Six Steps To Repairing A Faucet

You might have a leaking faucet in the house that you think you can't repair by yourself. The truth is that you don't always have to call a plumber. In fact, you can save a lot of money by doing the replacement all by yourself.

You just need the right materials and you need to know the steps that you should go through to replace a faulty faucet. Here are the things that you should do to do just that.

• Buy the right faucet – Not all faucets are the same size or same make. You need to find a faucet that fits exactly in the place where your old faucet currently is.

The other thing is that it should be the same size as the hole in the sink or bath that you need to place it in. Also, make sure that you have the right tools to make sure that the operation of replacing the faucet goes smoothly with no hitches.

• Stop running water – Before unscrewing any pipes or removing faucets, you need to turn off your water supply. This means stopping water from flowing through the pipes because you cannot possibly replace a faulty faucet while the water is bursting out of the pipe.

• Loosen the faucet – You can't just unscrew a faucet and screw in a new one. It may sound that simple but it takes a lot of effort and concentration to do this correctly. You need to use a wrench to loosen the nuts underneath your sink where the pipes run. This will separate the sink and the pipes and therefore your faucet as well.

• Remove the faucet – If you are ready to remove the faucet, make sure that it is not stuck to the sink. Make sure you separate the faucet from the sink slowly so that you don't damage the sink in the process. Once you have that done, clean the sink and the area where you will place the new faucet.

• Putty the pipe – The next step is to make sure you apply putty to the pipe side of the faucet. There is special putty that plumbers use around the base of the faucet and this is used so that the faucet is held in place properly on the sink. Some faucets are already sold with gaskets which makes the putty useless so make sure of what you have first before buying things that you don't need.

• Mount the faucet – Place the faucet where it's supposed to go on the sink, making sure that the faucet is in the right position and that it is not loose. You can then place the washers and nuts that will hold it in place. Tighten these with a wrench again and check that everything is in place. Further tighten everything once it is in the right place and check that the sink is not tilted in any way and that there are no leaks in the pipe area. By this time you have finished a very simple job that might be a little tiring.