Watching all these toilet-related videos that YouTube keeps recommending to me has made me realise that not every toilet has a ballc*ck in it. Some have a weird cup thing on a stick and some have a vertical shaft with an empty plastic box on it that goes up and down.  I never realised that such fancy modern things existed.

Anyrodeup, which system do you have in your cistern?

I have a ballc*ck. It is orange. Presumably so that I can see it when it's snowing.

Vote! Vote now!

The auto-censor won't let me type the word ball c*ck.

It makes it appear as ball man chicken.

I've now realised it'll let me do it if I type it as one word, instead of two.

ie, ballcock.

I want one of these. They look technological.

I don't like that old one with the cup. The polythene hanging down doesn't look classy.

I have a ballcock, but it's a cylindrical sideways one, like a WW2 German stick grenade.

Actually, given all the other DIY shortcuts I've found from the previous owner, it probably is a surplus WW2 German stick grenade.

During any visit to the toilet I could be BLOWN SKY HIGH!

I was at art school with a girl who's grandfather had invented the b*llc*ck.

She was an incorrigible junkie.


I wonder what ever became of her?

OK, a brief glance at Wikipedia proves that this fact must be patently untrue, since...

Quote :

The modern ballcock was invented by José Antonio de Alzate y Ramírez, a Mexican priest and scientist, who described the device in 1790 in the Gaceta de Literatura Méxicana.[1] The ballcock device was patented in 1797 for use in steam engines by Edmund Cartwright.

But who are the two people who are too scared to check whether they have one?

Interestingly, I had to check the ballcock in my cold water tank this evening, cos when I got home the warning pipe was dripping out of the side of the house.

I worked the float arm back and forth a couple of times to make sure that it was closing properly, and that has stopped the dripping. I went outside just now to check.

Since I've only lived in this flat for 6 months and my t*ilet/cistern combo is brand new I've never had any reason to check the b*llc*ck or indeed whether one is under my stewardship.

Also, there's a framed picture propped on the cistern lid and I refuse to move it to check.

In a fit of b*llc*ck hubris I've voted for "I have an b*llc*ck" safe in the knowledge that when and if I ever do open the cistern lid a giant Sydney Funnel Web Spider called Sydney will leap out of it and sink its fangs into my face.

Whose picture do you have on your toilet cistern lid?

Is it someone you really like, and you want to see them very often, or is it someone you dislike and you've put them there for ironic purposes.

https://www.deezammit.com/stock/on-the-wall/233-1973-pirelli-calendar-by-brian-duffy

I'm not checkin' I think it's one of those ungodly Euro toilets, but i'm not risking damaging anything by taking the top off.

Fangirl Three wrote:

Interestingly, I had to check the ballcock in my cold water tank this evening, cos when I got home the warning pipe was dripping out of the side of the house.

I worked the float arm back and forth a couple of times to make sure that it was closing properly, and that has stopped the dripping. I went outside just now to check.

No drips so far. But I've bought two spare valves, and an extra large ball float - the latter will float lower in the water and mean the cistern will fill to a lower level.