A less than successful purchase

Alas, not all the purchases we made last Saturday were as successful as the toasted sandwich maker.

The bath sealant strip looked like a wonderful idea:


The old sealant was transparant, and looked rather gross with manky, mouldy bits showing. We'd been thinking of replacing it for about four years, but Richard really doesn't like using the giant syringe-like appliance for putting sealer in.

Having bought the strip, he used a knife to hack away at the old gungy stuff, then I spend another hour or so cleaning it thoroughly, getting rid of most of the mould, and ensuring surfaces were clean and dry. We left it for a few hours to finish drying - weather is still warm in Cyprus, so it was easy enough to do.

Then, in the evening, having read the instructions, Richard applied the strips:


It looked very professional...


... at first.

Unfortunately, it didn't seem to 'take' very well. In some places it was sticking, in others - despite our pushing it back regularly - it was not:


We lived with it for a few days, taking baths instead of showers since there evidently wasn't much of a seal.

Then, after all, Richard bought a container of the silicon seal thing that goes in the giant syringe.

He pulled the strip off. There really wasn't any choice. It left a sticky mess behind - it should have set by that stage, so perhaps that was the problem. Maybe, we thought, the sealant strips had been in the hardware shop over the hot summer, subjected to temperatures of 40C and more, and had lost its sticking power.

Not that there was anything we could do about it other than chalk it up to bad experience.

I spent another hour or so cleaning it up.. and he put the sealant in. It doesn't look as good as the strip did, but at least it's sealing. And it isn't mouldy. So on all counts, it's considerably better.