast iron baths. It has the unusual feature of the plunger for the bath also acting as the overflow. You don’t see this in later baths.

Melrose Abbey

Dedicated services in Scotland and England which include:bath re-enamelling, bath chip repairs, bathroom suite resurfacing, enamelling, bathroom renovation, re-enameling, resurfacing, bath re-surfacing, enamel repairs, chipped enamel, original cast iron bath sales, bathtub refinishing, and bath tub resurfacing.

A day of work in Sheffield

04/02/09

I travelled all the way to Sheffield today. It looks like they had had a lot of snow. We have employed a chap to cover this area specifically but I do like to do the odd job myself, especially when we are really busy. Sheffield is really rather nice.

I got to the job. A very pretty roll-top bath from 1928 was the bath to be resurfaced. It was in excellent condition too. But the customer wanted the holes for the taps filled and that area to look like it had never had taps. He had the new taps coming in over the side of the bath from above. So I filled the holes and resurfaced the bath. Can you tell where the tap holes where? I hop not.

The house was having a lot of work done to it; an extension being added and so on. One of the sparkies said something to me I didn’t catch. I asked him what he’d said. He laughed and said (refering to my Scottish accent), “Tha’ talks worst than ma!”  “Black”, “kettle”, “pot” and “calling” are some words which spring to mind. And most people think i sound American!

Heading back to the motorway from Sheffield, you pass a church with a crooked spire. I hope you can make it out in the picture. I am pretty sure the spire is meant to be like this.Quite a sight. Does anyone have any information on that Church spire?