Have you ever had a pipe, that you just could not get to loosen no matter how big of pipe wrench you used?
Tighten it in, you have heard the term lefty loosie-righty tighty. Well just turn the wrench around and tighten it ever so little, as soon as you feel it move, go back to loosen, it will turn and come out.
Suspect the shower is leaking?
Well before you call a plumber and he tells you it is the tile or grout, and says here is your bill, Try this first, to eliminate tile grout and all other.
If you have an access panel, usually on same end as faucet and drain. remove panel as to look at pipes. REMEMBER water pipes generally leak all the time. Drain pipes when draining. Run water so only tub spout is running. If you see water above tub line could be a faulty faucet stem. No water there then if you see none on drain, start the shower head, if still no sign. Then check out when someone is using the shower. Your ceramic tile loses its glazing and will become porous, water will penetrate and appear as a plumbing leak. Use silicone to seal but this is just a temporary fix.
The humming garbage disposal, and not humming your favorite song either. How do I fix it myself?
Garbage disposals come with a unjamming tool, (picture below) in the bottom of the disposal is a hole for an allen wrench, octagon shape opening With the power off, insert tool in opening and turn any direction you can get it to go, keep turning until moving freely,remove tool, with power still off, look inside of disposal and make sure no silverware inside. After you are sure it is free, keeping hands away from disposal turn on power, 9 out of 10 times this will fix. Always run a lot of water. Also disposals have a reset on bottom, if during a jam it pops it is there to protect diposal from homeowners, just push it in with power off, it is usually on bottom next to unjam port. visit our INSINKERATOR page we have some good deals on up to 10 years of warranty.
I have poor pressure at both hot and cold on faucet, what can I do?
First check your aerator on end of faucet, sometimes the screen plugs and needs to be cleaned or changed.
The best solution is to rebuild faucet if it is a new one usually less than 5 years old, and a decent faucet, but sometimes the faucet was a home depot $19.95 special and it is not worth it. Sometimes it is just the cartridge in the faucet limed up, Rebuild it and clean it thourghly. If you are paying someone by the hour, before you know it you could have bought a new one.
Under the sink you should have shut offs for faucet, shut water off, and remove the spout, if it is a 2 handle, the spout is held on by 1 big screw cap. If it is a single handle, it involves removing handle and a cap then spout pulls straight up, remove cartridge, most rebuild kits come with o-rings for the spout, I like to clean the whole assembly, rebuild while you have apart if you have pressure, To check pressure when faucet is apart do this, Here is how I show the home owner, turn a drinking glass upside down over stub that is left reach under sink, turn water on you'll know right away if have pressure. Now really is all of this worth it, If you are doing yourself it is a good lesson on home repair, I have always recommended a new against rebuild and I have a hard time explaining that to a homeowner, whos faucet is only a couple of years old, but I will however rebuild the more expensive faucets, Sometimes both water lines just plugged shut at stops under sink over time and need new stops, they need to be addressed at sometime. When I replace a faucet, I install new shut offs and flush pipes into a 5 gallon pail. It saves a lot of problems in the long run.
I used to carry a CO2 tank on truck and used back pressure on faucets to temporarily fix, This was especially handy in areas of town that there just was no replacing faucets due to the old style. Especially when the ceramic tile was a factor, and was 3rd floor and all the galvanized pipes were plugged. Sometimes with galvanized piping it gets what I call hardening of the arteries, you can also backflush with water from another source or an air compressor. But you have to be careful and real handy to do this.Sometimes the customer is faced with the facts install new water pipes to the bathroom or kitchen.
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