The 15 year old toilet stains

Having just bought a house, we’ve been busy putting things where they belong and fixing things up. One of those things was the doorbell, which I finally got working today after the $100 doorphone adapter arrived. Crazy, I know, but the intercom needed to be connected to the telephone which required a special adapter. Seems like an expensive way to tell if someone’s at the door, but at least all the cordless phones around the house ring when someone presses the doorbell, which is kind of convenient.

If ever there was a stubborn stain, it’s the one in our toilet. When we came to look at the house before buying it, the previous owner said he never used the upstairs toilet which I guess explains why there’s a stain that only 15 years of still water could cause. Here’s a ‘before’ picture I took before donning rubbing gloves and attempting to clean it:

Toilet Stains - Before

Woah! Look at that! Pretty disgusting, eh? Well, I’ve just spent most of the last hour giving it a good scrub. I used ceramic cleaner, pure alcohol, some other super-strength toilet cleaner, four kinds of brushes…. and even kerosene!!! After all that scrubbing, the bowl is so clean you could eat your dinner out of it…. Here’s the ‘after’ shot:

Toilet Stains - After

Yep! That’s the result of nearly an hour’s scrubbing with all the latest cleaning products the local home center has to offer. It’s a bit of a ‘spot the difference’ game, but if you look carefully, you’ll see I made some serious progress down the right hand side! Any advice short of buying a new toilet is much appreciated!

If you like, you can find me on Twitter at @nick_ramsay. I'd love to hear from you!

3 thoughts on “The 15 year old toilet stains

  1. you should buy a new toilet my friend!!! or you could try using a chemical called t.s.p.
    when i bought my place it really helped remove all the dirt and grease that had accumulated over the years… i dont know if it will work on that toilet but its worth a shot.. i dont know if you can buy it in japan though… maybe i can bring some when i go to japan this year…
    i would also try going to another home centre and perhaps trying another chemical… maybe a decalcifier… im probably not spelling that right… anyway keep trying nick!!!

  2. t.s.p, eh? I’ll look that up and try to figure out what it’s called in Japan. Maybe I can order it over the net. I’ll try everything before wasting money on a new ‘bowl’… ha! I may as well flush my money down the toilet!

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