Is there a "magic bullet" toilet that meets all of our needs?

[taylorshouse]

We are building a new home, and I am overwhelmed with all the choices. I'm secretly hoping someone can look at our needs and say "Of course! You need the ________."

Here are our considerations:

* We don't want anything loud. We stayed at a hotel once with a pressure-assisted toilet and by the end of the stay I was literally jumpy about flushing. I don't want to be startled awake by a loud toilet in the middle of the night, and I especially don't want to startle *myself* with a loud toilet in the middle of the night.

* Someone in the household has a bowel condition, which means there is, uh, spray. The toilet needs to wash the bowl well and be easy to clean, and the toilet itself needs to not have a lot of crevices (bonus points for easily removable seat). I saw a review of the Ultramax that made me worried about how well it washes itself and how easy it is to clean under the seat -- can anyone corroborate? We're also a little hesitant about the complicated inside surface in the bowl on the Toto dual cyclone models, even though that's meant to help it wash down.

* We would love to find a skirted toilet, to reduce the amount of dust and crud that collects on the trapways of typical toilets.

Does such a toilet exist that is reliable and not over, say, $500? Since we're building new, we don't have to worry about tight spaces or constrained rough-ins. (If we didn't have the cleaning thing to worry about I'm sure we'd have made our decision ages ago.)

I totally appreciate any insight anyone can give. Thanks!

 

[Gary Swart]

I would suggest you look at the skirted Toto toilets. These are the ones that use the Unifit adapter. Now, the adapter doesn't improve the flush or bowl cleaning, but these toilets do preform well. Noise wise, low flow toilets flush very quickly. They are not really noisy like the pressure assist toilets. Toto does not make a pressure assist. I would definitely get the optional Sanigloss finish as this helps with bowl wash. You do need to understand that low flow toilets regardless of manufacturer do not have the type of bowl wash of the old 3.5 gpf water hogs, but some do work better than others. There will likely be some of the more learned pros chip in on this with more first hand experience. This being a week-end, you might want to be patient until the first of the week.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Terry]

Sounds like a Vespin II

I sell a lot of the II series, Drake II, Ultramax II, Carlyle II
Double Cyclone with CEFIONTECT. If you need more rinse, there is always the handle that can be held down to drop more water.

 

[WJcandee]

Sounds like a Vespin II

I sell a lot of the II series, Drake II, Ultramax II, Carlyle II
Double Cyclone with CEFIONTECT. If you need more rinse, there is always the handle that can be held down to drop more water.

Also think about the Toto Aquia CST412MF. Washdown flush for really good bowl rinse. Dual flush. Quiet. Skirted. Often available, if you call around to 5 or more plumbing supply places with the exact model number and color, in cotton white, for under $400.

Here's a video of the flush (of the regular height rather than Universal Height, which this is):

 

[taylorshouse]

Thanks for the tips! I am seeing most of the Aquia's negative reviews mention "bowl residue", but none of the (relatively few) Vespin II negs are about bowl residue. I'll look at the Drake II reviews as well.

 

[WJcandee]

Me personally I wouldn't worry so much about the reviews citing "bowl residue" on the Aquia. You can see that flush is pretty comprehensive in terms of wash. Is it as good as the 5 gallon swimming pool in my 1950s toilets? No. But those toilets don't blast stuff off the surface either; they just swirl around slowly. So if "material" that is particularly-sticky gets on the bowl surface of even the old toilets, it might not come right off.

The II series toilets (Drake II, Vespin II, Ultramax II, Carlyle II, etc.) all come with CEFIONTECT finish standard in the bowl, and that helps some with the stickiest stuff.

Of course, at our house, for whatever reason about its occupants, there's no real issue with bowl wash on our two non-CEFIONTECT Original Drakes.

 

[hj]

quote; bonus points for easily removable seat)

You can get that buy buying a "snap off" seat, if one does not come with the toilet.

 

[WJcandee]

We have this seat, with easy-clean hinges. It also comes in plastic. We really like how easy it is to pull off to clean. Just takes a second.

http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3715697

 

[taylorshouse]

Thanks for the seat tip! Does that seat work with the skirted bowl design?

 

[Jadnashua]

In the box with the Toto skirted toilets come a pair of blind bolt assemblies (and the toilet seat itself comes with a set of 'standard' bolts). If you use the blind fasteners, you should be able to mount any toilet seat with them...just don't throw them away with the box! WOrst case, you can pick up some at a big box store.