TOTO drake waterhammer

[mildad]

I recently replaced an old, clog prone toilet with Toto Drake. It works very well, never clogged since installed about 3 months ago. With Toto installation and new problem developed. When the tank fill valve shuts off after filling the tank, there is a loud waterhammer noise in the pipes. This was not an issue with the old toilet. Closing the fill pipe shutoff valve slightly decreases (but does not eliminate) the waterhammer and makes the tank filling noisier. I installed Sioux Chief mini-restor ballcock and it made things better, but waterhammer noise is still there. Would a second mini-resor( 2 in a series) help? Any other advice? Thanks you.

 

[Terry]

I like to see the shutoff open all the way at the wall.
Sometimes the wall shutoff has a bad washer in it that flutters.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[mildad]

The shutoff valve was not altered when the new toilet was installed, yet the waterhammer problem developed. It was not an issue with the old toilet. The shutoff valve is acutally not at the toilet but a few feet away in side the wall in a panel. Is there a way to adjust the fill valve in the toilet to make it close slower? Would a second Sioux-Chief make a difference?

 

[Peanut9199]

You cannot adjust the refill volume of the fill valve.
Toto's fill valves at designed to have a large volume flow allowing a faster refill but when they shutoff that is when the banging happens, the same is found with quarter turn faucets now a days.

Depending where your pipes are rattling (whole house) you may need to install a water hammer arrestor that will do the whole house usually installed at the cold water feed.

I had one customer whose plumber secured the pipes that were banging (just lucky they could get at them).
Not sure how long that would last though.

 

[Henry Rollins]

It's the refill valve. I had the exact same problem immediately after installing a new Toto Drake 1.6 GPF that came from the factory with the refill valve installed. Here's the bastard that it came with:

I bought a Fluidmaster 400ARHR and installed a Sioux Chief 660-TK for good measure. Problem solved. I think the arrestor was unnecessary though, as the Fluidmaster shuts of slowly and gently. The cretin pictured above slammed shut like a jackhammer.

 

[WJcandee]

Couple of things.

First, like Terry says, make sure the wall valve is full open, regardless of whether it's there on the wall or two blocks away. I understand that the old toilet didn't have this problem, but Terry is telling you that with a MODERN toilet, which likely has a different style fill valve than your old one, leave the valve open because the NEW fill valve may need that more than the old one did. Copy?

Second, Toto has a fill valve that it sometimes uses, which is similar to the one in Mr. Rollins's post, that shuts off pretty quickly. In most people's homes, no problem. In others, you can get a little water hammer. I'm not a fan of that Fluidmaster adjustable-refill valve, because I don't like the style and lower-adjustability of the refill adjuster, among other things, but I am a fan of the Korky MaxPerformance 528MP valve with the silver cap (or the Korky PRO adjustable valve, or the Korky-made Toto TSU99A.X), all of which are essentially the same valve with different-color caps and some different accessories. Getting the 528MP at Home Depot or similar is probably the most cost-effective fix. http://www.homedepot.com/p/Korky-Qu...MERCH=REC-_-nosearch2_rr-_-NA-_-203145423-_-N It should solve your water hammer.

If your Drake came with a valve that looks like the 528MP, then getting a new one won't help, however, so don't.

 

[Henry Rollins]

I haven't tried a Korky, so I can't comment on that. It may fix the problem as well, but they appear to be the same design as the problematic one I posted above, which is why I chose another. The Fluidmasters use a different mechanism, and shut off smoothly. I'm not sure what "lower-adjustability of the refill adjuster" is referring to. What I can tell you is that my Fluidmaster solved the problem. Also, this wasn't just a "little" water hammer. This went from nothing with my old John to sledgehammer-on-your-pipes. I did discover, through trial and error, that my house is not equipped with air chambers. This may affect your purchasing decision. I'm sure Korky makes a good product. What I'm saying is that I fixed this specific issue with a FluidmasterARHR with a Toto Drake 1.6 and a Sioux Chief arrestor. *shrug*

 

[Jadnashua]

Fill valves on any modern toilet needs to have the proper balance of bowl to tank refill, or you can either end up with poor performance or end up using sometimes LOTS more water in the flush than by design and code. Older designs tended to overfill the bowl, which other than wasting water, posed no functional problems since it just goes down the drain. On the other hand, filling the tank, but not the bowl, will usually result in a poor flush. The goal today is to be more efficient, and it is mandated by code. Not all valves can be adjusted on every toilet to make the tank and bowl end up filling full at exactly the same time.

 

[Henry Rollins]

The one I installed has an adjustable flow valve. By that I mean, there's an adjustable rolling clamp on the tube that feeds the bowl that allows you to ratchet down the flow from your supply. It allows you to regulate the amount of water fed to the bowl so that it doesn't get over-filled.

 

[Wallijonn]

It works very well, never clogged since installed about 3 months ago. With Toto installation and new problem developed. When the tank fill valve shuts off after filling the tank, there is a loud waterhammer noise in the pipes.

Did the water hammering start three months after the Drake was installed or did it start immediately after installation? If it was after 3 months then you may want to take apart the top of the Korky fill valve and look at the screen. is it clogged with mineral deposits, sand or gravel?

The next thing to do is to find what your water pressure is by using a water pressure valve.

http://home.howstuffworks.com/home-improvement/plumbing/how-to-fix-pipes5.htm
http://plumbing.about.com/od/basics/a/Test-Water-Pressure.htm

 

[Wallijonn]

I think the arrestor was unnecessary though, as the Fluidmaster shuts of slowly and gently. The cretin pictured above slammed shut like a jackhammer.

Did you try the Sioux Chief water hammer arrestor with the Korky, first?

 

[Duder]

This is an old thread - but I found it from a Google search. What a great resource this site is.

I just installed a Drake II and I had the same issue described by Henry Rollins in 2015 (same Toto fill valve) - very loud water hammer when fill valve shut off. I read this thread and then called Toto, they said my house water pressure was "too high" , but they could send me a new fill valve if I wanted. I asked if they see this issue very often and they said no. I think they were full of crap based on this thread alone (others are on the internet). I said "no thanks" on the replacement fill valve.

The original toilet did not produce a water hammer so i was very skeptical of the house water pressure claim made by Toto. Still, I checked it out - my house water pressure is a very stable 60 psi so no issue there. So I followed Henry's advice and installed a FluidMaster ARHR from Home Depot - no arrestor in place. Water hammer issue *immediately* solved.

Making Toto buyers aware - for some reason - in the year 2020 - they continue to provide a fill valve that is too strong for some plumbing systems. If your toilet has even a small potential to destroy your plumbing system and flood your home, I would characterize that as a "major malfunction" of the toilet, not an issue in the plumbing system or house water pressure.

I'd suggest that Toto buyers make sure they check out which fill valve comes with their Toto toilet, the Korky option they provide is better than the absolute piece of garbage that Henry highlighted in the photo above. I have one other Toto in the house and it came with the Korky, something that looks like the MP528 - never had an issue with it. A water hammer is an absolutely unacceptable situation for any new fixture installation, I absolutely put the blame on the manufacturer for this. They should know better by now. Otherwise, I love Toto toilets...never had one clog

 

[Jadnashua]

Toto sources products from many of their world-wide factories depending on demand and where in the country you are, and thus, the supplied fill valve tends to be a locally supplied one. This means that on the same model, depending on where it came from, may have different fill valves in them. Those made in the USA tend to have valves made for them by Korky, which normally does not have the issue about turning off rapidly and causing a water hammer. Some valves can close quite abruptly, and having high water pressure just means that the water is traveling faster. Just like hitting a tree with your car, the faster you go, the more force is created, and the ability to move the pipe from the inertia that makes the water hammer.

The Korky supplied valve has a user replaceable seal. How long that seal lasts will depend on your water chemistry. Some people may find it lasts many years. With the water I have, they seem to last maybe 3-4 years. It only takes a couple of minutes to replace it and does not require any tools. I tend to keep one on hand so if I notice the valve running and overflowing the tank, I can replace it. From my experience, one clue the thing is wearing out is that there's a delay after flushing before it starts to refill. The rubber seal is getting stiffer, and will eventually crack and leak is my guess as to what's happening then. The replacement seal is in the $3 range.

 

[Jim Hoagland]

Thank you @Duder for your recent post, and previous posts by @Henry Rollins and @Terry; these helped us figure out a problem we were having. We were about to call a plumber out, which was especially unappealing due to the pandemic. Posting this to potentially help others that may come across this discussion later.

Short version: we were getting water hammers sometimes with our Toto Drake II from 2019. Solved by fully opening water intake valve.

Longer version:
We remodeled our upstairs hallway bathroom in 2019 (finished around August 2019) and selected a Toto Drake II as our new toilet. Contractor and their plumber subcontractor installed it and there was no problems for 11 months. Then only July 4, 2020 in the evening, we had our first water hammer event. Scared the dickens out of some of us; we had never even heard of a water hammer. For this first one, we had flushed 3-4 times without waiting for the tank to finish filling, which is something we rarely do. After that, we would sometimes have water hammer instances even with a single simple flush. This mostly happened after 10pm at night or later, not during the day. (Maybe the city's water pressure is higher at that time due to fewer water users - not sure.)

Coming across this discussion, we checked what kind of fill valve we had in our toilet. It was the same green one as @Henry Rollins posted a picture of in 2015 -- the one people here are saying shuts off too soon. We also have the same one for our new Toto Drake II for our downstairs bathroom; that one was installed this summer and never had a water hammer.

The water hammers have gone away now for two weeks, so I'm tentatively declaring the problem solved. Up until the night I solved it, I had assumed that the water intake valve was fully open -- that the plumber would have put it in that state after completing the toilet install. However, by accident I discovered that that was not the case; it has been only halfway open (halfway through the full range of rotation). After opening it fully we have had no water hammering.
The tank refilling sound is notably different now too.

I still don't fully understand the mechanics of what was happening or why it happened with one flush but not another (and some of it it seems counter-intuitive), but I'm getting the idea was that the fill valve was sometimes needing water to come in at a faster rate that it actually was, with the half open water intake valve. When it didn't get that, this undesirable circumstance arises.

Main takeaway: if you are having water hammers happen, check your water intake valve on the wall to make sure it is fully open (fully rotated counterclockwise).

-- Jim

 

[Katie in Los Angeles]

I haven't tried a Korky, so I can't comment on that. It may fix the problem as well, but they appear to be the same design as the problematic one I posted above, which is why I chose another. The Fluidmasters use a different mechanism, and shut off smoothly. I'm not sure what "lower-adjustability of the refill adjuster" is referring to. What I can tell you is that my Fluidmaster solved the problem. Also, this wasn't just a "little" water hammer. This went from nothing with my old John to sledgehammer-on-your-pipes. I did discover, through trial and error, that my house is not equipped with air chambers. This may affect your purchasing decision. I'm sure Korky makes a good product. What I'm saying is that I fixed this specific issue with a FluidmasterARHR with a Toto Drake 1.6 and a Sioux Chief arrestor. *shrug*

Henry - I can't thank you enough for this post! Late last year (2021) I had installed a new TOTO Eco Max and since I live in California (sadly) we can only purchase VERY low flow toilets 1.28 gpf. From day one I had a pipe bang just as the refill was shutting off. As the toilet is upstairs, the pipe bang could only be heard downstairs in the wall directly beneath the master bath. My old water-guzzler was 30 years old and I never had a moment's problem. And now it seemed like the cold water pipe was getting hit with a hammer with each flush. Long story short, I went to Home Depot and purchased a FluidMaster CARHR. (In the People's Republic we have to also install a back flow preventer...which FluidMaster builds into the ARHR model and then adds the "C" in front.) It cured the problem immediately and fully. A million thank-yous.

 

[Blimpu]

t's the refill valve. I had the exact same problem immediately after installing a new Toto Drake 1.6 GPF that came from the factory with the refill valve installed. Here's the bastard that it came with:

View attachment 63883 I

I bought a Fluidmaster 400ARHR and installed a Sioux Chief 660-TK for good measure. Problem solved. I think the arrestor was unnecessary though, as the Fluidmaster shuts of slowly and gently. The cretin pictured above slammed shut like a jackha

Henry - I can't thank you enough for this post! Late last year (2021) I had installed a new TOTO Eco Max and since I live in California (sadly) we can only purchase VERY low flow toilets 1.28 gpf. From day one I had a pipe bang just as the refill was shutting off. As the toilet is upstairs, the pipe bang could only be heard downstairs in the wall directly beneath the master bath. My old water-guzzler was 30 years old and I never had a moment's problem. And now it seemed like the cold water pipe was getting hit with a hammer with each flush. Long story short, I went to Home Depot and purchased a FluidMaster CARHR. (In the People's Republic we have to also install a back flow preventer...which FluidMaster builds into the ARHR model and then adds the "C" in front.)

Henry - I can't thank you enough for this post! Late last year (2021) I had installed a new TOTO Eco Max and since I live in California (sadly) we can only purchase VERY low flow toilets 1.28 gpf. From day one I had a pipe bang just as the refill was shutting off. As the toilet is upstairs, the pipe bang could only be heard downstairs in the wall directly beneath the master bath. My old water-guzzler was 30 years old and I never had a moment's problem. And now it seemed like the cold water pipe was getting hit with a hammer with each flush. Long story short, I went to Home Depot and purchased a FluidMaster CARHR. (In the People's Republic we have to also install a back flow preventer...which FluidMaster builds into the ARHR model and then adds the "C" in front.) It cured the problem immediately and fully. A million thank-yous.

June 2022 here, newly installed Drake II with a hammer at the fill shutoff. Also fixed completely and easily by replacing the green monster Henry Rollins showed with a new Korky fill valve. Shame that Toto ships so many of these high end toilets with valves that hammer for so many of us. Just put the Korkys in there or update these old problematic ones. Either way, she’s all happy know!

 

[Jadnashua]

Suggest that you check your water pressure. Code in the USA says that the pressure should be NGT 80-psi.

Some toilet fill valves shut water off more abruptly than others. Toto makes many of their toilets sold in the USA in Georgia, and for those, they source the fill valve from a US supplier (generally Korky), but since they have factories all over the world, if the tank was imported, it will have a fill valve from other places as Korky is not generally available world-wide. Many places don't have a high water pressure issue like some in the US might especially if it's hilly around where they live. To get the water so it will go over a hill, the pressure needs to be higher, and when it falls back down, the pressure rises at about 0.43#/foot of elevation drop, so sitting at the bottom of a hill is like having a water tower sitting above you. And, if you're at the base of a hill the water is trying to get over, they will have raised the pressure to overcome the drop as it rises so those on top will have decent pressure, too.

Sometimes, the hammer is because of lack of anchoring the pipes in the wall properly. FWIW, I find that the Fluidmaster toilet valves shut off fairly quickly, too, and can cause the same problems for some. Water hammer is caused by the moving water being stopped quickly like running into a wall...the faster it flows, the more of a hammer it causes when you stop it, sort of like walking into a wall versus running into one.

 

[BklynProf]

We have an old model Toto, installed so long ago (roughly 15 years ago) that I'm not sure what model it is. Recently, whenever it is flushed we experience waterhammer. We can lessen the noise by opening an adjacent faucet, but it kind of undoes the advantage of a low flow toilet. I called Toto support and was told that the model we have is probably ST412M (the lettering on the inside of the tank has disappeared) and that we can perhaps fix the problem with a replacement Toto fill valve, TSU99AX. When I clicked on a link in a previous post it took me to a Korky replacement that is much less expensive, the QuietFill Platinum Fill Valve. Will that one only work with a newer toilet? If I search on Amazon I see the Toto one and an identical Korky, 528GT, for pretty much the same price. One reviewer noted that another model, 528T, would work just as well and is significantly cheaper. Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. We live in a row house and our next door neighbors just had a baby so we really want to solve this issue so that we don't wake up the baby or her sleep-deprived parents

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[Reach4]

We have an old model Toto, installed so long ago (roughly 15 years ago) that I'm not sure what model it is. Recently, whenever it is flushed we experience waterhammer. We can lessen the noise by opening an adjacent faucet, but it kind of undoes the advantage of a low flow toilet. I called Toto support and was told that the model we have is probably ST412M (the lettering on the inside of the tank has disappeared) and that we can perhaps fix the problem with a replacement Toto fill valve, TSU99AX. When I clicked on a link in a previous post it took me to a Korky replacement that is much less expensive, the QuietFill Platinum Fill Valve. Will that one only work with a newer toilet? If I search on Amazon I see the Toto one and an identical Korky, 528GT, for pretty much the same price. One reviewer noted that another model, 528T, would work just as well and is significantly cheaper. Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. We live in a row house and our next door neighbors just had a baby so we really want to solve this issue so that we don't wake up the baby or her sleep-deprived parents

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1. Partially closing the stop valve at the wall will reduce water hammer

2. They make water hammer arrestors that go between the stop valve and the flex supply line. https://www.supplyhouse.com/Oatey-3...Female-Compression-Copper-Tee-Hammer-Arrestor
https://www.supplyhouse.com/Sioux-C...on-x-3-8-O-D-Female-Compression-Tee-Lead-Free
https://www.menards.com/main/plumbi...-arrester/660-gtr1/p-1444442678868-c-8565.htm are 3/8 compression type (male+female), which is a common output for toilet stop valves.

3. There are different opinions on whether the Korky 528 QuietFill fill valve will be quieter.

 

[Terry]

The Korky fill valves with the blue and the gray caps will work for the Aquia toilet.