Wednesday, January 3, 2024
Jan 3 – How I Closed Out 2023
I closed out 2023 by dealing with this.
Around a month ago I woke up real early one morning to pee. As I sat in the silence I heard the faintest sound, like water dripping waaay far away (no… it wasn’t me).
.
Long story short, as days went by I knew what to listen for and heard it more often. No other sounds. I took the cover off the terlit tank, it wasn’t draining and refilling. And yet the noise was ever so faintly there. So I shut the water off and watched. Ah. The tank was indeed draining. A leaky flapper thingy! I removed it from the overflow tube and took a look.
.
It looked like this..
Those oh-so-tiny tiny white bumps were not letting the flapper seat all the way so water was leaking past (we have soft water FWIW - 8 years of soft water did that to the flapper). The fill valve? It was silently keeping the tank topped off
.
I tried to scrape the bumps off. Not much luck and I soon got tired of trying. I installed the flapper and the next time I was at the hardware store I bought a new one for a few bucks.
.
I got home and removed the bad flapper. It was then that I noticed that the two little pegs at the base of the overflow tube were different diameters. The holes on the new flapper were the same size (small diameter) so of course one side wouldn’t fit. O joy..
Back to the store. I learned that no one makes a flapper with two different sized holes for attaching to the overflow pipe. Why would anyone design and sell such a thing?
.
At any rate, I had to buy a kit (overflow pipe and flapper). I installed it on 123123 just before the sun went down. If anyone wants the old parts just leave a comment and I’ll take it from there. Cheers.