Mansfeld awful

[Peterl]

I never knew that there are a lot of engineering involve in a toilet until this forum. Anyways when I bought my home 15 years ago I ask the seller to replace the toilet. She put 2 mansfield 160 in the 2 bathroom. This mansfield never work right since the beginning. I have used plungers on this all the time. If I don't want to use a plunger I used a half gallon bleach.

My question is one of the toilet is not flushing properly. The water goes down slowly . I have used plunger, bleach, poured a gallon of boiling hot water in it and still have problem. The mechanism looks okay. Can someone tell me whats wrong with it?

I have ordered 743 toto drake and its not coming until two weeks. Meanwhile we have guest coming this weekend.

 

[Jadnashua]

IF the water leaves the bowl slowly, it is likely one of two things are happening: there is a clog in the trapway (could be a pen, pencil, toothbrush, toy, etc.), or there's a partial clog in the drain. A toilet auger sometimes will help if it is a clogged trap. You may need a pro if it is a main line clog. ANohter possibility is if they used a wax ring with a plastic funnel in it rather than an all wax one...sometimes, if you don't get things aligned well, it can partially close up when you set the toilet and block things.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Basement_Lurker]

Mansfields are just cheapo builder products which will clog easily. I see that you are doing the smart thing and swapping one or both for a drake....you should see if u can qualify a water rebate in your area as those units you have are old 3.5Gal/13L models.

I always tell people to look at a drake or an aquia as a base model toilet that they should be looking at because for the little extra money, they won't have to deal with the nastiness of clogs...which people seem to forget about until it happens again, and because if they get a bad clog they will just end up paying a drain cleaner a nice chunk of change to auger the toilet....which could have just gone towards a nicer performing toilet in the first place!

I would just keep trying to plunge the toilet...there actually is a way to do it properly. But if you still can't get it to flush properly....you will have to call in a pro, or just wait until the new toilet arrives and remove the old one and flip it upside down to see if you can see if anything is stuck in the trapway.

 

[hj]

What in the world does BLEACH do to keep the toilet flushing. And pouring hot water into a toilet is a perfect, and a recommended, way to crack it. IF the toilet worked at one time and does not now, there is an adjustment problem, because toilets do not "wear out".

 

[Peterl]

What in the world does BLEACH do to keep the toilet flushing. And pouring hot water into a toilet is a perfect, and a recommended, way to crack it. IF the toilet worked at one time and does not now, there is an adjustment problem, because toilets do not "wear out".

Can you tell me what adjustment I need to do? Ever since we got that toilet it has always been a problem. I thought having problem is part of owning a toilet. Bleach I just read it somewhere. Hot water was recommended by a website.

 

[Jadnashua]

Two things to check regarding adjustments: take note of how high the water is in the bowl - take a bucket and slowly add water to ensure it is full; then, take note of where the water in the tank is, if it isn't at the 'full' mark, adjust the fill valve to make it to that level. Then, make sure you have the proper flapper valve - if it closes too early, it won't do its job. Few modern toilets empty the tank on a flush...they use that extra height to give it a more forcefull one. If a toilet's bowl doesn't start full, part of the water from the tank must fill it up, and it won't have the power to flush properly, thus, ensuring it is full after a refill is important.

If the toilet bowl doesn't start full, and the tank doesn't empty properly, and the toilet still doesn't flush well, it is either a clog somewhere or a lousy toilet.

 

[Peterl]

Regardless of the flapper closing early , shouldn't it go down if you pour a bucket of water in the bowl. I am not even seeing the water going down right when i piour a bucket of water in the bowl. Should I still check the flapper?

 

[Gary Swart]

There's a blockage either in the toilet trap or in the drain. The flapper has nothing to do with the toilet draining other than to release the water from the tank when you flush. Bleach is a disinfectant and not intended to be a drain cleaner. Chemical drain cleaners don't work either, so the immediate answer to the problem is to auger the toilet then get a plumber to auger the drain if that doesn't work. Even with a new Toto, the drain has to be clear. Never pour hot water into a toilet.

 

[Firemark]

...pouring hot water into a toilet is a perfect, and a recommended, way to crack it..

I never realized that, makes sense. I guess I owe former tenants an apology. I had to drain a water heater and did not have a long hose so I used a bucket, dumping the hot water in the toilet of a half-bath. A week or so later the toilet started leaking all over the place and I just assumed it was cracked by the size of my tenants.

 

[hj]

I once had to replace the toilet in a grocery store. They had managed to pour hot water into the toilet and it broke perfectly right at the water line. I was able to lift the top part with the tank off of it and then unfasten the remaining bottom from the floor. A variation of that is when hot water gets into the toilet tank and cracks it. Then the room gets flooded until the water is turned off.