Very helpful DanM!
Yes, I agree. The type of mortar sits on top of the PVC liner and so water will constantly hit it once the tile is put on it.
I am just not sure if I can hit it with water before tiling? Once everyone else does the morter bed, they seem to jump to the tile (which is OK if they are confident the bed is OK). It seems that it wouldn't hurt anything to flood the mortar bed a second time, but I just want to ask to be sure?
Yes, yes I did do a pre-slope at 1/4" per foot as required. However, the desire to flood it with water is just to sort of see where the water pools/puddles? I would expect it to puddle towards the drain, and not puddle around the edges of the shower. By filling it with water (a second time), I could just double check things.
The idea is that I'd like to flood it with water BEFORE doing the extra step of tiling. There's a lot of weight put on when the MUD is put in. I just want to make sure the pre-slope has NOT changed and is still doing what it should.
Then, with that confidence, let it dry after flooding it and then can go ahead and tile maybe a week later. It would be disappointing if after tiling, I find out the slope was messed up somehow (although I don't expect this). Then, I would have to rip everything apart including tile. I'm sort of wanting to go through that extra double step to double flood check before moving forward on the tile.
From what you are saying it sounds like it won't hurt anything to hit the mortar bed with water just enough to see where the water goes. The mortar bed was put in a few weeks ago so it's pretty dry by now. So far I have never hit it with water.
