Replacing Toilet Seats Makes Cleaning Toilets Easier

Cleaning toilets is my dreaded Wednesday chore.

It’s a job that no one likes, no matter how much you are willing to pay them.

My son was our resident toilet cleaner for many years. He used a brush, and did an “okay” job.

But to really clean toilets, you’ve got to put on some gloves and get in there.

Cleaning Toilets from the Bottom Up

It started with a dingy toilet seat — stained even after scrubbing with bleach and scour pads. It’s hard to feel motivated to clean when things get to this point. The payout just isn’t worth the effort.

In this case, all of the scrubbing and bleaching of out toilet seat and lid still yielded a dingy looking job.

Replacing Toilet Seats: Round or Elongated?

We recently renovated our powder room, but the main bath hasn’t seen much love. Maybe it was time to replace the seat.

I headed to the nearest home improvement store and found the plumbing aisle.

I stood in front of a wall of toilet seats.

So, for toilet seats, there are plenty of color choices, two shapes, and a few materials choices.

Our toilet is basic white, and the seat plastic, which is by far the most popular color and material.

The seat is elongated. You will need to check out the shape of yours (elongated or round-front) before you buy.

Once I made my seat purchase, I headed home and into the bathroom.

Installing the Toilet Seat

Now, to figure out how to change the seat.

I saw that the seat attached to the toilet with plastic nuts and bolts. How do you screw them in?

I looked under the toilet and saw this:

Yes, it’s a picture of the underside of the toilet. See the nut?

So, that’s how the seat is attached. I wondered how to get it unattached.

From the top of the toilet seat, I saw that the bolt covers actually had arrows on them. Rotating the covers in the direction indicated, I was able to access the tops of the bolts and lift off the seat.

Older toilet seats may have bolt covers that lift off with a screw driver.

Then, it’s just a matter of replacing the bolts and attaching the new seat.

Cleaning Toilets Finale

Before attaching the new toilet seat, I could see that cleaning was necessary.

Around the bolts on the top side of the toilet, it was grungy. It was easy to clean up with no bolt covers in the way.

You can actually remove the toilet seat any time you want to clean around the bolts. That’s the beauty of updating by replacing an older toilet seat.

Since the bolts (and everything else in this world) are made of plastic, don’t do this too often, though.

However, once in a while it’s worth the extra effort.

Not only do you get a beautiful new toilet seat that is easier to clean, you now have a new method for cleaning those awful bolts.

Cleaning toilets just got easier.

Updated 11/12/2024