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Recycle your old Toilets

As a follow up to my post on upgrading to high efficiency toilets to reduce water usage, I have now completed my toilet upgrade in all four bathrooms in my home.

After my last post, I took a trip to my local home improvements store and looked at several HET toilets including the Kohler Wellworth model.  After speaking with the salesperson about the toilet upgrade, he pointed me to the Glacier Bay 1.28gpf toilets that are a store brand.  The clerk was very knowledgeable and explained that he had installed these in his home as well as his daughter's house and that they had the same flush power as the Kohler and other powerful brand name toilets.  According to the flush power scale they had on display, the Glacier Bay unit was a '10' on a scale of 1 to 10.  I was a little skeptical but decided I would buy two and try them out for a couple of weeks.

After discovering that the toilet came as a kit with wax ring, hardware and even a toilet seat, I decided to install it myself instead of hiring a plumber.  Not only will I save $100 per toilet on the Glacier Bay models but I won't be paying someone for installation.

After installing the two toilets and testing them for two weeks in our busiest water closets, I'm happy to announce that the Glacier Bay toilets worked great.  They had much more flushing power than the old "builder's grade" toilets that used a lot more water per flush.

Based on the results, I bought two more toilets of the same model and installed them last weekend.  One of the new toilets had a slightly smaller outlet hole in the bowl and the flush hardware was different.  So far, it appears to have the same flush power so I'm keeping it in place. (UPDATE: This different toilet has now malfunctioned a week after installation.  I will take pictures of the differences so you can check before purchasing this model.  I will also report on how Home Depot handles the return of the defective toilet.  Here's my updated post)

I have also submitted my documentation for the Georgia Utility rebate that should give me a $200 credit on my water bill.  I will post when I have more information on how this worked.

UPDATE: I was able to recycle my old toilets into road gravel!  Read about it here.

Overall, I'm claiming victory on my HET toilet upgrade!  Now, I'll have to wait and see how this affects my water bills over the next year.  Visit our Water Conservation forum in the Mapawatt Community and let us know your plans for upgrading your baths.