Alternatives to Reglazing a Tub

Reglazing

• Reglazing your tub is exactly what it sounds like, replacing the glaze on your bathtub. When reglazing your tub, a remodeling professional removes all caulk and other sealants or adhesives from the perimeter of your tub. Using acid, your remodeler removes the existing glaze on your tub by burning it away. Sanding the exposed surface of the tub helps remove all cosmetic blemishes to create a flat, even surface on which to apply your new glaze. According to Henri De Marne, author of “About the House with Henri De Marne,” reglazing jobs should last several years.

Refinishing

• Refinishing and reglazing often appear as synonymous terms, though the process of refinishing a bathtub differs in a few important ways from the process of reglazing. Refinishing begins, like reglazing, with the removal of all caulk. However, refinishing does not require the removal of the old glaze. Rather, refinishing works like repainting your tub. Remodelers apply a bottom coat of usually silicone-based material that works as both a binding agent and a primer. A topcoat goes over this primer. Once dry, these materials create a new solid surface on top of your old tub surface.

Lining

• Lining your tub is a simple process that consists of little more than purchasing and installing a liner. Manufacturers make bathtub liners out of plastics like reinforced acrylic, the same material used to make prefabricated shower pans and walls. When you purchase a liner, the company you purchase it from usually offers installation service, in which case this alternative to reglazing requires no work on your part. Ask for an installation manual if you decide to install the liner yourself, and always work with manufacturer recommended caulks and sealants.

Replacing a Tub

• Reglazing a tub constitutes an alternative to tub replacement. Therefore, it stands to reason that tub replacement constitutes an alternative to reglazing. This process entails shopping for and purchasing a replacement tub and hiring a contractor or other professional to install the tub for you. Replacing your bathtub costs more money and time than any other alternative to reglazing a tub, though results also last significantly longer. If you own an old tub that already experienced reglazing in the past, any further work on that tub is probably cost ineffective -- replacement represents your best option.