Summary: Often complain about leaking toilets? Something is wrong with the flange of your toilet. Take the necessary steps to check the movement of the toilet.

Question: My toilet leaks for the past few days. An examination of the parts of the toilet reveals rusting of a few parts and the nuts and bolts have become useless. Moreover, often the toilet seems to be dancing from side to side. Can you guide me to solve the issue, without disturbing the drainage pipelines?

Answer: Your problem seems to require immediate remedy. There are reasons why the toilet should not rock and dance and properly sealed in its place. No one would enjoy rocking toilets and apart from this there are other influencing factors as well. This only helps to prevent the sewer gas from emanating into your house and enroots the wastes into drains. Toilet seal problems are significant health hazards.

Toilets have a special kind of construction for the purpose of providing sufficient and good drainage system. The pipes and fixtures are attached in a special way and techniques are used to attach the pipes and fixtures. For example, “desanko”, is a special fitting used under the sinks to take the water exactly into the drains without creating a mess. This fitting has a nut and a washer on it that allows you to connect the P trap pipe to the drainage system. As you tighten the nut, the washer compresses around the P trap pipe and creates a waterproof and airtight seal.

As far as toilets are concerned, the installation is quite different. The basic connecting part of the toilet is the flange in the drainage system. The setting is like this, the upper part of the flange must me at least one-fourth of an inch above the surface. There are holes in the flange, so you can tie it to the floor surface or wood. It always a wrong idea to transfer the weight of the toilet and the person using it be transferred to the drain lines. So the flange is generally supported by the floor.

The next step is to exactly fit the toilet in its rightful place using the basic plumbing tools. The bolts are long enough o reach the bottom of the flange and reach the base of your toilet. The basic support of the toilet is the flange and this is tightened to the toilet bowl using nuts and bolts.

Many people complain of having a rusted flange with worn out parts. The alternative is to use a flange extender and attach it to the toilet using nuts and bolts. Also, a sealant is available in the market made up of special paste gasket seal. An application of the silicone paste between the extender and the rusted ring is used to fix the flange. The seal should be as tight as possible and free from the reach of gas and water. As stated earlier, the fixing should be gas and water proof. A wax ring is used to accomplish this one. This wax ring is installed on the flange. Always prefer a ring supported by a horn. This prevents water from diverting to some other channel other than the drain lines. The sticky wax sets the position of the bowl and if all is in place, you will not complain of a rocking toilet bowl in future.

The next essential step is to install the toilet in its proper place. It is essential to ensure that the toilet set right to avoid leakage of drainage water and other problems in future. You need to understand that this a one time process and requires a lot of effort and cost in repairing work. For this it is important to check if the floor of the toilet is level. Firstly you need to place the flange extender, then its time for the toilet to be set right, without the need of the wax rings in place. Use wood shims and a two foot long level to get the toilet so that it is indeed level. The reason we did not place the wax ring is to check if it exactly fits

Now if it exactly fits, we need to fix it so it is ready for use without leakage. While placing the ring on the flange, it should face towards the drain pipe. There are slots in the flange for the bolts in place. Just place the toilet in its place and tighten the bolts until you are sure. Remember these will hold the toilet tightly in its place. . Lower the toilet slowly until it contacts the wood shims. Tighten the toilet bolts and grout the space between the floor and the base of the toilet. When the grout sets carefully remove the wood shims and fill these holes with the same grout. Thus you are done with installing a new toilet!!!

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