Wall tiling and wall hanging toilet

[wallhanger]

This is a tiling behind or around ? wall toilet question. My actual question is at the end below the dotted line. the stuff before the dotted line is my description of my situation.

A family member has a house built in the 50' s or 60's. I am involved after the plumber did initial surgery and now wants carpentry work.

The plumbing is cast iron. The master bathroom has a wall hung toilet. the toilet broke loose from the wall. The plumber opened the wall up. The opening is about 25" square. I am not at the house now, so I cant measure, but I think it is a 2 x 6 wall with 16" centers.

Studying the edge of the plumbers opening, except for the vertical section the plumber opened, the basic wall construction appears to be a layer of 1/2" sheetrock overlaid by a layer of 3/8" sheetrock and then tiled from floor to approximately 4' high.

The 25" opening is roughly centered on one pair of studs. Between the studs is the large vertical cast iron vent and waste pipe. In the area behind the toilet, the bottom layer was 1/2 plywood instead of sheet rock. As near as I can figure, he ran a strip of 1/2 plywood floor to ceiling over the vent pipe, came up to both sides with 1/2 sheet rock and then overlaid the whole thing with 3/8.

The plumber is now ready for a new surface over the opening. The surface is to come flush to the edges of the large toilet mounting plate. I have read about something called concrete backer board.

What it looks to me like I can do is finish removing all the exposed 1/2" plywood in the hole and then create two new pieces of plywood backing and fit them in place. Then I think I could overlay that with 1/4" backer board instead of 3/8" sheetrock.

That brings us to the tiling. (We can't match the original tile, we'll have to come up with something else. And I know absolutely nothing about tiling so this may get tricky.)

The plumber on site specifically said NOT to tile until after the toilet was set because we wanted to tile up to the toilet. When I called the plumbing company later for clarifications and instructions, the person to whom I spoke (I think the owner of the company) Said that was incorrect and we are to tile completely. And that also appears to mean putting tile over the metal mounting plate. They closed Fri evening for the weekend.

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So, when prepping for a wall hung toilet, do you tile before or after the toilet is hung on the wall. And can tile be glued to the large metal plates that hold up wall toilets?

 

[Terry]

These are standard measurements needed for a replacement wall hung toilet as done in the 60's.

The horn for the seal should be extending 5/8" from the flat washers that the bowl mounts against.

You may or may not have room to tile behind the bowl. It would be nice if you do as it makes a much nicer finished job.

Here is an installation with wall paper.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[wallhanger]

 

[wallhanger]

Thanks Terry,
Here is a picture of what I have to work with. The plumber (the employee working on site) said he wants a wall surface flush with the metal plate before he mounts the toilet. I haven't the strength or technical ability to cope with that toilet, so I just have to trust that part of things.

I think your one picture answers my tile question, if we want to put tile back up, we need to get tile up sorta close to the porcelain wall flange, but not under it. That is going to require running one or two bands of tile across the metal plate which will be behind the tank. And I'll have to see, I expect the metal flange to be slightly higher than the wall surface at the top.

There is a need for the toilet to be functional next weekend so we may wind up with a non-tiled fix that will not look as nice, just to get the plumbers scheduled back in time to get functional plumbing by Friday.

 

[Terry]

Normally with these, you have backing nuts with backing large washers that the bowl goes up against. In a perfect world, the bowl never really touches the wall and it's supported up against the washers.
Tile doesn't have to be in the middle there. You can cover that but it's covered by the bowl anyway. I would tile before the bowl is set on the wall carrier.

 

[wallhanger]

x (figured out how to use backing nuts. Thanks to above and below for comments.)

 

[Jadnashua]

The bracket MUST be well supported as the toilet with a person sitting on it is a huge lever with a lot of weight on it. You need to do whatever is required to make the bracket solid.

As Terry mentioned, the toilet itself doesn't need to actually touch the wall. YOu'd put a nut and washer on the stud, and the washer would provide the contact point with the back side of the toilet. Then, you use another washer and nut on the outside of the toilet to sandwich it up against the one inside. There are limits on the depth from the finished wall for the bracket so that the thing can be properly sealed for the waste. So, as long as the bolts and the waste connection are open, the rest can be tiled. You'd typically get the nuts adjusted so that the toilet would be close to the finished wall so it can be caulked to keep things clean and look good without putting any pressure on the finished surface at all.

 

[wallhanger]

x

 

[wallhanger]

I'll see what I can do. You cant see it well in the picture I posted above, but the bolts are anchored in cast iron flaps that are part of the overall grey cast iron fitting that has the toilet opening and the sink drains coming into it. The wood under the little bracket at the left next to the water line is rotted to the point that I don't think there is any support. For the last however many years, the main support for that bolt has been the rigidity of the cast iron forging. I think I can get fresh wood in between the brackets and the wall base to provide vertical support. I am not sure the wall base over by the water line is solid enough to screw anything into, so I doubt I can make those brackets provide any horizontal support for the wall. The plumber did not say anything about the brackets. I'll study on that some more today.

 

[wallhanger]

Still working. After reading and rereading the posts several times I think I finally understand about the backing nuts and washers. I've cleaned up the allthread for the plumber. The original installation appeared to have the toilet resting on the wall at the bottom. I've added backing nut and washer to the bottom bolt to get the effect you all have told me about. I counter sunk the washer in the wall to get vertical mounting with minimal shimming on the top bolts.

 

[wallhanger]

This is the result after the plumber left after the reinstall

 

[WJcandee]

An aesthetically-pleasing job! A little tile and you're all set!

And it sounds like you got the guts properly-secured before mounting the thing. Thanks for sharing the result!

 

[Reach4]

You might take some old tile to tile stores to see if you can get a good match.

 

[wallhanger]

(Terry, I asked for help and wanted to show what I did. If what I post below is overkill, let me know what I should delete and I will be glad to do it.)

The white items are homeowner expeditious choices to get Plumber back on Thur and toilet fully useable by today. I've gotten the rest of my pictures.

 

[wallhanger]

Problem, 50 year old American Standard toilet with homemade upper carrier has come loose in wall.

Plumber's initial examination:

You can see the homemade mounting plate on the floor. The upper right bracket is loose on the stud.

 

[wallhanger]

After the plumber's repair, the worksite looked like the first picture I posted.

Here is a closeup of the bracket repair:

 

[wallhanger]

Plumber left, asked for wall rebuild.

I removed all remaining plywood from the opening.

I cleaned up the lower allthread and got the threads unburred enough to get nuts all the way back.

(Later I also cleaned up the upper allthread for the plumber.)

 

[wallhanger]

1/2 " plywood sub layer.

 

[wallhanger]

Sheet rock. This was complicated. There are 4 pieces. The two left ones are 1/2" with a 1/2" edge at the left and a finish edge facing right next to a full thickness of 1/4". The long 1/4" piece at the right has a finish edge at the right next to the tile. This cut the sheetrock thickness down in stages trying to flow with a problem in the wall.

The bottom backer washers are flush with the sheetrock. I had to add the two washers on the top to give the plumber vertical to refit the toilet. (and I had to recut what was originally 1 piece of 1/2 in the lower left to into a 1/2 next to the tile and only a 1/4" around the bottom left bolt so I could get the left mounting vertical.)

 

[wallhanger]

And the rush pre-plumber tile job:

The picture a few posts above is what it looked like after the plumber left.