In Perspective - Toilets

This week I had a request for information on toilets. These are fixtures that definitely do not get the respect that they deserve. They usually work, on demand, over years without any maintenance. Toilets have changed over the years but in most cases, unless there was renovation, the fixture still remains original.

Early toilets used somewhere between five and seven gallons of water per flush. With average use being about five to ten times a day, the amount of water use ran nearly 25 to 50 gallons. Toilets use about 30% of water use of each household. So as the population increased the amount of water needed increased. This puts a higher demands on water sources as well as waste water treatment. When looking at this individually the demand doesn’t seem like much but when you look at 300 million people over a year that amount of water used get enormous coming close to 3 trillion gallons a year literally flushed            down the toilet.

In the early 90's, the government stepped in and put some standards in place that reduced the flush from five gallons down to 1.6 gallons. Originally, this gave toilet manufacturers a problem but after a bit of engineering most of these problems have been overcome. Now residential toilets must pass a series of ASME/ANSI tests, including a test in which 100 3/4-in. dia. plastic balls are flushed and then a granule test in which 2,500 tiny plastic granules are flushed and finally a test in which ink lines are drawn inside the upper rim and flushed away referred to as a dye test and a drain-line transport test.

In your lifetime, you will likely flush the toilet nearly 140,000 times. If you replace these older, existing toilets with WaterSense labeled models, you can save 4,000 gallons per year and when you think of this nation-wide it will reduce our water consumption by almost 40%. To put this in perspective, a standard 12 ft Round above ground pool with a wall of 52 inches will hold about 3,398 gallons.

This would reduce the loads on water treatment plants as well as the demand on the water source which is paid for with tax money.

Another type of toilet that is peaking interest is the dual flush toilet. These toilets use 0.8 gal/flush for light flushing and 1.6 gal/flush. Because of creative necessity they have even come up with retrofit parts to make standard toilets dual flush.

Repairing a toilet can be done by a do-it-yourselfer, but can be complicated by corrosion of bolts and connections. There are hundreds of replacement parts available at your local retailer, but don’t get caught picking up the lowest priced replacement parts. Sometimes you get what you pay for and replacing parts once a year isn’t saving you money. Even replacing toilets with new models can be complicated. Old toilets may need an offset that will place the new model close to the wall instead of being an inch away from the wall.

Reviews

http://www.buzzillions.com/toilet-reviews

http://wetheadmedia.com/reviews/toilet-reviews/

High Efficiency toilets

http://www.epa.gov/watersense/pp/find_het.htm

Repairs

http://www.askthebuilder.com/B332_Toilet_Repair_Instructions_for_10_Common_Problems_.shtml

http://www.doityourself.com/scat/repairing

Dual Flush retrofit kits

http://www.dualflushtoilet.net/

http://www.ecoflushtoilet.com/ecoflush-retrofit-kit.html?_oskwdid=5548979