Saving Water With The Brick

I read an article this morning in our local newspaper on saving water in the bathroom. It was talking about the “brick trick” or putting a brick in your toilet.

What you do is put a brick (just one) in your toilet tank and you will save approximately a third of a gallon of water every time you flush. This is a trick I heard about many years ago.

As you know, our son James is a plumber. So, I went to him to ask if this really works. James’ advice is as follows:

This really depends upon the design of your toilet. The average toilet tank holds between 1.6 - 3.0 gallons of water. There are newer ones on the market that only hold 1.2 gallons.

If you are going to try this, do the following. After you put the brick in the tank, flush it. If the toilet bowl empties completely on the first flush, then leave the brick in the tank.

However, if you have to flush two or three times to empty the bowl completely, you are doing more harm then good. Here are two reasons why:

• If it takes more than one flush, you are using more water; and
• The little holes under the rim of the bowl will eventually get clogged with mineral deposits because they are not getting flushed out completely.

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To Does your Outside Faucet, Which is Frost Resistant, Leak?

To High Water Pressure and How It Makes a Difference

To Tankless Electric Water Heater - The Installation

To The Clogged Toilet

To The Hot Water Heater or Water Heater

To The Leaky Faucet in the Shower and the Fix!

To Water Heater Element Replacement Without the Mess!

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