{"id":283,"date":"2010-04-01T12:56:47","date_gmt":"2010-04-01T20:56:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/?p=283"},"modified":"2024-06-14T09:21:28","modified_gmt":"2024-06-14T17:21:28","slug":"replacing-the-lavac-inlet-hose-spigot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/?p=283","title":{"rendered":"Replacing the Lavac inlet hose spigot"},"content":{"rendered":"

While working on replumbing the head, the inlet hose spigot snapped off inside the Lavac Zenith toilet. Yikes! It left a piece inside, so we were left with trying to figure out how to get that piece out, and what to do about replacing it. The Lavac toilet is just too nice to abandon over a little failure like this. I\u2019m posting this here in case anyone else encounters this problem with their 35 year old plastic part snapping.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

To get the part out of the toilet, Van used a hack saw to score the surface so he could get a screw driver in there to turn it out. That\u2019s the 4 cross-hair type marks that you see in the photo of the failed part above. It wasn\u2019t easy to do in the cramped quarters, but he did it, as evidenced by the photo. (The other parts in the photo are the hose barb piece that broke off from the inside flange, and the black rubber sleeve that seals the part inside the porcelain inlet hole at the back of the toilet.)<\/p>\n

We discovered that the part is still available for the obsolete Lavac Zenith toilet, and the US distributor (St. Brendan\u2019s Isle<\/a>) sells the assemby for a mere $64.99. (It\u2019s Part number TLZ 9031).\u00a0 As Joe our friendly diesel mechanic at Flying Wrench<\/a> told me, \u2018boat\u2019 stands for \u2018bring on another thousand\u201d \u2013 but $65 + shipping for a plastic part is a bit steep.<\/p>\n

Now if you had this part in your hand, you\u2019d realize how much it looks like a thru-hull. And that\u2019s when I started thinking about making our own.<\/p>\n

First problem, the plastic part. Turns out those cheap $5 Perko nylon 3\/4\u201d thru-hulls are just about the right size. The shaft diameter is almost identical \u2013 its only the mushroom diameter that was too large. Van used the belt sander to remove enough of the O.D. on the mushroom end so it would slip into the toilet inlet \u2013 it was oversized by ~3\/4\u201d. A lathe would have been very cool for that job, but we don\u2019t have one, and the belt sander trick worked pretty well on that soft nylon.<\/p>\n

Next, what to do about that black rubber sleeve that acts as the seal? With some creative sleuthing at our local Henery\u2019s Hardware<\/a>, we discovered the perfect sized rubber sleeve in a PVC compression tee that cost about $5. In fact, there were 2 rubber sleeves in there, so we have a spare. The only modification we made was to cut off the end of the cylinder to be flat, it had a chamfer on it as molded. That was easily done with an utility knife.<\/p>\n

Final step, installation. To allow a good hold on the part while tightening down the nut, Van slotted the barb end face so he could hold it with a large screw driver. Then he gooped up the rubber sleeve and end cap with some silicone, stuffed it in the hole. He tightened down the nut to compress the rubber sleeve, making it expand outwards for a tight fit within the porcelain hole. Voila!<\/p>\n

Result \u2013 a very nice seal on a suitable replacement part that cost $10 and some time \u2013 mostly spent thinking about how to do it. Actual time to make the part was about as long as it would have taken to place the phone order with St. Brendon\u2019s Isle for the real part.<\/p>\n

A caveat \u2013 the Perko thru-hull is longer than the original part, so it sticks out further at back of toilet. You might have a clearance issue there. We solved ours by adding a rigid PVC 90 fitting so the hose did not have to make a tight bend radius. I think Van trimmed a little of the Perko hose barb off too, as it was plenty long.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, we forgot to take a picture of the finished custom part before it was inserted, but it looks just like a Perko nylon thru-hull with a rubber sleeve between the nut and the mushroom. 8~)<\/p>\n

\"The

The parts used to make a new inlet hose spigot assembly. The black rubber sleeve is found inside of the PVC compression tee.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While working on replumbing the head, the inlet hose spigot snapped off inside the Lavac Zenith toilet. Yikes! It left a piece inside, so we were left with trying to figure out how to get that piece out, and what to do about replacing it. The Lavac toilet is just too nice to abandon over […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[28,21],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=283"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":414,"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions\/414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svrainshadow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}