Korean Job Discussion Forums

[chrisjbrooks]

Hey, so I was sitting on my toilet and reading when... crack! My back moves and inch and water is everywhere. The tank part of the toilet cracked and now I have to walk all the way to the other side of the house to crap instead of using the bathroom in my room.

I was kinda lucky because the tank part of the toilet is separate from the bowl part. So I took it all apart, got some silicone sealant and tried to fix it. After several trial and errors to get it completely sealed, it still leaks.

Does anyone know where to get a replacement toilet tank? I went to homeplus and there is nothing there, and I have never seen anything akin to homedepot here.

Anyone have any ideas about where to find replacement toilets?

[tatertot]

I would give gmarket a shot. You can find most things there.

[soulofseoul]

[chrisjbrooks]

Don't speak kreen. Also I think a plumba will be too expensive.

[premiummince]

I think the gmarket way is the best. I had the same problem and just checked online and did it myself. It's the cheapest way. Plumbers charge a mint.

[Yaya]

[Sleepy in Seoul]

[nathanrutledge]

okay, we need more information here.

The toilet is made up of two pieces, the bowl and the tank. The tank sits on the back of the bowl and has a gasket and 4 bolts holding it in place.

Did you actually crack the tank and if so, where? If you only broke the seal, those are pretty easy to fix. If the bolts are broken, again, a pretty easy fix.

If the tank itself is actually cracked, it's fixable but not with silicon. You'd want something like water putty - it'll set to a concrete like consistancy, very solid.

Either way, you'll want to go to the Euljiro area. In between Euljiro-ro and Jongno-5 ga and Jongak station, on the south side of Cheongye stream, that's the plumbing district. They've got everything you need.

Good luck.

[Swampfox10mm]

A new toilet from a plumber will cost around 350,000 installed (I got quotes on one last year). I don't know if you can get the bowl seperately, but I don't think doing it yourself (replacing) would save you much money, in any case. I could be wrong, though. Personally, I'd just have someone local do it, unless it was patchable.

[chrisjbrooks]

Thanks for the information everyone. I went on gmarket and found someone selling the tank part of the toilet. I saw their address and just went there. He told me it would be 45,000 for the tank. So I think that will work.

Unfortunately the porcelain tank part got all cracked. I was leaning into it like I would the back of a chair and it cracked. Luckily it is two parts so the bowl part of the toilet was fine.

I thought of calling the landlord, but I can fix it myself and I would rather not deal with him. I know he would call the plumber and that would cost a bunch of money that I wouldn't want to pay in case he tried to charge me.

[nathanrutledge]

Having worked in a hardware store that sold toilets, and having installed a couple in my day, I can tell you that 1) they are not expensive, 2) they are not hard to install, and 3) it IS easy to screw up. Since you're only replacing the tank, it's a cake walk. Turn off the valves, drain the tank, undo the lines, undo the bolts, take it off. Replace the gasket, set the tank, redo the bolts, and lines, turn on the valves and you're done. Just make sure your tank and bowl match and you have the right gasket. Gaskets are NOT interchangeable between toilets, and they may look the same but be wrong. Don't pinch the gaskets, and don't think that tighter is better. You wrench it TOO tight and you crush the gasket and it fails.

Anyway, you should be able to do all of this yourself for under 50k and about 10 minutes of actual time. It's not difficult at all.

[chrisjbrooks]

Cool, thanks for the advice. I'll have to make sure to get some new gaskets. I was going to use the inner workings from the old toilet in the new tank. I imagine it should all work.

[nathanrutledge]