Psychojet, curious to know what shower pan you selected and what you think about it? And did you go with a sliding glass door; if so, which and how is it? We are replacing our tub with a shower and want a high quality, good-looking composite pan.

Patricia Colwell, what is your reason for saying forget the barn door type shower door? Looks or performance or both?

Why do you want a sliding door - albeit a barn door style.

I really like my shower door much more than my old sliding door. If it slides it has tracks and tracks are harder to keep clean.

I wouldn't want a shower that wasn't enclosed because I appreciate the warmth of the shower after the water has been running for a minute or so. FWIW, I live in a relatively warm climate and like things cold - e.g. have not activated my heated toilet seat :-) but I appreciate the atmosphere of a fully enclosed shower/

I know that tracks are harder to keep clean. Nevertheless, our reasons for a sliding shower door are: 1) It's a small bathroom where a pull-out door wouldn't work, we think. The toilet is 18" from the left (back) side, so no way to put a pull-out door there. At the right (front) end, we think a pull-out door would hit the towel bar on the adjacent wall and that's pretty much the only place to puta towel bar. 2) After a shower, don't pull-out doors drip water onto the floor, whereas sliders do not? Thanks for your input.

@mimola, we actually have done a complete pivot of our redesign ideas from the original options of an 60x36 enclosure type shower to a regular 60x42 three-sided alcove. We're still going to move forward with the sliding door option precisely the same reason #2 as you stated and as Helen said as well, i.e., not keen on the draftiness of just a return/fixed panel. Our current shower set up is a pivot door and it's a pain in the rear because it just drips water everywhere.

Anyway, as for the shower base goes, we are planning to go with an acrylic composite instead of stone/gel coat. More specifically, we're going with the MTI MTSB-6042CD Shower Base (59.5" x 42") White (https://www.modernbathroom.com/showers-tubs/mti-mtsb-6042cd-shower-base-59-5-x-41-75-__mtsb-6042cd.aspx). With this base being 125 pounds, it does comes across as fairly solid and sturdier while being at least half the price of Corian and Dynex bases that I've researched.

Thanks for all this info, psychojet. Helpful for me as well as future readers of this forum. Even though this discussion is about shower bases, I'll add since you mentioned shower doors that we are likely to go with the Rotolo sliding door by Basco. Our local glass shop's installer who has 30 years of experience loves everything about it and prefers to install the Rotolo over any other. He says the glide design and other technical aspects are superior to other semi-custom doors. Both doors slide, which we want. Best wishes with your project!