Urine stains on your toilet can be an unpleasant mess and embarrassing. These stains form accidentally on the toilet seats, especially with more traffic to the toilet. The process of eliminating the stains might appear complicated, but it’s easy. In this guide, you will find out the causes of the yellow stains on the toilet seat and how to eliminate them and have a sparkling white toilet seat.
What Cause the Yellow Stains on the Toilet Seat?
Four factors may lead to the yellow toilet seat, and they include:
Excessive use
Toilets may change color if used for an extended period. Just like any other household item, the toilets seats also get old, fades, and finally turn yellow.
Hard Water
Hard water has minerals like magnesium, calcium, and iron. If you have hard water in the house, it may be one of the factors causing yellow stains. The minerals can damage the white toilet seat and turn it yellow.
Check this too: How to Clean a Toilet With Pumice Stone
UV sun rays
If you contact UV rays, they can harm your skin and turn it red. If the same rays fall onto your toilet, they turn the toilet seat yellow or brown.
Urine stains
If you fail to clean your toilet regularly, the urine mess may accumulate and turn the seat yellow. Over time, bacteria will grow on the stains and produce an awful smell. Urine contains a high amount of protein and calcium. These elements react with each other forming a uric scale.
The scale deposits on the toilet seats lead to yellow stains. The urine also gets absorbed on the porcelain seat, causing stains. Since the urine is acidic, the stains become permanent and hard to remove if you fail to clean the seat for a long time.
How Do You Get Yellow Stains off Toilet Seats?
There are various ways to eliminate urine stains on the toilet seat.
- Use of vinegar
- Baking soda
- Use of bleach
- Coke soda
- Citric acid-based cleaner
- Hydrogen peroxide and baking soda
- Baking soda and elbow grease
What You Require
- Rubber gloves
- Vinegar
- Hydrogen peroxide
- Baking soda
- Coke
- Bleach
- Toilet cleaner
- Toile scrub/ sponge
- Towel/ paper
- Old toothbrush
- Elbow grease
Removing urine stains using vinegar
Vinegar is a suitable liquid that’s readily available at home. It’s very abrasive, and you can use it to remove plastic toilet seat yellowing. Follow the cleaning guidelines listed below;
- Assemble several paper towels, damp them with vinegar, and cover the toilet seat.
- Allow the damp paper towel to sit on the toilet for a few hours. This step makes it easy to scrub off the stains on the seat. After 2 or 3 hours, remove the paper towels.
- Using a scrubber, scrub your toilet thoroughly. You can keep adding some vinegar as you clean until the seat becomes clean.
- Apply disinfectant on the seat to kill germs and dry it with a towel.
Clean urine stains using baking soda
- Apply a toilet cleaner with disinfectant on the toilet seat. Let it sit for 15 minutes on the seat, and then wipe it off with a towel.
- Make a baking soda paste using a generous amount of powder and some little water.
- Use a scrubber and scrub the toilet thoroughly as you sprinkle some water. Later apply the powder paste on the stains and keep cleaning to remove the stains.
- Rinse the toilet and check if there are stains left. If there are some, keep scrubbing and then rinse it off.
- Wipe the toilet dry with a towel and apply some disinfectant. This process should result in a clean white plastic toilet seat.
Using bleach to remove yellow stains
Bleach is a powerful disinfectant, making it the best to clean the toilet. However, it’s a skin irritant, and you should be careful while using it and wear gloves. In addition, using bleach may be labor-intensive (with a lot of scrubbing), but it gives good results.
- While wearing your gloves, measure a good amount of the bleach and pour it onto the toilet bowl.
- First, add water into a bucket and mix it with bleach. Then, remove the toilet seat and submerge it into the bucket solution. Let the seat sit for around 30 minutes and then scrub it to remove the urine stains.
- Scrub the other toilet parts like the seat cover bowl and rinse them with clean water. After, dry the toilet with a clean towel.
- Replace the toilet seat if it’s clean.
Removing stains using hydrogen peroxide
For a porcelain toilet, hydrogen peroxide will remove stains without damaging the original shine of the bowl.
- Prepare a mixture using hydrogen peroxide and baking soda. Mix 3% of hydrogen peroxide with two parts of baking soda.
- Use a toothbrush and apply the paste over the stains. Let the paste sit for 40 minutes, and then scrub it away.
Coke soda
Coke is a fizzy drink with highly corrosive phosphoric acid. Using the soda on your toilet seat will remove the stains though you need much coca-cola. The only disadvantage is that the soda isn’t a disinfectant. However, you can make the coke effective by mixing it with baking soda.
Pour a large amount of coke on the stains and spread a spoonful of baking soda. The two will react and form a foam. Allow this foam to sit on the stains for hours, and then scrub and rinse it.
Citric acid-based cleaners
Though the method is laborious, it still removes urine stains. You can buy these toilet cleaners and use them to wash the toilet seat.
Toilet seat cleaning using baking soda and elbow grease
The mixture can eliminate the unattractive sight of the toilet seat and create a shiny white appearance.
- Apply some disinfectant cleaner on the toilet seat and wipe it off after 10 minutes.
- Measure a ¼ of baking soda and pour it into a container. Add 50 ml of elbow grease and mix to form a paste.
- Smear the paste on the urine stains and let it sit for 20 minutes.
- Scrub the seat with a sponge or brush and keep sprinkling some water. Rinse the paste, clean water, and dry the seat.
- Apply disinfectant on the surface and wipe it off with a damp cloth.
Commercial Products
If you consider buying commercial cleaners, the following can be helpful. Ensure you follow the given cleaning procedure on each product keenly for the best results.
- Limescale remover
- Clorox Automatic Toilet Bowl Cleaner Tablet
- Mr. Clean magic eraser – best for tough stains
- Urine remover like Clorox
How to Prevent Urine from Staining Toilet Seat or Bowl
Urine stains are embarrassing and can change the toilet seat from white to yellow or brown. Though there are ways to eliminate the stains, it’s best to prevent them from occurring. There are several ways to ensure you don’t deal with stains.
- Clean your toilet with a cleaner regularly. It’s best you don’t wait until the stains occur to scrub the toilet thoroughly.
- Again, advise your family members to use the toilet appropriately to avoid stains. Teach the little ones how to pee without spilling on the toilet seat.
Conclusion
Apply the methods explained above to remove urine staining on a toilet bowl. Choose whatever ingredient is available to you, whether homemade or commercial products. Again, choose according to the effectiveness of the product.
For stubborn stains, you may require to apply more than one method. However, the bottom line is to get your toilet seat sparkling clean in the least time possible.