Toilet Clips Not Holding Down

[live4fun]

A few weeks ago I removed the recirculating toilet to clean and do maintenance on it. It had not been removed for nine years since the foam ring was completely full of silicon caulk like others have mentioned. The removed and toilet maintenance was successfull. I bought a new thedford toilet foam ring from my supplier and fully cleaned the toilet flange, pipes and surfaces.

I adjusted the flange bolt nuts to the proper height, and pushed in the shim wedges with hand. After a day of travel, the toilet was loose and movable on the floor. Then I tighten the flange bolts some more, and reinstalled the wedges. This time I tapped the wedges in with a long screw driver and hammer without breaking the wedges.

Then on the next day's travel, the toilet was loose and rolling around on the toilet flange, again?? Both times I have my wife with full weight sitting on the toilet while installing the wedges. Does anyone have any advice for me for my next installation attempt? Im trying not to overdrive or split these shim wedges with the screwdriver? thanks in advance.

 

[Shrimpburrito]

Been there, done that. Your approach in tightening up the nuts a bit is quite reasonable, and one I've also done. I found it helped, but ultimately, it can still fail because what happens is the bracket to which the bolts are secured starts bending upwards a bit, negating the effect of tightening the bolts. Another approach would be to reinforce that bracket somehow, but that's starting to get a bit complicated.

I think the problem is exacerbated by traveling with the toilet with anything in it. Obviously, the more weight in there, the greater the force that is applied to that bracket. So always traveling completely empty, as I suspect many people do, will help tremendously.

I didn't do that, however, when I had the Electra Magic. I opened the valve at the bottom of the toilet before closing up, so I could dump at a dump station on the way home without having to open the TM.

Ultimately, this repeatedly coming loose from the floor issue was what caused me to switch to the Thetford Curve. I did not want to risk a seal failure while traveling down the road with a full toilet -- that would be disastrous.

The Curve is basically a cassette toilet, so I can dump it in a vault toilet before we leave camp -- that saves a stop at a dump station on the way home. It also makes the toilet lighter, obviously, so less stress is put on its bracket. However, the Curve has a fresh water tank in the top half, and holds something on the order of about 3 gallons. Unfortunately, I've already experienced that top portion of the toilet falling off and onto the floor during travel, so I've since screwed 2 eyebolts on either side of the toilet to which I connected a strap to hold the toilet down while traveling. So far, so good. I suppose you could also do this with the Electra Magic.

In hindsight, while I still would have replaced the Electra Magic, I should have replaced it with a true cassette toilet, such that the cassette is removed from outside through a door you install in the wall of the TM. I find a full Curve a bit awkward to carry, especially given its weight when full, and am not thrilled with juggling the toilet, closing the bathroom door on the way out, and carrying it over food prep surfaces. But, the Curve is ~$100, and a true cassette toilet is ~$600-$700.

Dave

 

[Bill]

This is a nasty problem that I have not experienced, so I will offer only two comments, and no experience-based solutions.

1. You definitely do not want to deform or split the wedges. Rather than using a screwdriver to drive them home, try to find something blunt. You should be able to find a length of steel rod at a hardware store, for example, though you may have to buy a 3-foot length, then cut off an appropriate piece and file the end smooth.

2. It occurs to me that your wedges may not have seated all the way. They fit very tightly. I've had my toilet out a couple times. Both times, I found it quite difficult to pull the wedges, and quite difficult to push them back in. Pushing them in by hand was nowhere near enough force, and tapping gently with a hammer was pretty iffy. When they finally went on, they did so with a definite "pop" of the wedge under its mating surface. If your wedges pushed/pulled more easily than that, or if they don't pop, they almost certainly weren't fully seated.

Bill

 

[live4fun]

Well I wanted to thank you for the great advice, and I tried to use it all. But it was my wife who suggested I use a mirror to see into the far underside and that seemed to give me the confidence to know that the clips were in deep enough and not messing up the bolts. Using her small cosmetic mirror, I was able to adjust the height of the nuts on the bolts and better approximate the space needed for the shim/wedges. Of course, my wife was sitting on the toilet during this installation to compress the foam ring. Having adjusted the bolts and tested the wedges to get what I thought was the perfect spacing. the Wedges went in hard and snug, but with the mirror I could see that they completely went all the way into the bolt slot. Time will tell after I travel around a bit tomorrow to see if the wedges will hold down the empty toilet. Eventually when I am comfortable with the connection, I will try to drive it full (I normally don't keep it full unless the circumstances warrant it). BUT THANK YOU to all my TM Forum maintenance friends!