Bedding WC pans

[Bernie2]

I would like to ask what people use to bed their WC pans.

Both on wooden floors and on solid.

In the old days we used paint and putty for wood floors and lean mix sand and cement for solid.

This changed of course to bedding in Plumbers Mait or Silicone for wood.

And none setting mastic for solid.

Its the none setting mastic that I am interested in. I never really found one I felt satisified with.

Its a wonder really that somebody hasn't brought some thing out specifically for bedding WC pans or have they?

Lets know.

 

[migoplumber]

hi bernie, i havnt come across many pans at all that have been bedded down here.
no matter what the floor is made of, generally the pan is sat on it, screwed down and siliconed around at finish. i have only installed my own toilet here, and that was bedded down with cement on a slate floor.

shaun

 

[Bernie2]

Hi! Shaun,

Its funny that I have found the same, not many Plumbers seem to bed pans now days. It was drilled into us that it was highly necessary that they should be, to counter any floor shock between the china and the floor when somebody sat on it.

 

[Plouasne]

I haven't bedded down a 'pan in a long time, just assemble the pan and cistern, bolt the two together, grease the rubber for the pan piece, offer the complete pan & cistern to the pan piece, sit down in front of the pan and gently push the pan into position, then drill through the fixing hole either side, blow the dust out of the hole, then with the plastic "plug" on the end of the bolt push the plug down the hole, then do up the bolt, untill the "flats on the bolt are flush with the pan drop on the plastic washers, then bolt the cover/holding down nuts down firm, the cistern does not have any fixing holes and sometimes is not tight up to the wall

Click on to the link then click on to Kits et chevilles spécifiques (70) to see what I mean, listed as kits pour fixation W/C, and kits pour fixation lavabos

"+titre+"

 

[MarkB]

It all depends on how good the floor and the pan are. If they're a good fit then sometimes won't use any thing and as Plousane says, just use a fixing kit. It the floor or the pan are out then a bead of silicone under the base.

Mark

 

[badbob]

Getting a couple of WC's fitted should I ask them to do this? One on ceramic tiling, another on bamboo.

 

[Plouasne]

All the fixing's you might need, I can pass on some tips on how to fix to plasterboard walls, (single sheet or the egg box stuff), plaster block walls and the absolute pits hollow terra cotta block, and hollow concrete walls

[DLMURL="http://www.castorama.fr/store/materiel-de-fixation-sanitaire-PLcategorie_sdb15.htm"]Fixation sanitaire - Castorama[/DLMURL]

 

[Bernie2]

Hi All

Ideal Standard a WC pan maker, says point the bottom with Silicon. Its just that in the old days it was a big no! no! to put a pan in dry like many people seem to do today.

The pans have not altered nor have the floors. So what has changed so that bedding is no longer needed?

As somebody said about level floors. How do you know the pan bottom is level and its not leaving gaps under part of the bottom rim? At least a bed may help make up for any variances.

The other point is china shock. If you put a pan on a tiled floor and then sit on it the weight exerted around the rim can be quite great.
So you have a china to ceramic interface with nothing to cushion the impact of the pan on the floor.

You can often hear them grinding together if you fit them dry.

Can you imagine what happens if the pan rim isn't supported all round the edge?

 

[badbob]

hmm ok will leave a note for plumber to apply silicon on the bottom, hope he does so. I just wonder if he'll not bother read the note and just do WC to tiling with no silicon.

 

[Plouasne]

Its easier for you lot over there to put the pan in, in ways, but when you have the pan and cistern put together out of place, it gets a bit "meaty" to lift into place

 

[Puddle]

Well seems I belong with the dinosaurs I am afraid, I always bed mine down on cement mix with maybe ¼ quick set if needed, (we could not use all quick set as the heat generated when setting has been known to split the pan) I have been known to drill and screw to the floor also, would not like to just screw to floor
The main reason for this is, if I may refer to what Bernie said

‘The other point is china shock. If you put a pan on a tiled floor and then sit on it the weight exerted around the rim can be quite great.
So you have china to ceramic interface with nothing to cushion the impact of the pan on the floor.’

And if you add to the above with the pan being a bit loose, you are heading for trouble

In fairness I do not put a lot of pans in now. But in the past have see and replaced a lot of pans sat on concrete floors that have cracked up from the screw hole upwards and cracked into water trap causing leak, only the other week there was a thread about pans leaking maybe this is why
Also would say if you were sat on a pan and it split, would have thought damage to yourself would not be nice, I have a 50mm scar on my arm were I caught it on a broken basin once ,years ago, as you know ,like razors
You can not bed a pan on silicon as once the weight of the pan on top you end up with about ½ mm under pan rim all you are doing there is trying to seal inside of pan to stop capillary action pulling wee ect in and causing smells and dare I say it health and safety issues
I Guess this not bedding pans down came from sites trying to get everything dry fix to speed up completion, would be happier if they designed a plastic cradle that could be screwed to floor (say the thickness of a horse shoe) with clips to fit pan to cradle, thus pan sitting on plastic to cushion
What do people now use to joint two part pan together or is that still cement mix
Mean while I will carry on being a dinosaur, I feel safer with the job I leave behind

 

[Plouasne]

Don't you in the UK use a nylon protective sleeve, between BOLT not screw, and pan what I can describe as looking like a BSS ball valve seating, this is standard in France, and they can be either a double threaded bolt with a cap nut or a bolt with a snap on cover, what ever type they are in stainless steel, and hold the pan down a treat

 

[Puddle]

Yes we do. I am not talking directly about the stress between the pan and screw/BOLT, I am talking about ceramic pan against concrete, just as you would protect pan from fixing, you should protect pan from concrete and I do not think mastic or silicon can do that, especially long term and one of the stress points will become the fixing point as a result

 

[leadpig]

Yes we do. I am not talking directly about the stress between the pan and screw/BOLT, I am talking about ceramic pan against concrete, just as you would protect pan from fixing, you should protect pan from concrete and I do not think mastic or silicon can do that, especially long term and one of the stress points will become the fixing point as a result

in 17 years I've cemented pans down once and that was because that was on the specs (gov job 14 years ago),nobody i know does it any more for domestic work.bedded on mastic and screwed/bolted down is the norm

 

[Plouasne]

To be honest I have not for a long time come across a pan that has not been flat at the base, so unless the floor is out and there are high spots in the floor in contact with the pan base, I cannot see any reason for any bedding of the pan, perhaps a fine fillet of silicon around the base of the pan to stop any moisture ingress, that is all, but with around 20 to 25 mm edge of pan base flat in contact with the tiles there should be no problem

 

[NickH]

Seems like a lot of worry over nothing, the pan manufacturers dont seem to advise that their pans should be bedded on anything. I've always fitted them "dry", occasionally with a bead of silicon around the base, and i've NEVER had a problem so I wont be changing my ways now.

 

[Puddle]

Can see what you all are saying,thats why I am saying I am a dinosaur,maybe with good quality pan,25mm thickness,nice level floor,I could put a bead of silicon down and fix,which is another point ,since all manufactorers are saying just bolt down,has the bottom of the pan surface area been increased
have seen the cheaper low level pans with about 5 mm bottoms,is this still the case,not all pans are good quality porcelain at £80 a complete c/c w/c,if so,I am back to may sand and cement,sorry

ps 17 years takes me back to 92,many plumbers still cemented pans in then,did'nt they, are am I really becoming an old dinosaur

 

[Plouasne]

Go back to '59, it depended on what type of pan it was if fire-clay, it was just a thin bed around the edge of the pan if earthen ware, or vitreous it was the full works, fill the base of the pan with compo and plonk it down, slab urinals and shower trays were grouted in solid, 1 shower tray I did took half a hundred weight of cement to grout it in

 

[stevetheplumber]

i normally just screw down most pans now the big differences are
1 most pans are close coupled or back to wall so supported and more mass to hold them still
2 panconecctor are now flexible so no stress on the pan even if it does move slightly

funnily enough i did some work in a goverment office last year and we were instructed to bed the back to wall pans and sillicon the backs to the panels
the disabled toilets on this job were wall hung monsters must have been nearly three foot projection from wall amazing that the ceramics are enough to take the wieght

 

[david williams]

what wwp does not have fixing holes

 

[stevetheplumber]

what wwp does not have fixing holes

wwp i havent heard that term for some years
quite a lot of new cysten dont have fixing holes i just put ywo small dabs of silicon on the top edge so it can be cut to remove at later date
i love the fisher type pan fixings which screw in horizontally

 

[Alanka]

I usually fit the pan 'dry', using levelling wedges (plastic) only if the floor is way out (very rare). After screw-down I then follow this up with clear or white silicone sealant all round the pan foot, injected well into the gaps between pan foot and floor. I then finish off with either a moist finger, or a special rubber tool to give a good finish and force the silicone into the gaps.

After this treatment - and 24 hours to let the silicone sealant cure thoroughly - the pan is well bedded with no grinding or rocking at all, and there is a layer of silicone between floor and pan foot virtually all the way round (because the foot actually touches the floor at only a few points).

I've done many wc pans this way and have had no trouble.

 

[badbob]

You probably have to be really, really REALLY drunk.

 

[dave1]

hi alanka, do you mean you dont screw the pans down just silicone? i go to so many jobs where plumbers have done this or used short screws or steel screws which rust.

 

[Puddle]

Filling gaps with silicon,injecting,little plastic wedges,steel screws,weak screeds,think I may be going and getting my bag of cement back out the skip
All this cuffuffle for the sake of a bit of mixy.mixy bloby,bloby,bedy,bedy and away we gowy