Weekend Plumbing Disasters

[ttbean2]

Hi. I'm hoping someone can help me out. This weekend was supposed to be a relaxing 5day break for me. But...the winter temperatures decided to take over. On Friday, my pipes froze. Probably both underground and inside my walls. On Sunday, they thawed out enough for me to notice a leak in my pipe right before my main shut off valve. I got the water shut off from the street...and had a plumber come out on Monday morning to fix the main line.

All was fine...until I noticed my toilet was leaking from the handle. It looks like water is seeping in. So...I did what you guys hate. I went to Home Depot and bought the supplies to replace the fill valve inside the toilet. In the middle of that project, I noticed the downstairs toilet has a puddle of water under it. What's going on here? Why would I have the same issue in two toilets at the same exact time the day after I had a plumber come fix my main line? Can someone help me out? Is this just bad things come in three's??? Or could there be something else going on?

[CarlH]

Could you see water dripping from the toilet? If the problem was the fill valve not closing, the excess water would run into the bowl and not on the floor. Check the shutoff valve to see if it dripping and then follow up to where the line is fitted to the fill valve. Then check the tank bolts from the underside. If your tank bolts are not brass, they could rust through. I've had to replace tank bolts in the past that have rusted through and started to leak.

[ttbean2]

The water is leaking into the tank. And then the tank fills up really hight and leaks from the handle.

[CarlH]

There could be that some debris could be causing the fill valve not to close. If you are going to replace the fill valve, remember to flush the supply line prior to connecting it to the new fill valve to clear out any junk that could be still in the line.

[WV Hillbilly]

You can remove the tops on my fill valves & clean & flush the junk out . No need to replace . Can you post a pic. ?

[nhmaster]

Bad Kharma Baby.

[TedL]

The handle hole should be above the top of the overflow, the open top pipe generally in the middle of the tank. If the overflow was replaced at some point with one too tall, it would lead to the water coming out the handle hole. Not under normal conditions, but if the valve were not shutting off, or or the float set too high. So, it seems you have a (relatively) longstanding error that didn't cause trouble until debris clogged your valves.

[SewerRatz]

The handle hole should be above the top of the overflow, the open top pipe generally in the middle of the tank. If the overflow was replaced at some point with one too tall, it would lead to the water coming out the handle hole. Not under normal conditions, but if the valve were not shutting off, or or the float set too high. So, it seems you have a (relatively) longstanding error that didn't cause trouble until debris clogged your valves.

I was going to post the same thing. If the fill valve is not shutting off, it should just go into the overflow.

[Redwood]

But if you have high pressure/high flow the incoming water will come in faster than the overflow can drain it off.

[SewerRatz]

But if you have high pressure/high flow the incoming water will come in faster than the overflow can drain it off.

True, I only seen this a couple times a while back. Mostly where the fill tube was inserted into the overflow,, part way blocking the effective drainage area of the overflow tube. Which is why I always use the clip that holds the fill tube just above the overflow, and I hold the float down to let the water purposely fill over the overflow to make sure it can handle the incoming flow rate.

[ttbean2]

Thanks! It was indeed the debris. I replaced one of the fill valves...and just cleaned the other. I took a wet vac to the tank first to get all of the crud out of there before putting them back. Both toilets are fully functioning again...I will take a look at the overflow pipes. I'm sure that they probably aren't installed correctly.

Thanks for your replies!