Replacing leaking toilet

[Jeremy Taylor]

Hi all,

My toilet seems to have developed a leak at the point that it 'plugs' into the waste pipe at the back. My first question therefore - is there an easy way of re-sealing this joint?

This may be a good time to change the toilet completely. I replaced the floor in the bathroom many years ago with thick terracotta tiles but, being fairly new to the DIY game I didn't fancy taking the toilet out to do it. So I botched it and the loo now sits in a 'recess' in the new floor about an inch deep. Ok - nobody's perfect.

The problem with re-seating the toilet on top of the tiled surface would be the waste pipe. How can I get the toilet to mate with the pipe now that it's going to be and inch or so higher? Does this mean moving the waste pipe? This would entail knocking a slightly different hole in the outside wall and changing the connection to the down pipe outside - a big job. Is there no easy way to re-jig this to get around the height difference?

Thanks in advance for any advice.....

Jeremy

[David Kerr]

Hi Jeremy,

Partly depends on the length of run of the waste pipe from toilet bowl to hole in wall. There is a certain amount of 'free play' in the pipe-connector-toilet pan assembly, especially if you have (like I did) a 90 degree bend connector. Have a look in your local DIY shed - some connectors are available which are designed to be flexible in order to aid alignment. If you are fitting a new toilet pan, check the waste outlet height as in my experience, they differ quite a bit.

HTH,

David

[StealthUK]

Very easy. New toilets use adaptors to connect into the soil pipe rather than fitting into them directly. There are various adaptors available including one that shortens. lengthens and bends as needs be.

It's when the toilet waste is going into the ground that causes headaches when re-positioning, out the wall is no problems.

[Alex]

What you need is a offset multiwick connecter,easy to fit and your toilet can be use at the new height.Go to a builders merchant or plumbase,or plumb center.do not goto sheds as they will probably not have one.

[Jeremy Taylor]

Thanks for all the advice.

I've browsed B&Q's selection of adapters and they have quite a choice. But I still think it's going to be tricky. The current waste outlet is quite steeply inclined (probably about 20 degrees) and sticks out of the wall about 20 cm. The centre of the end of this pipe is 14.5 cm above the level of the floor. The new toilets in B&Q have their outlet centre about 18.5 cm above the floor.

They do an offset connector which seems to buy me about 1-2 cm (not enough) or there is a flexible connector. This seems to be a better choice but is very long - compressing as hard as I could it seems its min length is about 30cm. As the current toilet outlet is only about

25-30cm from the wall and there are 20cm of waste pipe sticking out then that's going to be way too long. Obviously I can cut the waste pipe back to the wall but it's still going to be tight.

I guess I need to visit the Plumb Centre at the weekend....

thanks again.

Jeremy