Bathroom Wastes

Bathroom Wastes — Basin, Bath and Shower, in Matching Finishes

A bathroom waste is the fitting the water drains through, and this page covers all three places you need one: the basin, the bath and the shower tray. Basin and bath wastes here are click clack — press the plug to close, press again to open, with no pull rod behind the tap and nothing to seize up. Shower traps work differently: there is no plug, and the waste and trap are combined in one body under the tray. Finishes run through chrome, matt black, brass tones and white ceramic.

The three are not interchangeable, and that is the first fork in the road. A bathroom sink waste uses a G1 ¼ thread and drops into a 45 mm hole. A bath waste is larger, threads G1 ½ into a 52 mm hole, and arrives as an assembly with its linked overflow. A shower trap is sized to the hole in the tray and connects to 40 mm pipe. Buying one when you needed another is a wasted order rather than a near miss.

Basin, bath or shower?

• Basin wastes — slotted and unslotted, at 60 mm, 66 mm and 70 mm. This is where the overflow question matters: look inside the bowl for a slot near the rim before you order.
• Bath wastes — all with a linked overflow and an easy-clean removable basket. Baths effectively always have an overflow, so there is no slotted-versus-unslotted decision to make here.
• Shower traps — waste and trap in one fitting for the shower tray. Measure the hole in the tray itself, not the old cover, and match it to the size on the product page.

Buy it with the tap

Most taps are supplied without a waste, and the two sit close enough together that a mismatch is immediately visible — a black tap above a chrome plug is the one we see most often. The finishes here are made to match the taps in the same range, so ordering both together is the simplest way to avoid it. Check What's Included on any bathroom tap page.

Two Deva basin mixers are the exception and come with their waste already: the Ethos and the Adore Mini. If you are buying either, you do not need a basin waste from this page.

About the trap

The trap holds a little water to block drain smells. Under a basin or a bath it is a separate U-bend below the waste, and a sound existing one can almost always be reused when the waste above it is changed — which saves both money and a considerably more awkward job. Renew the sealing washer under the flange rather than reusing it; a hardened washer is the usual reason a refitted waste weeps.

A shower tray is the exception. There is rarely room for a separate U-bend underneath, so a shower trap combines the waste and the trap in a single fitting — replacing it replaces both.

Not sure which you need? The wastes buying guide covers the questions that decide it, and our article on slotted versus unslotted wastes goes further into the detail.

We ship across Ireland — Dublin, Cork, Galway, Limerick, Waterford and everywhere between — with free delivery on orders over €100 and same-day Dublin pickup on stocked items.