So we had a leak in our water main (?, it’s the pipe that brings water to the house from the county’s pipe) last week, and a nice man from Roto Rooter came out and fixed it on a Sunday in blazing heat and charged me less than the actual time he spent at the house.
Yay! Problem is, he shut off the valve where the pipe enters the house. I’d already shut off the water at the main. When I turned it back on, the pressure was a lot higher. I turned it down so it was actually slightly lower than before based on the volume of water that comes out of my bathroom sink tap.
Now, when I flush my toilet, it fills to where the float rises, and the tank keeps filling. The main bathroom toilet had the same problem but I adjusted its valve and it has worked since. I’ve tried doing the same with mine but it doesn’t help; when the float rises, the water cuts off only slightly.
Did the tank valve just happen to break at about the same time as the leak occurred? Or am I doing something wrong? The fill mechanism is weird; it looks like this, not the traditional “ball on an arm” arrangement.
I’d turn it back up. I’m not entirely sure how those fill mechanisms work (on an internal basis), but based on what you’re saying, I’m going to guess they need a higher water pressure pushing against the valve to hold it shut then what you’re providing it with.
Think about it this way. If you have a fire in a night club and 500 people push against the door that opens in, they’re not going to get anywhere, but if it’s closing time and a few people are coming out, one or two at a time, it’s no problem for them to get around the door. Make sense?
The valve in your toilet might need the pressure pushing against it to hold it shut.
Could be that the float mechanism got gunked up (tanks can get gunky) and the different pressures or whatever moved the gunk around and it just needs replaced. It costs like $10 and 10 minutes to replace, check into it. You’ll need to replace those things a few times in the life of a toilet so might as well try now.
I was just on a job that required fixing one of those. The water wouldn’t shut off. It was a Kohler model. It had a red cap and I undid that, pulled the guts, and replaced the washer. Other brands may not have that washer and might need to just be replaced.
Wow.
Worst I ever did was two trips to the hardware store because I screwed up the wax ring. This will be Our Little Secret, lest my Man Card be revoked.
To be frank, those Fluidmaster things kind of suck – I reckon if you get five years out of one, you’re ahead of the game. Replace it and open the cutoff valve. Both you and the valve will be much happier as a result.
Just for clarification, when the float rose up and the water kept running (but a little less, right?), did you try pulling up the arm connected to the float to see if that shut off the water?
Because doing that might help isolate the problem before taking any more steps. If pulling up on the arm shut off the water, either the float is sticking, or the water level adjustment clip slipped and needs to be re-adjusted. If the water is still flowing when you’re pulling the arm up all the way, then you probably just need to replace the valve mechanism.
[By the way, partly closing the main water supply valve really shouldn’t change the pressure much, except when you’ve got a whole bunch of faucets/showers/etc running full bore. I mean, the main pipe in should be many times as big as your bathroom tap, so even closing the main pipe halfway, it should still be much wider than your tap, and so shouldn’t be affecting how much comes out of the tap. I wonder what’s going on there?]
It won’t affect the pressure, but it’ll reduce the volume. The pipe that comes from the street will be, say, an inch and a half, the one that comes to the bathroom might be a half an inch, but he may have turned the shut off far enough that the opening is essentially the same as, say, a quarter inch or eighth inch pipe or even smaller.
You have to turn a shutoff pretty far before you start noticing a reduction in volume.
Just look at a saddle valve for a fridge/ice maker, that’s just a pin hole and there’s still plenty of volume there (and the same amount of pressure as the spigot that you attach your hose to).
ETA, I wouldn’t attempt to reduce the volume (or pressure) coming into the house with anything put a quarter turn valve. If it’s the kind where you have to turn it several times to shut it off, you may end up with really loud vibrations as the washers rattle around and if you ruin the washers you won’t be able to shut if off again if you need to. Those are designed to be full on or full off. The quarter turns don’t have washers. They do, however, make pressure reducers that’ll do what you want.
Get a meter that you can hook up to a spigot and air for 50-60 psi.
I can’t really figure out how to take the valve/arm assembly apart. It looks like it all clips together rather than being screwed on. I’ll try and post a picture tonight.
Yeah, sorry, should have specified. I pulled the arm up myself and it had the same effect: reduced the flow slightly.
A gate valve is designed to be fully opened or fully closed. A globe valve is designed to throttle flow. A quarter turn ball valve would be a poor choice for throttling.
As others have already said, the ‘supply’ valve should be opened all the way. Opening it partially will only reduce the volume, not the pressure.
If you pulled the arm up all the way and it still ran, you’ll need to go ahead and replace the valve/float mechanism. They’re not very expensive and extremely simple to install, the only tools you should need are a pair of ‘Channel lock’ pliers.
The one I mentioned above was a Kohler from a plumbing supply house and did come apart. The package that the new washer came in had instructions on how to take the body apart.
Before we all jump into the car to buy toilet parts, the problem is probably a lot simpler, and free to fix.
The water main work is all but guaranteed to kick up some pipe scale, rust flecks, etc, and it doesn’t take much of this grit in the wrong spot to cause troubles. See steps 12-14 here…http://www.fluidmaster.com/product_docs/400a_installation_instructions_english.pdf and with any luck, doing this once or twice will clear out the junk.
Thanks to everyone who’s contributed. I’m not so much a shadetree mechanic as a doofus who can operate tools as long as they have no moving parts.
So I tried it, and it worked! Well, sort of. When I opened the supply tap all the way, the water shut off when the float went off (though curiously not when I lifted the arm myself). However, it made a sort of whooshing noise like you occasionally get when a tap is turned almost but not quite off. Which brings me to…
I think this might be it - the gunk kicked up is jamming the last few millimeters of valve travel. Thanks for that link! I will try it tonight.
