Basin Wastes: An In-Depth Guide for Plumbers and Bath­room Installers

Dat­ing back to 1959, the Basin Waste remains to this day one of the most inte­gral parts of any bath­room set-up. Allow­ing users to fill and emp­ty their basins with water effi­cient­ly and clean­ly. Max­imis­ing hygiene, prac­ti­cal­i­ty and in some cas­es style. Despite often being over­looked when con­sumers spec a bath­room, the hum­ble Basin Waste is not just an acces­so­ry, it’s as impor­tant as all oth­er brass­ware locat­ed in the bathroom.

In this guide, you will learn about the func­tion­al­i­ty of Basin Wastes, just which type is best for your upcom­ing bath­room project as well as main­te­nance and buy­ing tips.

So, what is the func­tion of a Basin Waste?

A Basin Waste is designed to stop water from col­lect­ing inside basins, instead allow­ing it to safe­ly flow out into pipework, keep­ing bath­room sys­tems func­tion­ing and oper­a­tional. As well as the release of water, a Basin Waste can be used to close the con­nec­tion to the pipes, allow­ing the user to wash and bathe in their basin using the asso­ci­at­ed tap with­out increas­ing water bills through con­tin­u­ous run­ning water. 

Which type of Basin Waste is right for my plumb­ing installation?

There are a wide vari­ety of Basin Wastes on the mar­ket today that can con­fuse even the most sea­soned plumber. These range from Push But­ton or Click Clack Basin Wastes, Pop Up Basin Wastes, Flip Top Basin Wastes and Plug and Chain Basin Wastes. In short, there is no one size fits all when it comes to Basin Wastes, every bath­room project must be approached dif­fer­ent­ly due to spec­i­fi­ca­tion as well as con­sumer pref­er­ence, with dif­fer­ent basins, wastes and taps all being needed.

Plug and Chain Waste

A clas­sic which is still wide­ly in use today with the major­i­ty of tra­di­tion­al­ly styled bath­rooms. A Plug and Chain Basin Waste does what it says on the tin, a sim­ple plug unit installed in the bot­tom of the basin with an attached chain for sim­ple open­ing and clos­ing of the attached drain. 

Although sim­ple to install and use, these types of Basin Wastes must be installed where an accom­pa­ny­ing over­flow is present to com­plete the sys­tem. Elim­i­nat­ing it from more con­tem­po­rary set ups.

Push But­ton (Click Clack) Basin Waste

The most mod­ern and easy to use Basin Waste design. The Push But­ton Waste, com­mon­ly referred to as the Click-Clack Waste or Click­er Basin Waste due to the sound the waste makes when open­ing and clos­ing, is the go to waste of choice for many con­sumers with a con­tem­po­rary bath­room set up.

You sim­ply press the Basin Waste down to allow the basin to fill up with water and then press it again to pop it up and let the water drain away.

The major­i­ty of Push But­ton Click­er Basin Wastes are designed to be used with­out an inte­grat­ed over­flow mak­ing these Unslot­ted Wastes, how­ev­er options are avail­able for use with over­flows. These Push But­ton Basin Wastes are referred to as Slot­ted Wastes.

At Rop­er Rhodes Trade Solu­tions we offer both forms of Push But­ton Waste, giv­ing you the ulti­mate free­dom to spec any bath­room. In a 75mm chrome fin­ish vari­a­tion we offer the Unslot­ted WASTE6 & Slot­ted WASTE7.

Pop Up Basin Waste

Not to be con­fused with the Push But­ton waste, the Pop Up Basin Waste oper­ates by using a lever usu­al­ly locat­ed at the top of the basin by the asso­ci­at­ed tap that when pushed, seals the Waste and when released, opens it to allow water to drain away.

This is one of the most hygien­ic design options, elim­i­nat­ing the need for those using the basin facil­i­ties to have to delve into the water to seal or release the Waste.

Flip Top Basin Waste

Known for it’s sleek unas­sum­ing design char­ac­ter­is­tics, the Flip Top Basin Waste utilis­es a rotat­ing, cir­cu­lar, disc shaped plug to con­trol the flow of water enter­ing and leav­ing the basin.

Oper­at­ed by a sim­ple push, this plug is styl­ish as well as practical.

Due to the slen­der shape and size of the Flip Top, it allows it to be a wor­thy alter­na­tive to the ever pop­u­lar Push But­ton design.

Which Rop­er Rhodes Trade Solu­tions Basin Waste is right for my installation?

At Rop­er Rhodes Trade Solu­tions, we have a num­ber of dif­fer­ent style Basin Wastes on the mar­ket in order to guar­an­tee you always have the right prod­uct to hand, no mat­ter the instal­la­tion requirements.

Start­ing with the Plug & Chain. We cur­rent­ly offer this in both a Chrome fin­ish and Brushed Brass colour fin­ish. By hav­ing Brushed Brass, this allows us to offer a lux­u­ry con­tem­po­rary spin on a design clas­sic, ensur­ing we can aid you in ful­fill­ing the needs and desires of every form of end user. Espe­cial­ly when they have their heart set on a Plug & Chain but want a con­tem­po­rary feel to match cer­tain taps and brass­ware that have been cho­sen etc. Brushed Brass is rapid­ly becom­ing the most pop­u­lar con­sumer choice over oth­er fin­ish­es such as Brushed Stain­less Steel.

Mov­ing on to the con­tem­po­rary Push But­ton or Click­er Basin Waste. We offer both a 75mm Slot­ted and Unslot­ted design in chrome. As well as a 100mm Slot­ted Basin Waste Chrome variation.

To fur­ther feed con­sumer demand, we’ve also brought out a Dome shaped Slot­ted Basin Waste 75mm chrome Push But­ton vari­ant. The ulti­mate in mod­ern bath­room inno­va­tion and link­ing per­fect­ly with the major­i­ty of our mod­ern tap ranges such as Crew.

Last­ly, we offer a Uni­ver­sal Push But­ton in Chrome, Matt Black, Brushed Brass and Gun­metal colour finish.

These Uni­ver­sal Click Basin Wastes are suit­able for the vast major­i­ty of basin types. The body is com­prised of two parts mak­ing it adjustable in depth.

Uni­ver­sal open basin wastes have a fixed open cov­er which ensures water flows from the basin at all times. Suit­able for basins with­out an inte­grat­ed overflow.

By offer­ing a matt black vari­a­tion, it allows you to spec a con­sumers bath­room from start to fin­ish, link­ing the Push But­ton to our black Brass­ware col­lec­tion such as our Joy and Marine showers.

How to best main­tain any Basin Waste

From the get go, our prod­uct offer­ing is always designed and built with fit & for­get means in mind.

How­ev­er, it’s not pos­si­ble to pre­dict just how must wear and tear or usage our Basin Wastes will receive once installed in fast mov­ing res­i­den­tial or com­mer­cial rooms.

To guar­an­tee the opti­mum reli­a­bil­i­ty of our prod­ucts, we advise you inform the own­ers of the bath­room space you’re installing in about the following…

To main­tain the qual­i­ty of any Basin Waste, reg­u­lar­ly clean both the Basin Waste and wher­ev­er applic­a­ble the over­flow area itself with warm soapy water.

For extra care, with an Unslot­ted Waste, reg­u­lar­ly check for clogs to ensure the waste is per­form­ing as it should, retain­ing quality.

With Slot­ted Basin Waste designs, be sure all slots are free of debris or pass­ing dirt that can accu­mu­late from fre­quent use.

Our full Spares Cat­a­logue, that includes parts for a large num­ber of our prod­ucts includ­ing our Basin Waste col­lec­tion, is avail­able to browse on our website.

Our Spares Brochure guar­an­tees that if a part does need to be changed, you can find the cor­rect com­po­nent quick­ly and eas­i­ly from us. Ensur­ing peace of mind.

If more infor­ma­tion is required, please con­tact our cus­tomer ser­vice department.