Forum menu
Looking at ripping out my bathroom over Xmas and just looking at combined toilet sink units. The prices seem to vary massively between companies. So if I buy one for 300 quid, will I be ripping it out again in 6 months time or has anyone had any good experiences and companies they can recommend
Few years back I did out my bathroom with a £300 B&Q one.
The taps looked cheap but were fine. The bath was solid, but I understand a lot of that is to do with how well it is installed.
The only thing that did happen was that the sheen came off the bath inside, I guess where it had been cleaned, but this was after 8 years of use.
combined toilet sink units
Is it on a plane? You are Quirrel and I claim my five pounds.
Edit: I assume you're talking about cabinets / furniture that will take a a concealed cistern back to wall WC and an inset sink.
If so, I fitted the cheap as chips white modular B&Q ones in my ensuite in 2005 and it still looks as good as new despite being the most used bathroom in the house.
We had a Victoria Plum Bathroom installed - went cheap on the furniture (Bath panel, cistern cupboard, vanity unit and wall mounted cupboard). BIG mistake, 6 months later the veneer was peeling off pretty much all the panels. Fully refunded for all the furniture, though.
Edit:
[url=
VICTORIAPLUM.COM one - avoid![/url]
Looks like theyve changed the name of it too - was called Drift Essen.
looking at combined toilet sink units
Well I suppose it ends the argument about pissing in the sink.
Some stuff can be ok, the main trade off is increased installation cost and faults, ie poor threads, warped or unlevel edges, short lived finishes.
our 12 year old B&Q bathroom suite is looking fine
quality costs..
looking at combined toilet sink units
I thought this was a typo. WTF! Why?
[img]
UKBATHROOMSTORE.CO.UK Few years back I did out my bathroom with a £300 B&Q one.The taps looked cheap but were fine. The bath was solid, but I understand a lot of that is to do with how well it is installed.
The only thing that did happen was that the sheen came off the bath inside, I guess where it had been cleaned, but this was after 8 years of use.
we did exactly this at about the same timescale. Bath, sink and bog with taps for about 250 i think it was. The bath mixer taps were a bit crap but replaced those last year. It's been great!
Bath solidity very much down to how it's installed wrt supporting frame.
I thought this was a typo. WTF! Why?
In some bathrooms, in fact a lot of downstairs loos, that would actually be ideal. Didn't know about those - on the radar now for the new house refurb 🙂
I mean a unit with the toilet and sink in. A vanity unit?
You get what you pay for. Personally I'd spend a bit more to get something a bit nicer looking. £300 will get you a basic suite and not much else.
Just double flush bog and plunge your hands in ?
No way would I buy the cheap junk B&Q etc turn out for £300 for a whole suite.
The quality is generally terrible. whites that are not white, rippled finishes on the porcelain and really thin flimsy panels.
I generally pick something from ideal standard or a similar company that i know I can still get parts for 5 years later.
I worked at B&Q and the amount of rubbish suites we sold only for the buyer to find out a year later that the flimsy bath panel has broken and is now discontinued. Same with the taps. You can rarely get the correct size internals to replace if one starts leaking.
I'm not saying you need to spend a fortune but I would say its a false economy going cheap. We used to sell loads to people who were trying to make a quick £££ buying, doing up then selling houses.
IMAGES.VICTORIANPLUMBING.CO.UK An ex had a really cheap bathroom suite, the toilet didn't really flush and the bath had cracks & holes in it (with weather proof tape over it to fix it...). Not sure how directly the result was related to the quality vs the installation but I'd avoid the really low end stuff personally.
I think that unless you budget is so tiny that the above figure is all you can afford then its better to buy a suite from a reputable manufacturer (such as Armitage Shanks/ Ideal Standard as [i]andysredmini[/i] put above. The extra cost is relatively small compared to the aggravation and pain when you find that there's no spares available a couple of years down the line and you have to rip stuff out and replace it.
[i]£300 will get you a basic suite and not much else.[/i]
Depends where you buy it from - Internet is full of stuff better quality than B&Q, but at cheaper prices.
considering the cost of a decent install is much more than the component prices then paying a bit more for quality units is well worth it. Replacing toilets and especially baths means a complete refurb of the bathroom. I wish I had bought a better quality bath for ours
You can pick up a decent toilet for £100.
Nothing fancy though, bog standard really.
I thought this was a typo. WTF! Why?
In some bathrooms, in fact a lot of downstairs loos, that would actually be ideal. Didn't know about those - on the radar now for the new house refurb
Yeah we looked at one of those when we did an understairs a few years ago but my wife vetoed the idea as being a bit naff. I thought it was a great way of space saving and water saving.
You can pick up a decent toilet for £100.
Nothing fancy though, bog standard really.
And with the money you save, you'll be feeling flush.
Well, there's some good advice in this thread which should give the OP something to go on.
And with the money you save, you'll be feeling flush.
Ooh, I'm fiddling with my Ballcock right now.
These puns are getting crapper.
Put a lid on it guys.
Give the OP a break - he's having a bit of a toilet-tissue.
I have installed a few VicPlumb/ internet bathrooms.
Utter shite.
I now refuse to go any where near a job that has bought from them now. One job took 7 wc pans before we could get one to flush enough water to take away loo roll, even then we were not happy with it and ended up changing it to a better quality roca wc, which worked perfectly. VP had the cheek to tell my customer to change plumber as they thought i was incompetent. Cost the customer over £300 in time + £170 for the roca wc as it was the only one i could find that was high enough to cover the precut hole in the wc unit.
It's all chinese rubbish and give a lot of bother. Wc's, basins, baths and shower trays lose their shine very quickly and look terrible after a year or so. Some of the glass in the shower enclosures stain and is impossible to remove. I could go on!
Save yourself and your installer some bother and avoid cheap stuff.
Definitely a false economy IMO.
Yes it is. We bought complete suite off internet £400, but its crap. My normal supplier said best he could do like for like was about £800, but they were all well known brands. My wife couldn't live with the cheap plastic taps, so spent same again just on new taps!! False economy going dirt cheap IMO.
Frontline/kvit etc sourced through builders merchants. Kvit brochure can be downloaded on line.
Don't believe the list prices. I get 40 percent off those.
[i]cheap plastic taps[/i]
😆 where did you find those!?
I bought taps off ebay and they were just as good, if not better than B&Q, at a fraction of the price. Shower unit too, top notch.
Didn't just buy the first and cheapest I found though..
Just don't let my wife choose the suite....
WE had a whole housre refurbed and extended, and the sums involved are so bonkers you lose 'sensible reference'...only in the cold light of day a few months later I started to begrudge the £800 we'd spend on the loo.
Just the loo.
It is lovely though...
DrP
I too am anaesthetised to top end Bathroom product prices, as the company I subcontract for regularly sells 15-20k bathroom jobs. I'm glad they don't tell me how much some of the stuff costs as I'd be afraid to take it from the box.
2 weeks ago we broke a curved piece of glass for a shower screen, it cost £2000 I later found out!
I wouldn't go for the cheapest cheap, there's an awful lot of crap out there that's not fit for purpose. 'brassware' is the big one, lots of chromed plastic taps available on line. Toilets can be mis-shaped (quite often) and the seats have plastic hinges.
I'd go to the local plumbers merchant and see what they have and recommend.
I would get a second hand small wash hand basin and WC. Something old. I am an architect and so apparently I am meant to know what I am talking about.
Had a house built 17 years ago with 3 bathrooms and went for a good suite in one of them, guess what? the Heritage toilet pan has a hairline crack that leaks, the other 2 are fine. After looking on the Heritage website they offer lifetime warranty so I gave it a try and have been told “ most problems occur in the first 6-12 months and are not interested”. I always believed pay cheap pay twice, but not so sure now.
FTFYI am an architect and so apparently I [s]am meant to know[/s] pick materials and colours [s]what I am[/s] and then pass to people who know what they're talking about.
Currently going through this, may share some words of wisdom when I feel chilled. 😐
Had one from bathstore.com 10+ years ago and the surface finish is still good
I had to invent a basin waste to P-trap pipe extension because of inaccessibility due to basin/pedestal design underneath, otherwise all good
Buy cheap buy twice is my experience. We fitted RAK toilets in our last house and the manufacturing tolerances were not tight enough and it was a real pain to get the link between the cistern and pan not to leak.
Cheap taps are next to impossible to get replacement cartridges for so end up replacing the whole tap (which may still be cheaper than a cartridge for an expensive one but labour will be higher).
All big manufacturer stuff for the new house. We buy from a small local bathroom supplier who gives bigger discount off RRP as standard than the chains do in their sales.
Spend a bit more on taps. Oh and use copper 'top hats' rather than the plastic ones (the nuts that fix the tap to the bath/basin).
I refurbished ours few years ago - we kept the units (20 years old) as they were decent, but my wife wanted the bath turning 180 degrees. New electric shower unit, new quality taps, new soft flush mechanism (existing handle converted to 'touch', and I replaced the toilet bowl as that had a small crack.
Main issues with bathrooms are cheap connectors/top hats. As others have said, take time fitting the bath and get it all levelled and properly sealed in before tiling (fill bath, then silicone seal the sides to the walls). We found our bath hadn't been fitted that well by the builders - 2 or 3 of the 5 adjustable legs weren't tight to the floor.