Toilet retrofit flush valve; HydroRight Dual Flush

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austinado16

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Thought some of you might be interested in this little gem of an invention. Just purchased 2 of these from Costco for $18.59ea. Fantastic product, doesn't make the toilet flush worse in either mode, and really does only take about 10min to install. YMMV, of course.

Water is pretty dear around here, so I'm looking forward to seeing a reduction in our water bill. I know this isn't a new technology, but I think being able to retrofit an existing toilet, in situ, is a great idea. It's very well made, and overall, I'm impressed.

 
I bought one of those some months ago, but found that it wouldn't fit any of the four toilets on the property. The Hydroright model requires a toilet that has a slanted flush valve assembly - older toilets have flat flush valve assemblies. So I returned it. I finally found a version at Home Depot that would fit the oldest toilet here (circa 1941) but since it requires removing the upper tank from the bowl, I haven't yet gotten around to installing it.

The one I found for older toilets is the Fluidmaster S2DBL, Dual Flush system. It is specifically for older two-piece toilets. It's twice the price of the Hydroright, as well.
 
Didn't have to remove the tank to install these. They have a huge rubber dome for a gasket, and so are just pressed down onto the "seat" in the bottom of the tank that the flapper would normally park against. Slide on the rubber keeper ring, and tighten the pre-mounted zip-tie.....done.

Chris, I was really interested in buying a couple of the dual flush Oz toilets and they are available here; until I saw the price and about had a stroke. Hoping this will be a similarly good alternative. In the "pee" flush mode, it only drops the water level in the tank about 2in./5cm.
 
I did something years ago to greatly reduce the amount of water used by the older, possibly original 1950s, toilet in my bathroom. I moved that little spout that shot water down the tube to fill the bowl while the tank is filling. Now that water just goes into filling the tank so it fills quicker. There is enough of a pool in the bowl to be plenty adequate; it's just not as big or as deep as it was before. No modifications in technique by the user are required and it still flushes like a tsunami.
 
Tom,

I did the exact same thing you did about 8 years ago when I needed to replace the guts in our 1935 American Standard "Modernus" toilet.  At that time I installed a Fluidmaster Model 400A fill valve.  I also did the old trick of placing 1 1/2 bricks in the tank as well.  I haven't had any problems with chunks of brick coming loose, or with soil removal from the bowl.[this post was last edited: 12/29/2010-06:57]
 
I placed a gallon milk jug full of sand into the tank of my 1956 toilet. Does just fine. But with a toilet this old, I don't know if the HydroRight will properly/completely flush liquids. You have to get a good swirl going to get anything down or it just dilutes it in the bowl.
 
I've never...

...really understood how American loo's worked to be honest and have to admit to a small amount of facination about the whirlpool effect that is needed to shift waste through them....
 
They're really simple...

They rely on the venturi affect (or principle) by passing a lot of water from the tank, down the drain "tube" while at the same time, many force water into the bowl in sort of a jet action. So it's a suction created by dropping a bunch of water past a small opening, along with a blasting effect in the bowl, to help get stuff moving.

Some of our (older) toilets have bowls that probably hold a lake of about 2 or 3 gallons of water. Then the tank might dump another 3+ gallons. That suction, on that lake, creates the whirlpool effect. Most of our modern toilets don't have the lake. They just have a small pond sort of at the rear of the bowl. These are the models that also have the jet blast action from the front of the bowl, toward the lower rear "pond" area during flush.
 
ahhh....

...so your newer loos are similar to all of ours then...

Small amount of water in the bottom - can be as little as a litre (quart) and then water from both the tank end and from around the sides forces the offending detritus (love that word) moving through the bend....once if starts moving over the bend, gravity takes over and literally pulls it through leaving a small amount of water in the base of loo...
 
Hmm, I highly doubt this will work with my pink 1954 F-4033 American Standard. 7 gpf to eradicate every iota of evidence

qsd-dan++12-29-2010-22-28-38.jpg
 
"Didn't have to remove the tank to install these.&#3

I know that... my point is that all the illustrations show a slanted flush valve seat, and the Hydroright also has a slanted bottom to fit a slanted flush valve. My conclusion: it will NOT work with the older flat flush valve configuration.

But maybe it will. Is the flush valve on your toilet flat, or slanted? Do they just show a slanted flush valve in order to show that it will work on those as well as flat flush valves?
 
 You haven't seen a true  "jet action flush" until you've lived in a high rise building. When I lived in McClurg Court in Chicago in the 70's the toilets had no tanks on them. They were just mounted on the wall. But when you flushed one, you worried about everything not bolted down in the room. Everything in the toilet would be gone in 3 seconds.  And it made a noise that would wake the dead!
 
 We may be looking at new toilets soon. Ever since we moved in this house,  the toilets just haven't "felt right".  I asked Karen about this and she said not only do we have the 1.5 gal toilets, but they top (where the seat rests) is at least 3-4" lower than the toilets we had at our last house. Ah ha!
Therein lies the problem.
 
Sudsmaster, my toilets are both 1.6G modern, so they have the angled seat where the flapper parks. But the big gasketed business end of the Dual-Flush is quite a large dome shape, even though the plast base is angled. So I see no reason why it wouldn't just press right down onto the horizontal round opening of the older toilets like yours, and seat itself nicely.

But I don't know how well it would work on a bowl full of water, like in the photo of the pink toilet above.
 
Well, if that's the case, I'll see if our local Costco still has the Hydroright. If so, I'll pick up another one (and just in case, Home Depot carries them as well, at almost the same price).

If it fits, it would be a lot easier to install on the '41 commode than the Fluidmaster full kit.

On the other hand, the low boy American Standard in the master bath has a large flush valve assembly that is probably too big for the Hydroright no matter what.
 
We may be looking at new toilets soon.

WARNING: As of this year, most of the new toilets available (at least in California) are now required to use 1.28 GPF. Do a quick search on Google and you'll find that there has been quite an uproar about their lack of performance.

It's probably best to stay with your current toilets or just get some older, well designed 3.5 GPF toilets that are from the 1980's.
 
I have to agree, stick with the older units. I replaced the pink toilet in one of my baths when I redid it with a highly regarded TOTo unit. While it works OK 98% of the time, I have had it plug up once or twice. I think the issues is that it does not swirl the water, it's just a straight down flush. My older mid '60s units with more standing water swirl the water as it flushes, rotating the contents as it goes down. I was cleaning the baths a few months ago, and had a small amount of tissues in the waste basket in each bathroom. didn't want to make a trip downstairs for a trash bag so I dumped what was pretty equal amounts into both toilets. I let them stand for a while to saturate the tissues and flushed. The old American Standard unit had no issues, but the Toto choked, simply due to the non-rotation of the waste.

Next time I'll walk down the stairs and get a bag, but it was a good test of the new technology.
 

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