Water level in toilet bowl

Kath

Sorry for stupid question but...

After flushing toilet the water in the bowl drains as usual until it reaches the normal level, then suddenly disappears as if it's being sucked out from the other side.

We have recently moved into a new house an dbuilding work is still going on on houses very close. We did wonder whether that may have something to do with it. We don't want to call out a plumber if it's something that could be related to the building work - if it is they have to pay for it etc, otoh we don't want to complain to the builders only to find that hubbys use of drain-blocking quantities of loo-roll:D have caused a blockage/problem with unique suction powers.

So basically I'm after opinions of what may cause the water to be sucked out of the bowl.

J187

Ok, I guess I'm misunderstanding you because it sounds like you are saying the toilet is flushing. Its not common for every bit of water to flush out, but are you saying that its not prperly refilling afterwards? Could it be a pressure-assisted toilet?

Kath

Sorry I didn't explain it very well. The flush is fine. Its the water that gets trapped in the u-bend on the bit you sit on.

J187

so the toilet doesn't get refilled? I'm still confused, your explaination is probably good, its probably me not understanding it. Maybe someone else understands what the problem is...?

Kath

ok here goes.

Imagine you are sitting on the loo. Under your bum is the water that goes round the u-bend. This is the water I'm on about.

I've just noticed this site seems to be a USA site. Maybe your loos are totally different to ours lol

redline

Does your plumbing system have a vent?
There should be a pipe coming out near the roof for sewer gas to vent.
If you do have a vent, then it may be blocked and this will cause the vacuum situation that you are having.

When you use the bathroom sink does it gurgle when water goes down the drain?

J187

I understand what water you are talking, what I wanted to be clear on was what the actual problem is... I wasn't sure if it was the water level returning was lower than you are used to. Lower than it used to be, or that as you flush, the water was overly vacuumed from the bowl. If it IS over vacuuming, then it could definitely be a clogged vent, however it may be something you might not be able to see at the top of the vent stack, you may have to snake down into the pipe. It could also be a happy little bird's nest on top of it, an unfortunate animal inside or just scum and stuff clogged up in there. The reason I wanted to be clear was that you say you just moved into the new place, which leads me to beleive you are not yet familiar w/ the toilet you speak about... Toilets behave very differently. If you had one of those new 1.6 Gall/flush toilets, it would have a significantly lower water line than most common toilets. Some of the pressure or vacuum assistet toilets might have a lot more vacuum than other models as well.

Ron The Plumber

It could be just the way it works, if it flushes out everything on every flush, then don't worry about it.

Kath

Ok thanks guys. Will try and check the vent/pipes (if i can find them-everything seems to be concealed in these new houses).

J187

Agreed, that's what I was getting at. I couldn't figure out if the issue was simply that it had stronger-than-usual vacuum or that it actually was causing some type of problem....

MAS2006

http://home.howstuffworks.com/plumbing-basics-ga.htm

Make sure your vent resembles this.