In Which Una installs her own Toilet

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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(Posted on the UnaBoard)

Yesterday morning, I finally did it. I woke up, and said “I’m going to buy that pressure-assist ¶ toilet I want (and need) so badly, and I’m going to put it in all by my damn self, and then I’m going to have a glass of wine and smile self-confidently.”

So here’s what happened:

Background: I have two bathrooms, and just one me in my house. In the main bathroom, the tank on the toilet (an old, high-flow one) has been cracked for a while, but was repaired before I moved in. About a year ago, I noticed that the crack was “weeping” water. Thinking that I was near a flood of Biblical proportions, I turned the water off to the toilet and gave it it’s last flush, and went down to one bathroom in full working order. In the process of doing this, I found that the water valve (that shuts the water off to the toilet) was bad, and leaked too. Sigh.

The Present: So, after much research, asking, saving money, building confidence, and a thread on the SDMB, I decide to replace the toilet. And, due to the very poor experiences I have had with low-flow toilets, I decide to get a pressure assist toilet ¶. For those of you that don’t know what a PA toilet is, think “public restroom”, or WHHHOOOOSSHHHHH!!! You know, the ones that can suck down 5 rolls of toilet paper, the Sunday Times, a basketball…no more clogs! :smiley:

So, I start the morning with cautious happiness. I’ve decided to do it. I even get a little giddy in the car, singing “Goin’-to buy a toi-let, ev-ry bo-dy, goin’-to buy a toi-let, yeah yeah” to the tune of “Goin’ to a Go-Go” by the Rolling Stones…but enough about that.

So, I get to the hardware store, and there are two PA toilets in stock of the model I had selected, the Crane “Economizer”. A nice man comes over to lift a bowl and a tank down for me, and I ask if he will kindly lift each one out to see 1) that they are not broken, 2) they are not used (shudder), and 3) that they have all the parts required. He gives me “the look”, and then opens the box containing the bowl. The bowl, and 2 pieces of broken porcelain come out. Hmmm…not good. We check the tank, and it is OK. The second bowl is also good, so I get that. Then, I get a wax ring, new brass bolts, and a putty knife to clean the old wax ring off. The new water valve is a treat - I get the most expensive one there, a globe valve that works on just a quarter turn. Hey, I’m an engineer, I appreciate such mundane things…

So, I get home. I turn off the water to the house, and go outside to the sillcock and drain the water. Then, I unscrew the water valve hose from the tank, and with two large crescent wrenchs, undo and replace the water valve. Everything is A-OK. Next, I drain the tiny bit of water left in the old toilet, undo the two bolts holding it on to the bowl, and remove the tank. So far, so good.

I then undo the chamber bolts, and remove the seat as well. I lift the bowl, managing not to spill a drop, and set it in the tub. Everything is good. Then I am faced with the dreaded Old Wax Ring. At this point, I notice two things:

  1. The ring, and the hole, is remarkably, incredibly clean.
  2. There is no odor.
  3. The waste pipe is copper, like all the other pipes in the house. Cool!

So, I scrape the old wax ring off, that goes well. I put the new ring down, and the new bolts. Good. Then, I woman-handle the new bowl in, and carefully set it down on the ring. The bolts line up, and everything looks good. I try to put the nuts onto the bolts, and…

the nuts don’t fit! Yes, the bolts both have fucked-up threads, due to the brass “electro-cote” on them, and the nuts will not turn on them! There is nothing I can do, so I lift the bowl back off. Unfortunately, the wax ring has now torn in half. Knowing that this can be salvaged, I carefully mold the ring back together into one whole part, and then focus on the bolts. I clean the bolts, holding the oblong heads in lock-grip pliers, and run the nuts onto them with my ratchet. Back, and forth, re-cutting the threads, until the nuts spin on smoothly. OK…good. Now, I put the repaired ring back on, put the bolts in, and try to set the bowl back on.

One bolt is now cocked. I try to finagle it from the side, with my fingers, and it shoots out, and goes down the waste pipe.

Much screaming ensues.

I drive back to the hardware store, Lay Down the Law about the shitty bolts they sold me, and they give me a new wax ring and new, better bolts for free.

Now…I return, clean off the new (old) wax ring, put the new one on, the new bolts, everything lines, up, and the bowl in installed. Five minutes later, and the tank is installed. Five minutes of tightening and cleanup later, and the water valve is opened. The first flush comes 30 seconds later.

WHHHHOOOOOOSSHSHHHHH!!!

Several dozen flushes later - no leaks, no drips, no problems.

I did it!

:smiley:

Here is a NON-GROSS link to a video of the toilet in action. The red balls in the picture are ANSI “test balls”, not the result of a Heinekin and Papa John’s Pizza Roman Orgy.

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My Real Player has now seen everything.

So, what is it that makes it a pressure-assisted toilet? Where does the extra pressure come from? Is there a pressurized tank on your roof that could blow up in the middle of the night?

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You installed your own toilet.

Oh, you totally rock! :smiley:

4

The toilet has a pressure tank that is contained within the china tank on the back of the toilet. Your water line supplies the pressure that it needs, and it is all self-contained. From the outside, no one can tell anything about it’s mighteous force.

Go to this site, flushmate.com for a detailed description, with neat color pics.

5

I’m just impressed that an engineer used tools, lost only 50% of the hardware in the first attempt, and that there were no reports of injury or explosion! Truly an oddity:)

6

Sounds like a big job.

I’m glad you got to the bottom of it.

I don’t know squat about plumbing…okay, I’ll stop.

Well done.

7

…I even got 500 Delta Frequent Flyer miles out of the deal too. A win-win-win situation all around.

Butt (snicker) the problem now is…the toilet has not yet been properly “tested”. I’m trying what I can, but I don’t think I will be able to…“test” it before my trip to New York tomorrow. Hmmm…

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You go, girl!

And I mean that in every way possible. :smiley:

BTW do you know anything about leaking skylights?

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Turbo, I’m impressed she didn’t start flushing rolls of paper down in a display of it’s awe-inspiring power. I know that’s what I’d do. :slight_smile: Or did she?

Plus, globe valves kick ass.

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Most excellent! I helped a friend install a toilet once. We didn’t have the bolt problem. But he did have dry rot in the floor boards so we had to clean that up first. But now I know how to do all that, pretty cool!

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Well, let’s just say after every flush, my ears pop, loose papers are sucked throughout the house, and I always make sure I still have two cats…

Boi Toi - ugh. Dry rot sucks. Thankfully, I didn’t have any problems like that, or it would have been a sad saga of pain and torment.

Mermaid - Sure, I can do something about leaking skylights. Let me check…

WHHHHHOOOOOOOSSSSHHHHHH!!!

Yup, it will suck down a skylight too - pulled it right out of the roof. Now, where is the other cat… :confused:

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Anthracite, congratulations for doing the job and for not being afraid to attempt it. I always encourage people to do such things and not be afraid. The truth is: (1) Yes, it will be more difficult that you thought and you will run into a few snags but (2) you can do it and it is great learning and a wonderful sense of accomplishment.

And since we are on the interesting topic of toilets, I will tell you what I know about this because I have dealt with several which were quite stubborn, each in their own way. Each seems to have its own personality (they probably talk to each other and laugh at their owners when we are not around).

Ok, I have seen the AVI file and the flushmate site but I have never installed or used one of these toilets still, let me say a few things.

Low flow toilets can work but they can also not work as well as traditional (and now illegal) toilets, depending on the circumstances. I have dealt with many toilets with a tendency to not flush well and there is just nothing better than large amounts of water to make things move along. How you deliver this water also affects performance.

In the toilet we have the tank, the bowl, the trap and the sewer (discharge) pipe and they all need to be designed and installed correctly to work well together. Just changing one element can cause problems.

Now, if your toilet’s discharge has no horizontal run and is immediately vertical, then, once the waste is past the trap, it will fall and be washed by water from other places (shower, sink, washer etc). But if you have a toilet with a significant length of low pitch pipe, then you may have a problem because you just need sheer amounts of water to wash the waste along. I stayed in a hotel in China with this problem. The discharge pipe was so poorly designed that even the big tank of water would not be enough. After it clogged the first day, I bought a plastic bucket and would dump a bucket of water at the same time I flushed. All this water was enough to wash all the waste along to the vertical section. While this is a poorly designed waste pipe, if you have something similar you can expect lots of problems with low flow toilets.

Now, having seen the explanation of how the Flushmate works, I see what it does is dump the water from the tank into the bowl much faster than a gravity fed tank. Nothing more and nothing less. While this is a good thing, it can only do so much. You can easily do the same thing by using a bucket. I have been flushing toilets with buckets for a long time for a variety of reasons (lately I was having to dump hot water to prevent overheating in the solar system). You can see in the Flushmate site that a normal flush takes longer than 12 seconds whereas a Flushmate flush takes 5 seconds. You can take a bucket of water and dump it in the bowl in even less than that and you will get a fairly good idea of how it will work. Yes, dumping the water in the bowl faster is good but, again, it can only do so much. In the USA you are limited by law to the 3.5 flush so you might as well make the best of it. A pressure assist tank is better than a gravity tank, no doubt about it.

Now, let’s look at the bowl and the trap. Personally I like a big bowl, with plenty of water, because this means easy cleaning (waste falls into the water, not on the china. Unfortunately, lots of water in the bowl means lots more water needed to flush. Low flow toilets tend to have much less water in the bowl and trap and therefore require more cleaning. I would rather use more water than have to clean the toilet bowl with a brush every time I use it.

More things. The geometry and volume of the bowl and trap are very important. The assisted flush just puts the water in the bowl faster but everything that happens from there on is the same. There is no assist for the water in the bowl through the trap (like you have in airplanes). You need to overcome the inertia of what’s already in the bowl and trap and the more water you flush, the better you can do it. (One of my “inventions” was going to be a toilet with an airtight lid so the waste would be “pushed” out").

I have seen that AVI video of the toilet flushing and it looks like there is some assist in “sucking” the water out as the level starts to decrease immediately, without rising first. I have never seen a toilet do that and I doubt an assited tank flushing would do that. As I say, flush the bowl with a bucket and you’ll get an idea of what an assisted flushing is like. Rather, because you dump the water in the bowl faster, the level initially rises faster and higher. I have some questions about that video because you can hardly see any water entering the bowl and yet it is sucked out through the trap so fast. I think there has to be some sucking action there but the assited flush does not do that.

A toilet should work under any circumstances, not just favorable ones. I am a guy who generates waste in big sizes and often clogs toilets. Toilets should be made to handle everyone’s waste. I consider mandating 3.5 gallon toilets a mistake which has caused more problems on the whole than it has solved.

And then there is the topic of marine toilets but I’ll leave that for another day. (Summary: pretty much the same: people in Washington mandate things that don’t work for those of us who use them.)

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The toilet it replaced was a VERY high flow one (about 7 gallons per flush) and the waste pipe is directly vertical, about a 10-foot drop. And it still clogged on occasion…

BTW - you refer quite often to the “3.5 gallon” mandate. I’m pretty sure that the mandate is actually 1.6 gallons - am I correct here? That is what every single new toilet in my Crane catalog (PA or not) is limited to.

I can’t tell you why the video looks wrong, or explain it to you any better than the web site does, but I can say this with 100% certainty - the video is supposed to be of the same model toilet valve as I have, and it looks 100% true to life like mine. I just went over and flushed it again to check.

If you think it looks wrong, I can’t argue with you, because I don’t know as much about their operation as you. All I can tell you is the video represents accurately what mine looks like. Minus all those red balls. :wink:

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Yup, sorry, I got my gallons mixed up. 1.6 gallons (6 litres) is what’s mandated while older ones were about 3.5 gallons (about 13 litres). Obviously I wasn’t even thinking as I know full well how much each quantity represents.

If it does suck the waste down like that I would be very curious to examine one and see how it works. Maybe next time I am invited to someone’s house I’ll take my tools and lock myself in the bathroom for a while :slight_smile:

I’m glad I gave you the chance to admire and examine and test your latest completed job :slight_smile: If it were me I would probably just sit in the bathroom for a few days admiring it :slight_smile:

And while we are in the bathroom I should mention another abomination which is the “on-demand” gas water heaters which heat water as it goes through, rather than store in a tank like most American homes have. Yes, they save some energy but the temperature regulation is awful and you cannot take a comfortable shower. In Europe they are everywhere and I hate them with passion. They use them because they are like a box on the wall and use less space.

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the web site just says the water is flushed from the tank to the bowl much faster and that does not explain much. In a regular toilet bowl it would not make a huge difference. However, it could be that a substantial part of the water does not drain into the bowl around the sides but rather is direceted to a jet located under the water level and which would direct the water into the trap. This would explain why the water is “sucked” from the bowl and you see no water entering the bowl and no increase in water level… I most definitely have to inspect one of these creatures. :slight_smile:

I am reminded of the pumps the Coast Guard uses. If your boat needs some serious bailing, the CG come along and drop a serious hose into your boat and start pumping water into your boat. At the end of the hose is a venturi and the water being pumped in exits through another hose carrying along some of the water in the boat with it. A clever idea, especially when applied to toilet bowls (never mind sinking boats).

A really interesting topic we have here.

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Wow. I am seriously impressed. I don’t think I could have done something like that on my own. Way to go!

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Yes, I just flushed it again and watched. There is a very powerful jet of water that emerges from a hole, about 1/2" in diameter, that is under the water line in the bowl and forces directly back into the trap. It looks very forceful, and little water comes down around the top of the bowl. This may cause problems with keeping the sides and the top of the bowl clean, I do not know.

But I do love the toilet. It makes me happy.

To address a few other comments here: It is amazing what you can do when you have confidence that you can do something, have the tools, and have sought out opinions of experts in advance. I believe firmly that more women need to actively take a strong role in learning how to do things like this - whether it be changing a toilet, wiring a light fixture in, or changing your oil. With each success, or each completed project, comes a sense of greater self-worth, and a greater feeling of independence.

Women need to be strong, and independent, and self-sufficient. Now, I have several advantages most women will never have, so it’s not fair to look to me as being a good example - because I assure you, I am actually a poor example in a couple of ways. For one reason, just my knowledge as an Engineer helps me out a lot. But the point is still valid - skills can be learned, tools can be bought, and if you have the confidence to think through a situation carefully, seek both book knowledge and practical experience in advance, then most of your projects will turn out alright.

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I clicked on the video, and it looked cool. Like someone put watermelon balls or cherry tomatoes in the toilet and flushed.

[Homer Simpson]Mmmm… Now there’s something you don’t see in the toilet every day![/Homer Simpson]

Seriously, good job, Anthracite!

Robin

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First of all, kudos, Anthracite.

Second, I want to see if I understand this:

Are “test balls” specifically designed to see how well a toilet works? I had no idea such a thing existed. Are they used for other things?

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cool! i’m very impressed.

a nifty new loo that you didn’t have to smuggle out of canada under the cover of labatts.