Croydex Rutland Flexi-Fix Soft Close Wooden Toilet Seat - Quick Release Button for Easy Cleaning, Adjustable Hinges with Top and Bottom Fixings, Anti-Bacterial and Heavy Duty Toilet Seat (Solid Oak)

I am very pleased with this seat - it looks good, is comfortable, and was very easily fitted (contrary to some of the reviewers I found the instructions easy to follow, and the whole process very simple). There is the very slightest “wobble”, but this is due to the attachment-detachment mechanism (which is very good, btw, and certainly makes cleaning easier), but the seat doesn’t feel unstable. The closure speed is okay - although I’m sure over time it’ll need tightening.

Nice toilet seat. Packaged nicely, and arrived quickly. Looks nice in place, and is constructed with nice materials. So why 4 stars rather than 5?I'll describe the reason for the loss of 1 star first - then I will describe the seat fully - as it is a good toilet seat, and I would recommend to others, (and indeed I will buy additional versions of this seat for our other bathrooms in due course - however I will re-model the fixings to correct the problem).The problemIn fairness, this is possibly a little harsh - but the fixings supplied are nice - but not as solid as they could easily be. The manufacturer has not "skimped", and the design of the fixings is really clever, however by supplying them as they are, you cannot get the seat to be "solidly" in place, unless you put such a pressure on the bolts as to risk cracking the pan.I used the "top fittings". These provide nicely made rubberised plugs with integral brass threaded bolts which fatten up the rubber fitting clamping the seat in place as you tighten them. You then tighten the bolts to secure in place. I felt 15Nm torque on the allen keys to be the maximum I dare risk on a porcelain fitting, (15Nm is quite tight - roughly equal to the tightest you can get with the supplied Allen key). Even with 15Nm, there is still a small amount of play in the fitting, which is a little frustrating, and is less secure than the old non-soft-close, (and broken), seat was.The design of the fitting is actually lovely, in that there is a secure pad which - once pressed in place - makes the hinge un-removable without replacing that pad; i.e. you can remove the seat hinge, but would not be able to replace it and re-fit it once you've removed it once. This sticky pad is nice - but in my case I've discovered that the seat - although not "wobbly" - is just not solidly in place. I'd like to take if off, and fashion a plastic washer to spread the load on the hinge mounting, so that it is properly secure for a given torque, rather than as with mine, wobbling slightly.The seat as delivered - actually very lovely, and would get 5 stars, certainly.The seat is in nice quality solid-oak, slightly pale, but really nice texture, with a matt lacquer. Comfortable to sit on, and easy to clean. We have oak doors and cupboards in our bathrooms - and this seat looks nice in that setting. Quality is good, and grain on the wood is lovely as well. The seat has a nice chromed hinge mechanism which gives a soft close to both the lid and the seat. Very nice.Some reviewers have commented that the seat-close wears quickly, and the lid bangs down after a short while. This is simply the hinge bedding in - and you would expect this will all such components. At the end of the hinge is a removable flap - and if you want to speed up or slow down the hinge-fall, simply tighten or loosen the bolt. When new, the plastic in the hinge will bed in. Ours opens and closes fine now, but if it speeds up, or slams, I'll simply tighten the bolt.Another lovely feature is for cleaning - there's a little button on the hinge which you press allowing you to lift off the whole seat, so you can clean it over the sink, and also clean the hard-to-reach bits of the hinge itself. The whole thing is so nicely made, I doubt we'll bother removing it for cleaning - but it is surely a nice feature. The hinge base - some have commented that this over time has rusted. I think the manufacturer has listened to this feedback, and ours is in heavy-duty plastic, with a chrome-plated plastic removable cover - again super-nice for cleaning. With the plastic cover on, it is indistinguishable from a solid stainless steel fixing, but can never rust, and simply clips off to clean under the tap if you have sons with a particularly bad aim... This will never rust - can never rust !!One area the manufacturer could improve on is the 4 feet which sit underneath the seat itself and hold the seat off the pan. These are hard plastic. If I were designing this seat, I'd use slightly softer silicone-plastic, so that the seat sits a little more securely on the pan - i.e. the feet are a bit more "grippy". A super-minor point, but hopefully the manufacturer will look at this.FittingThis is easy, and instructions are clear. Took 10 mins start-to-finish. They advise putting cling film over the toilet pan to stop you dropping bolts in. This is nice advice, (but don't bother unless you have super-wide cling film - mine was not super-wide, and every bolt I dropped simply rolled right in to the water!) Not a problem though :-).Size-setting and locating on the seat is actually a real joy - and streets better than anything else I have seen. This is a truly lovely design-element. You place the hinge fixings in place, then attach the seat itself. You then rotate the hinge-bases, until the seat is exactly where you want it on the pan. Then you simply push down on the hinge-bases, which glues them in place with the contact adhesive they come with, (you first have to remove the covering for these). After that, all you need to is tighten up the allen keys and you are finished. I have never seen a nicer fixing than this !!SummaryI fully recommend this toilet seat, and am pleased I bought it. I hope the manufacturer looks again at the top-fixings, and makes them a lit more solidly in place. The problem is that the allen-key bolt, when tightened, is still about 5mm away from the top of the porcelain - and because of that gap, it will always wobble a bit; if you filled the gap around that 5mm with a hard-plastic internal washer, then it would spread the load across the rest of the hinge-fitting. I shall buy a few more of these seats for our other bathrooms, and fashion these load-spreaders before I fit - but would be nice if the manufacturer could do this for others! On balance I fully recommend this seat.

I wanted a solid oak toilet seat as I don't like cold or plastic toilet seats and I wanted it to never move. I've bought many cheaper seats before, but it always ended up being false economy. This one cost more than double than any other toilet seat I've had and I'm thinking of getting another for the downstairs toilet. It is well finished, no rough edges or any splinters, looks posh, was easy to fix and the feet on the underside that sit on the bowl are sturdy ones compared to the cheap hollow plastic junk that most others seem to use. I fitted it without taking the protective bit off the sticky pads as I figured I could stick it down later if it ever moved, it hasn't moved a millimetre in months. The whole hinge at the back is definitely part of the solid feel of the seat, it is metal, not plastic, and the chrome finish fits well with the overall design. I'm not a fan of the soft close idea, but for what it's worth, now that I have it I use it and that works well too. If there was a version without soft close for a few quid less I'd have opted for it. Cleaning is quick, press the button, release it, pull the seat up and the whole seat and hinge bar is out of the way, genius. I have a friend that is a handyman and he loves fitting these because he never gets a callback for a moving seat. Saved on my wishlist for the future and to easily find it to send a link to anyone that needs a recommendation.

The seat was installed correctly, to manufacturer’s guidelines, and only within a few months it has completely degraded in quality and function. All of the hinges have rusted or spotted, the covering flaking off when I haven’t used abrasive cleaning products - this suggests a cheap finish was used. The seat slides around and one side has become wholly unstuck while the other is warped underneath. One of the quick release brackets has somehow come loose and won’t click back into place, so it’s hanging on via one side. So disappointing as I finally found a supposedly good quality seat that fits my toilet, and within a few months it’s a mess. There’s only me in the house, so it’s not as if the thing gets an excessive amount of traffic either. I dread to think how easily it would crumble under a family of four!

Very solid and really easy to fit

We read the reviews. Users find it awkward to fit, the hinge doesn't grip well, and it fails within a short time. And yet we bought it anyway. We needed a new seat, and looking around this was the best deal. For the money, you get a good solid hardwood seat. And hinges can be replaced.We thought we may as well start with the hinge supplied. As reviewers said, it had flimsy fittings which were hard to get into place, and are only partly supported by the porcelain. The top-fitting parts were unusable, they don't fit our loo, but the bottom-fitting parts were ok. There are no top washers for the bolts, nothing supports them but a couple of ridges of plastic. The seat is firm at the moment but is only really held by the glue pads. However, it looks great!When the hinge fails - I give it 6 months, if used carefully - we will buy a set of standard loo fittings for it (we're not worried about the soft-close), then I expect it to last for many years. It will be a simpler DIY job than fitting the original!

closing not quiet rapid get your figgers out of the way, easy to fit used bottom fixing .much better.