Bloody hard tiles, and a bog cistern mech that I don't recognise ...

[Arfa Daily]

I've just put up a bunch of Spanish wall tiles in my downstairs cloakroom. They were a bit 'resistant' to the 'snap' bit of score 'n' snap, but never-the-less, did break cleanly with a bit of a karate chop across a piece of thin wood. The actual base material of the tiles was a red colour. Looked a bit terracotta. Today, I had to drill a couple of holes in them, and boy oh boy, they were the hardest tiles I have ever come across. I started, as ever, with a small 4mm masonry drill, expecting that to rip through with a minimum of effort, but it really struggled. I actually burnt my finger on it quite badly, when I withdrew it from the tile at about half way through. The gearbox on the drill was red hot. Anyone else come across tiles this hard ? Any tips to improve the drill's performance at cutting into them ?

I also have a new bog that I've been putting in. I unpacked the bits and pieces that go in the cistern, but there are no instructions, The filler and siphon are two completely separate units. There is a fairly conventional-looking adjustable float at the top of the filler tower. It works a lever right on the top, the inner end of which is hidden under a cap. Coming out of the side of the tower, below the lever, is a thinnish (5mm perhaps) flexible pipe about 20 cms or so long. It just dangles in a generally downward direction, the far end being open. What is this for, and should it be left to just dangle ? The open end will, I think, be below the full water level, if it is just left to dangle. I can't actually see where the water to fill the tank, exits the tower, but I guess it must be at the top somewhere, near to where the float valve lever operates. Just for sport, I tried blowing into the inlet at the bottom, With the float pushed up, you can't blow into it at all, as you would expect. However, with the float down, you can blow into it - but only just. Is this normal for this type of vertical filler mech ?

Arfa

[F Murtz]

Very small diamond core bits, build a dam with putty round hole and fill with water. similar to this.

[Thomas Prufer]

It is, maybe, a tube to run a bit of water through the overflow tube into the bend at the bottom of the pan, to refill it completely. Common in the US...

Here:

and on that page, particularly

Thomas Prufer

[Nightjar]

The tiles in my bathroom were similar. I ended up cutting the to size with an angle grinder (true)

I had no problem using diamond tipped glass drills.

It is the water inlet to the cistern, it reduces the noise of filling and it should just dangle. Because it is flexible, any suction, which could, theoretically, draw water back into the main will collapse the tube instead. I suspect that, if it is mains fed, it probably ought to have a double check valve as well these days.

It probably has an internal nozzle that is set for high pressure (i.e. mains) water. If you are running it off a header cistern in the loft, there ought to be a low pressure nozzle in the kit with which to replace it.

Colin Bignell

[Arfa Daily]

I have done this before to drill glass etc, but in the case of these tiles, it's not an option, as they are already on the wall, and the holes are required for hanging accessories such as bog-roll holder, towel rail etc. It's not a *big* deal - they do drill after a fashion - and once I was through, bigger drills, although still slower than normal when being used to open up the pilot hole, did the job without *too* much fuss. I was just interested really to see if others had come across such hard tiles. I don't recall having used any from Spain before, nor any with a red base material, rather than white.

Arfa

[Huge]

On 2011-02-07, Nightjar

[Huge]

Yep. Mine were Spanish, too. Although I used them as wall tiles, I did wonder if they were actually floor tiles.

I bought some white glazed tiles for my last kitchen that had red base material. But they were so soft you could almost drill holes in them with your finger...

[Arfa Daily]

Thanks for that. There is no obviously designed place for that tube to go in the water discharge tower, but several places that it could be put. It certainly seems to come from the area on the fill tower that the one in that diagram is shown to be.

Arfa

[Arfa Daily]

I did wonder if it was the filler, but it seemed a bit small for that, especially if the valve is a pressure operated 'servo' arrangement that opens up as a result of a 'bleed' hole being opened by the float dropping, as Harry suggested. The cistern is connected to full rising main pressure - albeit via a service valve - as the main comes into the house through this room. The cistern feed is tee'd from a point just above the main stop valve for the house, which has always been the case since the house was built over twenty years ago.

I have seen these alternate nozzles supplied with 'conventional' float valves, and have fitted them in place of the default high pressure one. The bog in my dear old mum's house was fed from the low pressure cold, and I had to use the alternate nozzle in the replacement I fitted to hers, to get it to fill quicker than a quarter hour ... :-)

However, there does not seem to be any such nozzle supplied with this one - not that I need one, as I am fed from high pressure water anyway. Sometime during this week or next weekend, I'll get the bits installed in the cistern, and get it hooked up. I guess that all will then be revealed ! I'll let y'all know if there are any 'odd' revelations. Might help someone else if they come across the same set of fittings.

Arfa

[F Murtz]

You can still the same drills just dribble water on it from a large hypodermic or some such.

[Dave Liquorice]

Equlibrium valves don't have different sized nozzels but should come with flow restrictors that fit into the inlet pipe at the tap connector. With Torbeck(tm) valves these are a bit of plastic with a variable number of fixed pitch fins along about 1.5" of stem.

The flow through a eqlibrium valve can be rather high at mains pressure and they shut off quick, this can lead to water hammer. Also the overflow might not be able to cope with the flow rate...

[John Rumm]

If you managed to get a masonry bit into them that far, then they were not as hard as some I can assure you! Try porcelain ones...

Start with a new quality masonry bit - one of the Bosch multilateral ones. Push hard before starting - you should hear the glaze crackle a little. Then drill *slowly* 100 rpm tops - keep the force on the drill and keep water spraying onto the drill site. If you don't have a spray, then stop every few seconds to dunk the drill in water.

The tube could be the inlet filler - these are often designed to fill the tank from the bottom up, so you get no sound of running water.

[Chris Wilson]

F Murtz wrote in news:iiolp6$q44$ [e-mail]- september.org:

Hamster water bottle tapes to the wall works very well indeed ... course it's a "bit" late in the day to help the OP