Shaggy dog rant: new parts into old systems!

[bungeejumper]

Excuse me while I .........aaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAArghhhhhhhh !!!!!!!!!!!

Oooh, that's better.

So the valve from the downstairs loo was leaking, just a drop or three per day, but enough to collectively create a bit of a dampish area which the memsahib thought was a bit unnecessary. So would I investigate? Indeed I would. After all,it was me that installed all our sanitary and washware, 25 years ago. And I of all people ought to know what I was doing. Bwahahahaaaaaaaaaaa.

So okay, it quickly turned out that the right-angled isolation valve thing that connects to the cistern had had its day. Because it was entirely made of white plastic, and the white plastic had degraded with age and stopped being watertight, and that's why I'm never going to buy another plastic pipe fitment, ever again. A metal replacement cost barely four quid, so job done.

Except that when I shut off the main household stopcock it filled my entire system with blackish crud that stopped the shower in its tracks and put me right off drinking tea as well. And then the toilet valve failed under the strain of the black pollution. This wasn't going well.

The ball valve in the cistern looked like the iceberg that sank the Titanic, it was that thick with limescale. Easy, I said, I'll just buy another bottom-feed ball-valve unit, and bob's your proverbial. Next lesson: It looks like they don't make ball valves any more. Just those vertically rising floats-on-a-stick that ships used to use for signalling to each other back in the age of steam. Still, it couldn't be that hard to replace t'one with t'other, could it?

Could it heck. The new valve (Flowmaster, brass shank, decent top-rated jobbie) had been specially designed to collide with the existing siphon valve, so that the rising float thingy would have no chance of signalling to the fleet commander that I was taking in water and in danger of drowning and/or sinking. And it also collided with the side-mounted flush handle thingy that isn't supposed to be there any more in this push-button-toilet age. So that was another two hours of sawing bits off the old gear, and eventually I had a working float.

And then the destructions said that I should hand-tighten the water connections and turn the water back on. There's a special place in hell for whoever wrote that, but I was fool enough to do it. Who'd have thought that water could knock the pictures off the wall? Still, we should have the bathroom dry again with a month or three, and nobody will ever notice the stains on the downstairs ceiling, honestly darling.

So here I am with an artfully bodged old system that now boasts the very latest in valve technology. Technology that assumes my toilet's ceramic casting has holes in places where it doesn't even have places. (All the holes on the 25 year old unit are "wrong" for the newbie fit.) But what the heck, it now fits, and it's watertight, and if it ever leaks again I'm gonna throw bricks at it until it dies. And then I'll fit a completely new bog in three hours flat. Which is what I should have done from the start.

Thanks for listening!

Older but wiser BJ

[kiloran]

Next lesson: It looks like they don't make ball valves any more. Just those vertically rising floats-on-a-stick that ships used to use for signalling to each other back in the age of steam. Still, it couldn't be that hard to replace t'one with t'other, could it?

Could it heck. The new valve (Flowmaster, brass shank, decent top-rated jobbie) had been specially designed to collide with the existing siphon valve, so that the rising float thingy would have no chance of signalling to the fleet commander that I was taking in water and in danger of drowning and/or sinking. And it also collided with the side-mounted flush handle thingy that isn't supposed to be there any more in this push-button-toilet age.

I also had a float valve leakage problem a month or two ago and bought the Flowmaster thingy with the brass shank and found the same problem with it being in too-close proximity to the other gubbins.

Couldn't see an easy solution so bought a bottom-entry ball valve jobbie from B&Q: https://www.diy.com/departments/flomast ... 330_BQ.prd
A plastic instead of brass shank which then created its own leakage problems and a bit of brain-ache (and neck-ache from leaning under the cistern) but I finally won. With much cursing.

--kiloran

[jfgw]

Those old brass BS1212 part 1 ball cocks that used plain, flat washers have not been legal for toilets for decades.

The traditional ball cock that uses diaphragm washers comes in brass (BS1212 part 2) and plastic (BS1212 part 3). Bottom entry part 2 valves do exist but you won't get one from any of the DIY sheds, https://www.plumbingworld.co.uk/brass-1 ... entry-6846 . The ones in toilets are almost always plastic. (You might find that a part 2 one is too long to fit whereas the part 3 ones often have adjustable length arms.)

If you fit a new fibre washer, do the nut up reasonably tightly to begin with. After the water has been turned on, the fibre washer gets wet and a bit more compressible. Don't worry about a small dribble, just nip it up a bit more once the washer is wet.

A modern (part 4) valve will fit a proper toilet (one with a syphon rather than one of those evil push-button abominations) as long as there is an inlet hole the opposite side to the handle. If there is only one inlet hole, this will be the same side as the handle, which is correct for a part 2 ball cock.

if it ever leaks again I'm gonna throw bricks at it until it dies. And then I'll fit a completely new bog in three hours flat. Which is what I should have done from the start.

Don't forget, this is the UK; we have left (or, in practice, are in the process of leaving) the EU and there should be no place in our homes for any type of toilet flushing mechanism other than the simple, reliable syphon which has served us for well over a century. Those push-button mechanisms are overcomplicated, far more likely to fail than a syphon and have been known to dribble hundreds of pounds' worth of water down the pan.

Julian F. G. W.

[Maroochydore]

Could it heck. The new valve (Flowmaster, brass shank, decent top-rated jobbie) had been specially designed to collide with the existing siphon valve, so that the rising float thingy would have no chance of signalling to the fleet commander that I was taking in water and in danger of drowning and/or sinking. And it also collided with the side-mounted flush handle thingy that isn't supposed to be there any more in this push-button-toilet age.

I also had a float valve leakage problem a month or two ago and bought the Flowmaster thingy with the brass shank and found the same problem with it being in too-close proximity to the other gubbins.
--kiloran

OK, at the risk of sounding smug, and this was my wife's suggestion, sometimes knowing nothing about a problem is helpful. She said "why don't you turn it around 90 degrees". No way, I said, but to stop the nagging I turned it around and lo, it no longer fouls the other bits.

Of course this all depends on the shape of the cistern but worked for ours (with a Flowmaster).

[TwmSionCati]

there should be no place in our homes for any type of toilet flushing mechanism other than the simple, reliable syphon

Hmmm! For the less hidebound I suggest the Improved Victory Flush Valve: “... no need for a cistern — it connects directly to your water tank (gravity fed). No complicated mechanism to go wrong, it only has one internal moving part, [and] can be on display or concealed behind a stud wall with only the lever or button showing”
[http://www.facebook.com/pg/The-Improved-Victory-Flush-Valve-1734737320152007/posts]

I installed two 40 years ago, and they’ve given no trouble, apart from renewing the seals 10 years ago.

TSC