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I can’t believe I’m posting about this!
We are refurbishing the bathroom.
How much should you spend to get a decent toilet with good flush mechanism or whatever else?
They range from £150 to £500.
Or can anyone recommend a decent brand that you can’t go wrong with?
I fitted one of these over a year ago, it's been faultless so far.
https://www.screwfix.com/p/ideal-standard-della-close-coupled-toilet-dual-flush-6ltr/6779j
A shit load, obviously.
How long do you intend to spend sitting on it? (Genuine question as unless you are very old, you take a phone with you if not a magazine or book!)
Get a something with a comfy seat that fits. Plenty seem to be either too narrow or too wide, so sit on a few and see what feels comfy.
Depending on how you pay your water rates, do you want one with a quick flush as well as full flush? I suspect these things add to the overall price, but may provide useful in the long run.
Same with soft-return lids...
flush mechanisms are controlled by the inside bit and standard / replaceable. Only choice really is whether to go for handle or push button. You can upgrade your flush when you like (you can put XTR on a pub bike if you want)
We went mid range from Bathstore, modern looking, close coupled, posh enough to look nice but not so expensive that i feel guilty for leaving skids down the back wall.
A penny.
We just spent £500 on one but that is because my wife liked the particular style (Roper Rhodes). Not sure it is any better than cheaper ones I have had in the past (it just looks nicer!)
I spent 300, It is one of the cheapest i think
+1 for midrange from Bathstore.
A penny.
Beaten to it.
True if slightly unpalatable fact.
Not all toilets are the same shape - on the posh one in the nice bathroom suite upstairs, mentioned above, it I sit normally then the cargo always bounces off the back wall like a base jumper caught by a sidedraft. To effect a clean entry I have to shuffle to the front of the seat like a XC jeyboy climbing a loose gravelly fireroad.
In the 1970's avocado still not got round to changing it after 16 years in the house practically an outside lavvy still facility, it's neptune's kiss territory without fail.
I am consequently banned from shitting in my own toilet and have to use the downstairs one. AKA the Poo Loo
I'm saying this because you don't want to find you've bought a shape that is incompatible with your chute / cheek geometry. How you check this in the shop....Jackass covered it, but it's not recommended.
Worth consulting your plumber as well, unless you're doing it yourself, some of the close coupled (eg flush to the floor/wall) ones may not work with your soil pipe.
Exciting stuff, but I found out the difficult way.
Ours is a basic Armitage Shanks one, from Bathstore I think - £200-£300 I'd guess.
Depending on how you pay your water rates, do you want one with a quick flush as well as full flush? I suspect these things add to the overall price, but may provide useful in the long run.
Isn't that mandatory now? They never last, the quick flush mechanism died after a few months, luckily the main flush still works. Same with all our office loos, the quick flush buttons no longer work...
When we did our bathroom last year we found getting a toilet the hardest bit.
For starters we could not find one that looked normal and then when you sit on them they are not right. They seem to have prioritized style over function.
We ended up with a Roca Laura, looks like a toilet should and works.
Get dual flush and soft close, just makes it better.
When we had our bathroom done recently the guy who fitted it said it was basically all about how they looked. The flushing mechanisms are pretty similar now, you'll do well to find one without 2 flushing modes, so don't sweat on that.
You just want a comfy seat (he genuinely said to try and sit on a few in the bathroom shop), with soft close, that is rimless (much easier to clean).
I would say the amount you spend should be dictated to you by several things:
– Is it the main house bathroom or an en-suite?
– What is the standard of furnishing across the rest of the house?
– What is the value of the house?
For example, spending £1,000 on a branded toilet to go in the downstairs bog of a £60k terrace in Sunderland would be crazy. Equally crazy would be putting a £100 loo in the master bedroom en-suite of an 8-bed house in Wilmslow.
We went for comfort height, basically a few inches higher than normal. Turns out they are not comfortable at all. Don’t do that, get standard height. They are standard for a reason
Apparently higher ones feel better to sit on in the showroom but, due to the human geometry and plumbing, you can expect more cleaning on the back wall.
Unless you're very tall indeed don't.
Get a slightly lower one so you are almost squatting...helps with the removal of waste without having to push!
My brother-in-law got me a Squatty Potty for my 40th as a joke but I said I'd use it...it is great...absolutely genuinely effortless...
soft close
Which is great until you go somewhere that doesn't have it and there's the clatter of seats tapped down for the non-existent closure!
1) Rimless, easier to keep clean, doesn't harbour limescale (if that's an issue in your area)
2) Back to the wall - so there's nowhere for muck to gather.
I think we spent about £350 on our fancy Roca (it's called the Gap 🙂 ) .
Basically, not whatever Barratt fitted in our new-build (e.g. the cheapest available).
The seats eventually come loose. No biggy, but the mechanism for tightening the seats is a couple of bolts that are virtually inaccessible and are tightened by a pair of razor sharp sort of wing nuts which for some reason sort of wind themselves up against the uneven surface on the underside of the pan and 'feel' tight but then come loose again within a week.
There's probably a specific tool or technique beknownst only to plumbers but I'm too proud to pay someone just to tighten two bolts...
Anyway, double check how the seat attaches!
Don't get a fancy designer one.
We have one in the upstairs bathroom that the previous owners installed.
The toilet seat hinge broke and because it's a weird shape only the manufacturer supplied seat will fit.
£150 for a new seat.
The hinge is still broke.
There’s probably a specific tool or technique beknownst only to plumbers but I’m too proud to pay someone just to tighten two bolts…
Mr Monk - I think you might need one of these.
How much are Japanese ones?
The seats eventually come loose. No biggy, but the mechanism for tightening the seats is a couple of bolts that are virtually inaccessible and are tightened by a pair of razor sharp sort of wing nuts which for some reason sort of wind themselves up against the uneven surface on the underside of the pan and ‘feel’ tight but then come loose again within a week.
You need these - the black part pushes into the aperture (from the seat side) and then you screw the bolts in and the rubber expands our (a bit like a rawlplug effect) - no need to try to get access to somewhere inaccessible. I put them in and they have remained secure for years.
We spent a week in a house with a Hyundai water jet bog. Naturally, I just pretended it wasn't there until a couple of days in Mrs BigJohn came up to me with a look on her face that I haven't seen since we saw Keith Moon's drumming in 1971 and told me I had to try it.
Fantastic! "We'll have one on our next house!" she said. "No" I said. "We'll have two".
I think theotherjonv's post is extremely important! not sure how you try before you buy though...
My parents have surely the worst toilet in the world (and being an old house, its the only loo, which is fun when the 5 of us go to stay!)
The seat is fine, but there is a very shallow shelf at the front, before dropping into the poo chute/water area. If you sit on the loo for a number 2, your tackle sits on this shelf. Its horrific! Especially as my parents are not fans of central heating and the tiled, window open, toilet is at a constant ambient 5c.
coupled to that a useless pneumatic button and its a very traumatic experience.
Any shops let you try before you buy?
If you sit on the loo for a number 2, your tackle sits on this shelf.
surely the 5C effect counters the shallowness. Just allow time to acclimatise and problem will be solved?
not sure how you try before you buy though…
Are you flush?
Money down the drain otherwise.
🙈
If I were going to spend more than £50 @ Screwfix for a new toilet it would have to be a Japanese-style one (or a retro-fitted smart seat, at least - they had a Xiaomi one on AliExpress a while back for a little over £200!) You'd have to be an idiot to spend £500 on a crapper and then still have to clean your own arse 😃💩
we bought one of these:
and a sqatty potty, clean and satisfying! only downside is its over too fast if you need personal time/space!
either number 1 or number 2
I went with a Grohe Euro with pure guard coating (or something). The main mistake I made was getting a wall hung version, it probably would have been OK if I didn't have such a crap house with plasterboard sheets bonded together instead of actual walls. Only found this out after the work had started, the carpenter working for the plumber rigged a frame up and it seemed secure enough. Trouble is there is a bit of flex and tiles have now cracked at floor level and I really don't trust that's it's not all going to come crashing down at some point - should have just got a normal floor fixed one!
Also I agree with the 'comfort height' being bollocks - mine's actually between standard and comfort height (just where the plumber fixed it basically) and I often get dead legs during number 2's as my feet barely touch the floor (even though I'm 6ft) :p Possibly might be a better height if you have very poor mobility but otherwise avoid it.
johndoh
MemberFor example, spending £1,000 on a branded toilet to go in the downstairs bog of a £60k terrace in Sunderland would be crazy
Well it wasn't a grand but the bog that went in my £60k terrace in Sunderland retails at around £300 Ideal Standard one. Luckily I worked for a plumbers merchant then so got it at cost.
Anyway, back to the original question. Just spend a few hundred quid, a bog is a bog. Pick one that you like the look of (and if it's a weird shape from a brand you've never heard of buy a spare seat just in case).
Just bought a Fired Earth one for our bathroom. Suspect it's a bit like getting a 935 steel frame when a carbon one would be stiffer/lighter/cheaper. It does look nice though.
I fitted one of these over a year ago, it’s been faultless so far.
https://www.screwfix.com/p/ideal-standard-della-close-coupled-toilet-dual-flush-6ltr/6779j/blockquote >And I've just taken one out today that's been fitted for 18mths and leaked from a casting fault since day one by the looks of it and wrecked a £600 floor...
well, what i can say is that the "MODE" Rimless jobs (yeah yeah, fnar fnar) - are utterly rubbish at flushing away anything more than a ssee through bit of tissue. They manage to create the perfect tumbling action, so you can literally just watch your shiv rolling round and round, not actually going anywhere... 🙁
"Comfort" pans are bad for your bowels, you sit too high. Get a low rise one if possible for a cleaner crappage. To assist arse cleaning I hightly recommend fitting a hand bidet/ Muslim shower to blast your bottom buttons away. They're only about £20 plus fittings, well worth it especially if you have kids / women in the household.
and a sqatty potty, clean and satisfying! only downside is its over too fast
Like an otter off a bank