How to Replace a Shower Drain
When remodeling a shower, it is often necessary to replace the shower drain. Sometime old bolts are rusted and break off and other times the old drain is not at the proper height you need. In any case, I've found a simple trick to remove and replace the drain which doesn't require access from the room below your shower.
Here's the old shower drain installed. It has been recessed in the floor and I want it to be about 3/4" above the floor so that when I preslope the floor under the shower pan liner it is flush with that presloped floor.
Take a dremel with a cutoff wheel attachment and insert it into the drain and cut all the way around the drain pipe and the drain will come right out as shown above. Once that is out, a new drain can be glued into place with a 2" coupling and short 2" ABS pipe.
This picture shows the new drain installed. I added a couple shims to screw through since the previous contractor had cut too large of hole and recessed the original drain. The pre-slope mud deck needs to be a minimum of 1/2"-3/4" in depth at the drain for strength so you want the height of the drain to match up accordingly.
Step 2: How to Replace a Shower Drain
Step 3: How to Make Shower Deck Mud
Step 4: How to Build a Shower Floor 1 (Curb and Pre-slope)
Step 5: How to Build a Shower Floor 2 (Liner, Drain, Final Slope)
Step 6: How to Install Shower Backerboard
Step 7: How to Build a Waterproof Shower Bench
Step 8: How to Tile Shower Floor
Step 9: How to Tile and Grout Shower Walls