/diy/ - Do It Yourself

>>495291
Not the same person, but I am a licensed plumber. The toilets you're using now could have a few things wrong with it causing it to take a long time to fill up and flush. Usually when it takes more than 30 seconds or so to fill up, the fill valve is clogged up with sediment, calcium, or rust (especially if you have galvanized steel pipe water lines). Underneath that black cap at the top of the fill valve the other poster linked to is an screen. A way to blow that out is to shut the water off at the shut off valve, remove the cap, then turn the water on a few times with your hand over the top. You'll splash water around, but it helps blow out any sediment inside if it's a newer fill valve.

As for the slow flush, if it's an ancient toilet it probably uses 3 gallons of water to flush. Despite most people's assumption MORE WATER=BETTER FLUSH, it's not true. You're just wasting perfectly good drinking water to have gravity slowly flush that water down into the bowl to push the pooky into the sewer line. Newer toilets from Kohler don't even have a flapper. They have a tower that's roughly twice the size of the flapper so that when you flush, you have more force entering the bowl from the tank. It's their way of dealing with EPA regulations for water usage. I believe the current is 1.26 gallons max for toilets. Toto just uses a bigger flapper. In our part of the country, those rubber pieces deteriorate very quickly due to high chlorine and ammonia inside the water supply from the local government.

As for upgrading your flush valve to allow a bigger flapper for an existing toilet, I wouldn't recommend it. You run the risk of cracking the porcelain when you disconnect the bolts holding the tank to the bowl and someone who's not familiar with that process will most likely crack the toilet tank upon removal or reinstallation of the tank to the bowl, or have the bolts leak. Home Depot carries a Kohler Cimarron which is the best DIY friendly toilet I can recommend.

>>287966

Depends on what you want to do. In Texas, there are 2 options. The first would be to go through a union. They'll put you through their school so many nights a week and you'll get on the job training during the day. Rinse, lather, repeat for 4 years, then you can qualify to go to Austin, Tx to take your journeyman test.

Option 2 is to get hired on with a local service company, work 4000 hours to qualify to take your tradesman test in Austin, and then you're able to work on almost any residential home in Texas. After another 4000 hours of work, you'll be able to go take your journeyman test which allows you to work on commercial and residential properties.

I live near Houston. During the months of May-September, it sucks. The humidity kicks your ass when working outside or in an attic. And you will sweat your ass off in attics because that is exactly where the builders install water heaters 9 out of 10 times. Usually by 10 A.M, you'll be drenched with sweat.

It's no where near as bad as most people think. My usual day consists of replacing the insides of a toilet, giving an estimate to remove all the rusting out galvanized water pipes in a home, running a roto-rooter cable through the flange underneath a toilet to unclog their sewer line because the cleanout cap outside was buried by landscapers, or replacing a water heater. Very little of my job actually has to do with fecal matter.