How do I make my toilet flush quieter? archived

If you looked at the flush two different cycles, which one bothers you?

The actual drop of water resulting in the removal of the stuff and cleaning swirl of the water, or the noise of the refill of the tank?

If it is the drop cycle I would expect that you need to purchase a new unit with a different design of the bowel. A lot of science and testing goes into that design to get the best removal of stuff, with little smearing and the least amount of water per cycle.

If it is the tank refill, you have some hope in that new tank guts with slower re-fill cycles will reduce that noise cycle. Home Depot parts are not going to be quiet so expect that you will be buying Kholer or other Brand names so cost will be up.

Do your research and ask MOL plumbers who put these in all day long for input. I put new hardware in a tank once and the by product was we could not hear it re-fill. That was a Brand name unit that cost 3x the Home Depot prices, and it was so long ago I forgot the Brand.

But things change so ask around.

Later,
The UPS Store
George

How about putting soft padding around it and a rug on the floor?

The noise comes from the siphon created, which you can't mess with and still have the toilet function properly. Loud bowls are just loud bowls.

Gotcha...thanks for the info master plvmber. That's a pity!!

Ahh, but read what he said. You can google and search. There are Quiet design bowels that are designed to do the siphon thing with less noise.

Perhaps you can find one and solve most of your problem.

As, Master said, Loud bowls are loud bowls.

So, take a look.

Later,
The UPS Store
George

Quiet design bowels?
I definately need to look into that.

in our house the flush itself is pretty quiet, but the water filling the tank is what makes the real noise - not just filling up, but water running, meter noise, etc.

I do hear there are composting toilets that don't use any water ;-)

the bowel problem, well, I think that's a whole other thread....

I like hearing my tank fill and make it a point to never leave the house until it has finished.Better than coming home to a toilet that " ran" all day.

The Kohler one-piece toilets have been the most quiet in my experience.

Is there a tradeoff between quiet operation and water-efficiency? We just bought a toilet that claims to use only 0.8 gallons per flush. I'm looking forward to using it, so to speak.

Tom,

In my opinion, that would depend on the quality of the design. The whole point of bowel re-design from the 1960 American Standard units is to shape the bowel to develop the siphon (the suck) to the point that less and less water is used.

A sloan pressure jet system uses very little water, however, it is loud. (think airport bathroom) An older American Standard unit at my MIL's fills with a lot of water then drops the stuff. Pretty quiet but it is the old unit that takes a couple of gallons per flush.

That said, I watched a show on cable on this subject and some pretty impressive designs were being tested. Some worked with compressed air and small amounts of water. (think airplane).

By far, the most quiet unit I have ever used were the units installed on Nuclear Submarines. Every thing is quiet on those and you can not hear the flush. If you are 1,000 feet under water the outside sea pressue is about 441 psi. So flushing is quite a trick.

Later,
The UPS Store
George

While a crappy photo, this is a very expensive and very quiet flush bowel design. I would bet the design for it was over a Million of tax payer money, then the cost to build it.

You flushed it with that long green handle.

Later,
The UPS Store
George

A better shot.

Later,
The UPS Store
George

My joke answer would be to not make it flush so loudly! )

Years ago, my dad got a super-powerful toilet. One of the first Totos, maybe? He loved that thing (the men in my family have an unusually close relationship with all things scatological, even for guys). He had it installed in the guest bathroom next to the master bedroom & had his own little retreat thing going.

It didn't last long; my stepmother was not thrilled with the vibration of the wall & sound of a jet taking off during his meditation sessions. She made him move it to the powder room on the first floor.