What is Toilet Bidet? | How to Choose, Use, and Maintain it

About Toilet Bidet

A toilet seat is getting popular among consumers and it is helpful to know what bidet does for us. This article has been written for general information on bidets intending for you to understand bidets, how to choose the right seat considering the dimension and shape of your existing toilet bidet, how to use it, and how to maintain it.

General considerations in choosing a bidet

There are some factors to consider before choosing the right bidet. Most of the bidet seats shall work with your existing toilet, however, there are certain toilets having a French curve that may not work with the seats.  Therefore, you should check with your toilet for dimension, shape, water opening, wattage, and water pressure before choosing the right seat.    This article also covers information about the LivingStar Bidet Toilet Seats that are available for you to choose from.

What a bidet seat does for you?

The toilet bidet helps to clean up without needing wipes. It cleans up completely with comprehensive built-in bidet functions  Especially, heated seat, warm water wash, and dry function make better blood circulation that may help improve hemorrhoids and constipation if used properly.

what a best bidet does for you - bidet benefits

How do I choose the right bidet toilet seat?

You may need to check the functions you need versus the cost you want to pay for. Generally, the more comprehensive functions, the more cost of buying the seat.  Some of the factors for your buying decision are as follows:

  • Washing: posterior wash, feminine wash, turbo wash, kid’s wash
  • Washing modes: oscillation of nozzle for wider area clean coverage and massage effect.

toilet bidet - wash

  • Adjustment of water temperature, water pressure, seat temperature, and warm air dryer.
  • Spraying warm water via nozzle functions (one pocket 2 or 3 holes, self-cleaning); nozzle plays a very important role for a bidet. (check for stainless or non-stainless,  how many holes are available for an exclusive wash for posterior or bidet wash)
  • Nightlight
  • Water filter (some regions may need a water filter to protect the unit from impurities in the water)
  • Remote control

bidet toilet seats functional keyboard layout - demonstration

  • Tankless vs. Tank type (Instant heating is a synonym for tankless and constant heating is referred to as tank-type); Tankless heating is more hygienic than tank-type and saves energy since there is No tank to heat up the water.  No tank means No bacteria or viruses built in the tank.
  • Energy-saving mode
  • Body sensor to prevent an accidental key stokes; it ensures to disable the functional keys until you are seated.

What are the bidet installation considerations?

There are several checkpoints about your toilet bowl and surroundings at the installation site; this audit shall help you save time and money before purchasing a bidet.  Below is the graphical presentation of the checkpoints:

check points for choosing bidet

 

Check the dimensions of your toilet

Check your toilet’s dimensions, shape, and distance from the tank to the bowl.  The distance requirement may differ from model to model.  Check the diagram below for reference to the measurements. Note that French curve toilets won’t fit with LivingStar Bidet Toilet Seats.  To find further details about the French curve and one-piece toilets, and why they won’t work well with most of the bidets, click here. 

  1. Measure the distance between the two toilet bolt holes of your toilet.
  2. Measure the distance between the toilet bolt hole to the toilet tank.
  3. Measure the distance between the toilet bolt hole to the front edge of the toilet bowl.

LivingStar Toilet Bidet Seat

Find out what shape you will need: Elongated or Round variation.

Also, check the bidet shape for choosing the right one.  Usually, the length of the round shape runs between 19″ to 20″, and the elongated shape measures between 20.2″ to 21.5″.

  Elongated Shape  Round Shape
easy install bidet toilet seat - Elongated Bidet easy install bidet toilet seat - round seat dimension

 

For further details about shape variations, click here.

Power requirement of the bidet seat and availability of wattage at your restroom.

A typical wattage of a bidet seat requires between 1000 to 1300 Watts depending on the comprehensive functions available of the seat.  You should check your power availability at your restroom before installing the seat.  Short wattage creates problems with blackouts or units going off due to lacking proper power.  If you have not checked and installed the bidet, the best way to check is to run the bidet while turning on a hairdryer in the restroom.  If both are working then you have enough wattage, otherwise, try to use only one device at a time.

Check the ground of your power source

If your power source is not properly grounded, you will experience unexpected and various issues while you are using the seat.  Ensure your power source has proper ground.

Check water pressure from the source

Lack of water pressure sometimes creates an issue in delivering proper water pressure to the unit.  Proper water pressure should be between 0.07 to 0.74 Mpa.   If you believe you have a water source below this level, for instance, your intended installation site is above ground level, then we recommend a tank-type bidet seat. However, improper water pressure still could be an issue to use continuous washing since it takes time to fill and heat water in the tank.

Can I install the seat by myself?

Many people can install a bidet seat by themselves.  However, you may need professional assistance, if the water opening or shape of the toilet may be abnormal.

Other Considerations for choosing your toilet bidet

You should also consider some of the other bidet functions described below:

1. Detachability for a complete cleaning of the unit

The toilet seat needs to be completely cleaned regularly including the unreachable bottom part. There would be some contaminant deposits underneath the bidet over time. Therefore, the unit has to be detachable so that you can clean the underneath.

2. Material of the bidet built, especially the seat and lid

For a long use of the toilet bidet, we highly recommend using a bidet made of PP material, proven to be stronger than ABS material.

3. Kid’s Wash (if you have any children to use it)

4. Turbo Wash

5. Automatic Wash

6. Oscillation

7. Dual Control for remote and side panel keyboard

8. Waterproof keyboard

9. Body sensor

How do I maintain my bidet toilet seat?

Consider a toilet filter (some regions may need it)

We recommend using one of the helpful bidet seat attachments, a toilet filter, which provides to filter impurities incoming water.  Some regions contain excessive lime that can be purified either using an external water filter or internal filter or both.   You may want to replace the filter every 6 months or sooner, depending on the frequency of the seat use.

bidet water filter livingstar

Detachable bidet toilet

Molds and urine marks are developed after months of use without cleaning up the unit.  We recommend detaching the unit from the toilet using a one-touch detach button to release the unit.  Then, use a soft cloth with warm water to clean up the unit.  Ensure to dry the unit completely before reinstalling the bidet toilet seat.

Bidet Nozzle Cleaning

The bidet nozzle can be manually cleaned up. The keyboard sequence to move the nozzle from the base for clean-up depends on each model of the LivingStar bidet toilet seat.   Ensure not to press unnecessary force when you clean up the bidet nozzle.  Also, be careful not to clog up the holes in the bidet nozzle.

How to Clean Bidet

LivingStar Bidet Toilet Seats are available in different models that you can choose from. Check each model and find what you need.

Cleaning Toilet Seat

Many people find cracks or imperfect bidet surfaces a few months or a year later. The issues are most likely from the strong cleaning chemicals, which tend to slowly tend to develop cracks in the seat or lid, especially if the bidet material is made of ABS. When you clean the unit, try to use a wet and soft towel for cleaning the toilet seat.  Never use any hard or strong chemical agent to clean up the unit.  Read the further details on How to Prevent Cracks.

For a complete guide to cleaning a bidet unit, including a bidet sprayer, click the How to Clean Up Bidet.

Use Bidet Energy Saving Mode

The built-in Energy Saving mode of the Living Star bidet seats has the ability to put the system in sleep mode, which makes the system use minimum energy, saving you money.  Well not only the energy-saving mode saves you money, but also it makes your seat long use.  A bidet seat is vulnerable to heat and pressure; therefore, the longer use of the heated seat, the more chance of cracks to be developed.  Once you are seated, the energy-saving mode will be disabled and all the settings will be enabled, including the seat temperature that you set already.

How to use a bidet seat?

1. Set your preferred seat, water, and air temperature via the control keyword

Try the different levels of settings while you are seated.  Note that the body sensor detects if you are not seated, then the functional keys are all disabled; therefore you must be seated to change the settings.

2. Use simple wash functions: bidet or posterior wash in the beginning

3. Once you are familiar with the basic wash function, then try others such as Turbo Wash, and Automatic Wash with Oscillation.

4. Repeat wash until you feel cleaned and completed.

5. Once the wash process is done, then use the air dry function.  You may want to use multiple drying processes.

About LivingStar Bidet Toilet Seats

A functional overview of Living Star Bidets models: 5900, 7100, 7500, and 7900 is described below. You may like to know each model’s capabilities and available functions.

Living Star has provided affordable and high-quality bidet toilet seat solutions since its foundation.  Tankless is an instant heating method, that provides energy efficiency without having any tank in the unit.  No tank means No chance of having bacteria or molds develop in the unit.   The best way to provide personal hygiene.   Comprehensive washing, drying, and automatic bidet use are available via a full stainless steel nozzle with exclusive holes for washing modes. 

 Living Star Toilet Bidet Comparison Overview

5900 7500 7900 7100
Tankless
Full Stainless Nozzle

Nozzle holes for exclusive wash

2

3

3

2

Posterior/Bidet Wash
Oscillation Wash      Automated
Kid’s / Auto Wash    N/A
Turbo Wash    N/A N/A
Energy Save Mode
Remote   N/A N/A
Air Dryer 3 5 5 5
Water pressure 3 5 5 5
Water Temperature 3 4 4 4
Seat Temperature 3 4 4 4
Nozzle position N/A 5 5 5
Nozzle Cleaning Auto or Manual Auto or Manual Auto or Manual Auto or Manual
Nightlight N/A
Water Filter
Body sensor
Device Safety
Measurement 20.27(L) x 17.40(W) x 6.29(H)

8.15 LBS

20.27(L) x 17.40(W) x 6.29(H)

8.15 LBS

21.02 (L) x 15.98(W)  x 6.37(H)

7.93 LBS

21.14 (L) x 15.82 (W) x 6.06(H)

7.49 LBS

 

Check further details of each Bidet Toilet Seat 

Bidet Toilet Seats by Living Star shall bring you high value with comprehensive functions for your need.  We shall provide diligent and high-quality services for our customers.