Leaking Toilet Drop Valve....

[GaryTheGolfer]

OK, on the heels of my first post and the helpful comments, I thought I would have another go....

A couple of years ago I refurbished a house I rent out. I put in two toilets with double push button flushing (Bowden cable flush rather than hydraulic type). The house is in a very hard water area.

You're ahead of me.....The drop valves both dribble. I suppose the good news is that the dribble just goes into the bowl. I changed the washer/valves and cleaned the (porcalein?) valve seats. The leak is much better now but it still dribbles very slowly.

The basic design seems very poor: The drop valve tube is very light (plastic) and doesn't seem inclined to fall vertically....so the valve doesn't seat perfectly. Putting on an engineering hat, I thought a little strip of lead around the neck of the drop valve tube would help. It did, I'm now down to a very small dribble.

But these should just work shouldn't they? If I had an (old) syphon system, there would be NO possibility of a leak would there?

Are there any tricks/tips to fix this annoyance (apart from changing the cistern)? I can't be the only person with this problem....am I? It feels like a dripping tap problem. I know I'm not paying (water-meter) bill but I am fed up with the hassle from tenants.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[REDSAW]

i hope no one is drinking from this as lead is banned you know?

for £40 why didnt you just get a proper plumber out?

no it wont happen with a syphonic flush!.

are you sure its not just the over-flo?.

where is it filling too?.

 

[Mushybees]

i hope no one is drinking from this as lead is banned you know?

From a toilet cistern

 

[mark6266]

NEW SYPHONE !! The rubber seal losses its elasticity , can extend the life a little bit buy removing scum from rubber seal and seating with white spirit , some say that you can remove the seal and turn around and refit ,not tried that myself though.

 

[REDSAW]

how far over your head did that go mushyb's?

 

[Mushybees]

how far over your head did that go mushyb's?

There have been some silly questions asked on this forum lately. Sorry pal, didn't mean to throw you in with them lol.

 

[GaryTheGolfer]

i hope no one is drinking from this as lead is banned you know?

for £40 why didnt you just get a proper plumber out?

no it wont happen with a syphonic flush!.

are you sure its not just the over-flo?.

where is it filling too?.

Well.......
The reason for not calling out a plumber was er........£40
The drop valve leaks all the way from empty (after a flush) to full: Its the valve that leaks not an overflow issue.

I was hoping for a solution....perhaps what a plumber would do....for £40 or so.

A competent DIYer should be able to solve this shouldn't they (assuming they know what the solution is)? After all I happily managed to fit ball valves to the cistern water supply pipe without any problem....specifically so that any maintenance problems could be made easier.

I did try cleaning the original valves. It only helped very marginally. I tried fitting new valves and things got better. But there is still a dribble. Is there a good solution to this?

These are Wirquin in case that makes a difference.

Thanks

 

[migoplumber]

its not a cure to the problem, but this might provide a solution.

put a weight on your drop valve, i used to use an piece of lead 1 1/2" about 2cm long from my scrap bin!

good luck
shaun

 

[johnmcginty]

I think I fixed one of these last week and just couldnt see how the original design could ever last that long as some of the bottom sections of these valves rely on a perfect fit with a really thin washer . My second best advice would be to take off the cistern and replace the drop valve with a brand new universal one. Make sure you know weather or not it is 1 1/2inch or 2 . A diy'er would be able to do this... especially if he was a plumber. My first best advice if you dont want to spend £ 40 is to phone up your local fasttrack plumbing course provider and pay a student a tenner to fix it ! Bear in mind he might not be insured rather like the diy'er.

 

[bcp]

These are Wirquin in case that makes a difference.

Thanks

I would respectfully suggest it's NOT wirquin or do I mean workin'