OK.....I bought the same Dometic toilet that Steve just bought. I didn't buy it because our toilet was worn out, although it has gotten a lot of use since January 31st of this year. We just liked the idea of a porcelain bowl being easier to keep clean. The old plastic just didn't clean well, and never looked clean. So, today is the day I decided I would do the "quick" change out....shouldn't take more than an hour, right? Well, Mr. Murphy must have been lookin' over my shoulder, because when I pulled the old toilet out I discovered that the water supply had been leaking behind the toilet on to the carpeting for a while. Naturally, I always assume the worst, and expected I would be ripping wood out and a four, or five day job, instead of a 1 hour job. After I got the carpet pulled I decided to give my good friend Steve a call (Prarieschooner) and get some advice. You see, I couldn't figure out how to get the flange off so I could demo the raised wood platform the toilet sits on. He kind of slowed me down by asking a few questions. Was the wood soft? Did it appear saturated, etc. Well, it wasn't soft, and wasn't saturated as far as I could tell, so he suggested I run the small electric portable heater I have, close the door and let the heat do it's magic. As it turns out the wood dried out rather quickly, and there were still no soft spots, so after about 5 hours I decided the wood was pretty dry and installed the new toilet without putting any carpeting back down. We'll let the wood continue to dry out for the next week, and then put in some new carpeting on the platform. The toilet went in easily, and in about 30 minutes I was hooked up (I installed a new water supply line that is not leaking). The toilet is so much easier to operate, and looks 1000% better.
The good news is that our desire to go with a newer, more serviceable toilet helped us avoid major water damage. Steve's change out got us to thinking we should replace ours before it needed to be replaced. I figure the water supply line had only been leaking a week, or so based on the condition of the plywood platform. It looks like the carpet absorbed most of the water. We wanted to replace the ugly peach colored carpeting anyway, so it turns out to be a win, win.
So, thank you Steve for posting about your replacement Dometic toilet, because it got us off the dime to replace ours, and in the end, saved us having to replace damaged plywood, and having to hoof it over to the restrooms every time we needed to relieve ourselves for the next week, or so. This is what is so great about this owners forum. You just never know when someone else's post will spur you to some action that will save you time, and a lot of grief!
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