If you have a leaking faucet on your kitchen sink, bathroom sink or even your tub faucet is leaking, there are a few things you can do yourself to stop the faucet from leaking. A leaking faucet can water several gallons of water and day and hundreds or thousands of gallons of water a year for no good reason. Most faucets are repairable meaning you can buy replacement parts from local plumbing supply stores or even a local hardware store.
The most common things that will go wrong with a faucet are the stem and the seat. Some older faucets will use packing, which is a bit different then the standard faucet but this type can also be repaired easily for only a few dollars. You can repair most faucets and shower valves with a few specialty plumbing tools that can be bought at the same place you buy your replacement faucet parts.
If you are unsure how to fix the faucet yourself you could always stop down at a local Home Depot or Lowes and take a class that will show you how to do basic plumbing repairs. Alternatively if you feel that you will not be able to do any of these repairs yourself then you might want to consider hiring someone. It is also more affordable and ECO-Friendly to repair your faucet then to just replace it. Repairing a existing faucet can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours but save you hundreds of dollars in the long run.
How To Repair Leaking Tub Faucets
If your tub faucet is leaking you will first have to determine if you have a washer type faucet or a cartridge type. If you have a three stem that uses washers and seats you will want to replace both the washer and the seat. If you tub / shower faucet is one that uses a cartridge you will want to remove the handle and then replace the cartridge.
How To Replace The Seat And Washer
If your faucet has a washer and a seat you will first need to remove the stem from the valve body. Once you have removed the stem from your valve body you will want to remove the center screw from the washer and then remove the washer from the stem. You then will want to take the new washer and place in on the stem and then reinsert and tighten down the center screw.
After you have replace the washer you will also want to replace the seat. You can take your seat removal tool and remove the seat from the valve body. Once you have the old seat removed you will want to replace it with a new seat and then tighten it down with you seat tool.
Once you have replaced both the seat and the washer you can reinsert the stems back into the valve body. You then will want to tighten the stems into the valve body and test to make sure that your tub valve or faucet is no longer leaking.
Why Should I Stop My Faucets From Leaking?
There are many reasons you should stop all of your faucets from leaking. The most import reason why you should stop all your leaking and dripping faucets is because it’s a total waste of perfectly good resources. The next reason is that a leaking faucet or tub valve can cause your water bill to be more expensive because your just wasting water.
Anyone Can Help Save The Earths Precious Water
No matter what your skill set you can help in some way to save water. You can DIY and replace the washers, stems, seats and cartridges. You could train to be a master plumber and then repair other peoples leaking faucets. You could work in a plumbing supply store and educate consumers of the value of watersense faucets. You could also call a licensed master plumber and him / her repair the faucets for you.
The most import thing is that you take action in some way to decrease the amount of water that is being wasted from your faucets or shower valves.