Saving $ on waterbill starting with the toliet?

[Twista]

I just read you can put a brick or 2 liter bottle filled with water inside your toilet tank (upper part) and it will save 16% more water each flush.

Is this true?

Put a brick or 2 liter filled with water in your tank that saves 16% of water everytime you flush!

:whiste: Myth of Fact?

 

[corwin]

Since it displaces volume that would otherwise be filled with water it would be true...not sure that the percentage is correct though, I hate math

 

[T_Yamamoto]

It will save money but you may have to flush twice if you take a large dump.

Percentage maybe off...well its more of a YMMV situation.

 

[brandonb]

Doesn't matter when I live. They charge a min usage which is higher than any 5 person family could ever attempt to use. So, in the end, saving water doesn't matter for me and I'm paying for it anyhow. So might as well use it. The only way I could use over the min level is to run sprinklers all day and night all month long.

 

[OVerLoRDI]

Would only be a good idea on older toilets that flush with a gallon+ of water

 

[CPA]

yeah, good luck with getting the brick that comes out of your ass flushed down the drain.

 

[Anonemous]

If paying for water bill -> you can do this it works.
If not paying for water bill -> who cares. (or still do it to save the planet)

 

[Phoenix86]

Or you could adjust the toilet so it fills less. Either way I don't think it's worth it since you will flush twice probably as much as you save.

 

[Doppel]

Or you could adjust the toilet so it fills less. Either way I don't think it's worth it since you will flush twice probably as much as you save.

This.

If the OP is genuinely interested, there are 2-3 products on Amazon that let you retrofit a toilet to a dual flush, one that uses less for pee, more for poo. I have one installed. My very rough estimate on the pay back period was 2 years--I only did one toilet, which gets the bulk of the home's use. My payback was probably quite optimistic and in any case we're talking chump change anyway. It was a geeky thing to spend an hour on if nothing else (it took that long in part because my toilet bowl didn't quite fit the thing properly).

 

[brianmanahan]

It will save money but you may have to flush twice if you take a large dump.

Percentage maybe off...well its more of a YMMV situation.

i flush every turd

so it would probably save me a load :awe:

 

[RossMAN]

If the OP is genuinely interested, there are 2-3 products on Amazon that let you retrofit a toilet to a dual flush, one that uses less for pee, more for poo. I have one installed.

Would you mind posting a link? Thanks.

 

[rh71]

living on long island the water is cheap... even with lawn watering all summer it was a $80 bill for 3 total months. We also have the newer toilets since we renovated. The downside is streaks are left in the bowl sometimes!

 

[SandEagle]

i'll try this. but with 2 bricks. i'll let you know in a month if my bill is 32% less or not.

 

[Anonemous]

I remember growing up in a drought area, you could also use plastic bags filled with water to displace it. For those using 2L bottles make sure to remove any labels on the bottle.

 

[SparkyJJO]

Depends on the toilet.

Old school multi-gallon tank units, possibly (though they might not work as well).

Newer toilets? I wouldn't want to try on many of them as they barely flush as it is.

 

[TwiceOver]

There's a brick in mine. It was there when I bought the place. Does it save money? Probably, but water is so freakin' cheap that I would never notice if I took the brick out or just didn't flush ever.

 

[Imp]

One brick is 1L to 2L-ish.

In the US of A, the average usage per person per day from the shitter is 18.5 gallons or 70.3 liters (stats from 2001 or earlier). Toilets are 10-20 liters unless you have a low-flow, which is 6L or less. The shitter is about 25% of the total indoor household water use.

So, ya, you'll save water, but old shitters might not like the fact that it's getting less water than it was designed for. You can test it out easily, so meh.

If you want to make a huge difference, get a dual-flush or learn to not flush for piss and keep the bowl yellow.

 

[DrPizza]

If paying for water bill -> you can do this it works.
If not paying for water bill -> who cares. (or still do it to save the planet)

The planet doesn't care if you save water or not. It has this thing called the water cycle. I happen to live in an area where mother nature doesn't say, "hey dumbass, don't live there, my water cycle doesn't replenish the water as fast as you're using it." In fact, my garden hose is spraying in a fine mist 24/7, creating really cool looking ice sculptures. (I don't want the hose to freeze up.)

 

[OBLAMA2009]

if youre really desperate, you can also take your shower water and dump it into the bowl and it will autoflush

 

[darkxshade]

Would you mind posting a link? Thanks.

I bought and installed this in my toilet, pretty awesome. You set water for 2 levels so you can have a small flush and a giant turd flush.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002NKRR7Y?tag=at055-20

 

[Mixolydian]

Pee outside as much as possible

 

[qliveur]

The planet doesn't care if you save water or not. It has this thing called the water cycle.

This.

 

[ElFenix]

dual flush toilets are all over the place elsewhere. probably not worth retrofitting your house with but it'd be nice if the house was built with the things.

 

[seepy83]

I bought and installed this in my toilet, pretty awesome. You set water for 2 levels so you can have a small flush and a giant turd flush.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002NKRR7Y?tag=at055-20

I put the same thing in my house. I don't know if how much savings it calculates to, but I needed to replace a bunch of parts in my toilet, so I took the opportunity to install one of these. Pretty nice to get a dual-flush toilet without actually replacing the whole thing.

 

[Imp]

Reminder that it isn't just about saving water itself, it's about all the materials and energy put into treating water (if you don't have your own well or drnk rain water), pumping it to you, sending it straight down the drain again to be treated with more energy and materials.

There are sink to toilet kits you can buy. They use sink water, filter it a bit, then send it to the crapper. Can't think of the names right now.