Toilet repair question

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BecP

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My toilet is refilling slowly and you have to hold the handle down to flush it. I thought I needed to replace the refill valve. Wile learning how to replace the refill valve, I discovered that if I turn the water valve off and on again, it will refill properly. But If I just flush, it will not. Any thoughts?

Thanks!
 

Terry

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There's a little more to it than that.
First you need water from the shutoff at the wall. You can test that by filling a bucket from the supply line.
You either have water, or you don't.
The fill valve needs to be adjusted to bring water up to a 1/2" of the overflow tube in most tanks.
Some use the rubber tubing to refill the bowl during refill. If the bowl does not start already filled with water, the first part of the flush needs to fill before any siphon can take place.
Make sure the bowl refills between flushing.
If you need to hold the handle down the entire time for a flush, you may have a replacement flapper that needed triming. A picture 800 pixels or less would let us see what vintage and parts you're working with.
 

BecP

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Thanks, Terry! I'm not fully understanding everything your'e saying, but perhaps these pictures will help. I put text with the image to show what's happening. Here is the first image, which shows the problem.
 

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BecP

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And here is an image showing what happens (if I turn the water valve off and on).
 

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Terry

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when_flushing.jpg


The chain is under the flapper.
The flapper needs to be pulled off and the center part that you have around the tube needs to be cut off so that the wings can pivot freely on the pins.
The fill valve is too low in the tank.
That fill valve came with a clip to hold the rubber above the overflow tube. If the tubing is too far down the overflow, it can siphon the tank. I would also think about replacing the trip lever.
 

Reach4

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If you need to hold the handle down the entire time for a flush, you may have a replacement flapper that needed trimming. A picture 800 pixels or less would let us see what vintage and parts you're working with.
The picture that got posted sure told the story. Make that stories!
 

WJcandee

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Just to add some detail. You probably know that the flapper is the pink thing. It's a Korky flapper. Korky has a set of instructions on how to install it and I suggest you review it and follow it.

http://www.korky.com/PDF/instructions/2000BP.pdf

What you will learn is that (1) you gave it way too much chain, so the chain is hooking under the flapper, preventing it from sealing, and preventing the tank from refilling; (2) When you installed the flapper, you bought a good universal Korky one. Flappers fit two types of flush valves (the flush valve being the thing the flapper sits on with the big vertical tube) those with the little wings/hooks on the side (usually plastic) and those without (usually metal). The universal one you bought works on both types, but has to be adjusted to work on one type or the other. If you had no wings on your flush valve, you would have hooked the circle ("collar") over the tube, as you have done, but there would be no hooks on which to attach the flapper. Because you have hooks/wings on your flush valve, you need to REMOVE the circle (collar) from the middle, as shown in the Korky instructions, and JUST hook the flapper to the hooks/wings. All it takes is a pair of scissors. Now the flapper will fit properly on your flush valve and will move up and down properly.

You should leave it, when it's resting, with a link (or two at the most), flopped on the top of the flapper. It needs a little bit of chain so you don't inadvertently keep it from making a seal. But no more than two links. That should also solve your "holding the handle down" problem. If it doesn't open itself and stay open with 2 links, then make it one, and that should fix it.

If you continue to have filling issues, you can replace that fill valve with a Korky 528MP (the one with a silver cap) Fill Valve, available at Lowe's and a lot of other stores. It should take 10 minutes, with minimal tools. It's a very easy DIY project. However, you probably don't need it; just fix how you have installed the flapper.
 

BecP

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Thanks so much to all of you! I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed but I'm going to look carefully at all of your notes. It may be a few days but I'll report back!
 
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