Low Flush Toilets

In case you have not noticed, there is a race going on in the toilet industry. Over 20 years ago the low flush (1.6 gallons) toilet became the standard and low flush also became synonymous with poor performance. Every toilet needed a plunger to help it along because the manufacturers didn’t know how to make them work without the 3.5 gallons of water they were used to working with.

About 10 years ago Toto, a Japanese company, began selling toilets that outperformed all the other low flush toilets. A combination of a larger opening from the tank to the bowl, and a redesigned trapway allowed for greater performance and the elimination of the dreaded plunger. It took a while, but now most manufacturers have re-engineered their toilets to meet the Toto challenge head on. The last few years has seen performance improve and water use drop.

No race is complete without a finish line. It has helped that an independent testing group started publishing test results, and each year more and more toilets have improved their ratings. The test is referred to as the MaP test and stands for Maximum Performance Testing of Popular Toilets. A rating of 1000 grams (2.2 pounds) is the top rating given in the standardized tests, though Porcher’s newer 1.6 GPF toilets are coming in at 1800 grams, which is nearly four pounds of waste. This test measures how much solid waste that can be flushed in grams. The minimum acceptable performance is 350 grams of solid material, though the race is all about getting to 1000 grams and while using as little water as possible.

There are four factors to look at when buying a toilet. The first should be performance — don’t buy a toilet with a test rating of less than 500 grams. 1000 grams might be the very best rating, but getting beyond 800 is pretty good. That is where the first Totos came in years ago. The second factor is water usage. By law all toilets sold in the US, except for California, must use 1.6 gallons of water or less. Soon that number will drop to California’s maximum level of 1.28 GPF. Some use quite a bit less, down to .9 gallons, but those are usually dual flush systems that also use 1.6 with the full flush. If you save only a half a gallon with every flush, you can save over 1000 gallons of water per year assuming you flush, on average, six times per day. That is a lot of water. The third factor is the size of the water spot. European toilets traditionally have a very small surface area of water in the toilet bowl. Most Americans prefer a larger area of water. A small area means that you will have to brush off the sides of the toilet quite often. The last factor is price. The low-end toilets are typically less than $100 whereas the high end can easily exceed $500. With anything past $300 you’re really just paying for style or that expensive name brand.

You don’t necessarily get more for your money when paying a higher price. At A-Boy Electric & Plumbing, a locally owned plumbing supply store, you can view many different styles of toilets at many different price points. And while A-Boy stocks and sells Toto, Hollywood store manager Scott Foster points out that many of the less expensive and less known brands like Porcher, St Thomas, and Mansfield outperform the Toto in independent tests. Many of them also have better warranties and styles available. He recommends checking the MaP rating at the Alliance for Water Efficiency website, www.allianceforwaterefficiency.org and visiting one of A-Boy’s five showrooms.

In the MaP report there is a list of tested toilets and their performance. The toilets that are real water savers have the High Efficiency Toilet (HET) label and the WaterSense certification. The number of grams of solid waste is listed as well as other features. The best toilet is a combination of price, performance and water usage (as measured in the testing), the size of the water spot, and the style.

The race by manufacturers to produce toilets with all the above features means that choices have gotten dramatically better in the past five years for the American consumer. The first edition of the MaP report in 2003 listed 80 toilets, and now the list has over 700. Of course, no retail store has them all on display, but A-Boy Supply has several of the top performing models coupled with knowledgeable sales people that can assist you in the selection of your new toilet.