Faucet Maintenance Will Prevent Headaches

Faucets in your house will not cease to function properly at a very frequent pace, but when a faucet packs it in it can cause quite a mess in your home. The most important part of preventing a really bad faucet accident that can cause considerable damage to a house is proper faucet maintenance. In other words, make sure that you take care of the problem as soon as you see kitchen faucets start to drip, instead of waiting to see how much water damage your kitchen cabinet can take! Most indoor plumbing problems are easy to remedy, even for the novice handyperson. There are some common leak problems within homes, and this article will help you decide how to deal with them.

The first common problem is leaky pipe joints within the kitchen. In the average house, the kitchen sees as much water flowing through it in a given day than any of the bathrooms. It is not surprising, then, that joints will spring leaks as time passes. In order to repair leaks, first locate the valve that controls the water output in the sink. Once you have located it, shut the water off. Next, remove the joint that is leaking and hold it up to the light. You should see light filtering through any holes or cracks in the line, and these need to be replaced. This can be done with plumber's tape, but make sure to wrap it tightly around the damaged portions. Once this is done, replace the joints and turn the water back on. If there is still a leak, you might have to repeat the process and check other areas, such as the fittings.

Another common problem area, especially in colder climates, is that pipes may freeze. This problem can be pretty annoying, as home owners will not always know which pipe it is that is frozen and is causing the problem. First, turn on all the faucets in your house. The ones that are not putting out water are the ones where the frozen pipe is attached. Shut off the faucets that are producing water and leave the other valves open. Now you will have to turn off the valve that brings water into the house.

There are several ways to thaw a pipe once you have located the frozen one. Determine the material the pipes are made of; a blow dryer or a heat gun can be used to thaw them out, but too much heat on a plastic line might melt it. If the ice plug formed due to a hole or crack in the pipe, you will want to repair it before your job is complete. In order to prevent more frozen pipes in the future you should consider wrapping them with insulation or heat tape, or building a heated space for the pipes to run through.

The writer Jerry Blackburn is very excited about areas related to kitchen cabinet and countertops. Recording his experience in works like www.kitchen-cabinets-tips.com/kitchen-faucets.html ,the reviewer demonstrated his skill on questions about kitchen faucets and countertops.

A leaking faucet could damage your kitchen cabinet

A broken faucet is not a common occurrence, but when it does happen it is a messy one. If you own your own home you have to expect these incidents from time to time. The key is not to panic when there is water spraying around the room, but to concentrate on finding out where the problem is and get it fixed. The solution to most indoor plumbing problems is a lot simpler than you expect. It helps to have a basic knowledge of the general plumbing issues that you might encounter and how to fix them, or even better, prevent them from occurring in the first place with a little faucet maintenance.

Your kitchen gets at least as much use as your bathroom and kitchen faucets can spring a leak just as easily as those in the bathroom. Often the leak is not spotted as quickly as some faucets are hidden with a kitchen cabinet. Fixing the leak is fairly simple. Firstly you need to turn off the water valve that leads to the kitchen sink. Remove the leaky section of pipe and hold it up to the light to check for cracks or holes. You will need to replace the part of the pipe that is damaged. Wrap the open end of the pipe in plumbers tape or Teflon tape, with four or five rounds. Put the pipe back together and hook up the faucet. Turn the water back on to check that there are no more leaks in the pipe.

Waking up to find you have a frozen water pipe may be annoying, but you will probably find trying to track down the offending pipe even more frustrating. Try all the different water systems in your house to determine how many pipes are actually frozen. Turn off the ones that are working but leave the valve open on the ones that are not producing water. Next you need to turn off the main water valve to the house. You can now try to thaw the pipes.

Check what kind of pipes you have under your house. They could be made from plastic, or from a metal alloy. You will need a hairdryer or heat gun to thaw out the pipes, but be careful with plastic pipes as it is possible to melt them with too much heat. Before crawling under your house to thaw the pipes, make sure you have a long enough extension cord, the thawing device, and a flashlight. You may need to repair a hole or split in the pipe, and that may be the cause of the ice plug. In this case you will need spare pipe and plumbers tape as well. Assuming there is no hole you can heat the pipe by running the hairdryer or heat gun over it in a swishing motion, for no more than five minutes. Turn the water main back on and make sure there aren't any leaks that you haven't spotted.

Of course it would be better to prevent the pipes from freezing in the first place and this can be achieved by surrounding them in a heated pipe space, or installing insulation around them. Wrapping the pipes with heat tape, which can be purchased at your local hardware store, can also do the trick.

Jerry Blackburn often writes long articles on problems corresponding to kitchen cabinet and countertops. Writing for detailed publications on kitchen faucets he expressed his depth of understanding in the field

Tales of the Often Underappreciated Kitchen Faucet

Hi, my name is Leaky (I hate that nickname but you gave it to me). I'm your kitchen faucet. I don't think you realize how important I am in your life. Stop and think for a moment how many times you touch me everyday. What about your children? They're up here pulling on my handle all the time with their grubby little hands, sometimes yanking too hard and causing me to loosen my screws a little bit more each time. I love your children, but they don't handle me with as much caution and some adults do.

Most of the time I go completely unnoticed. Sure, you use you all the time, but you don't really give me your undivided attention unless I'm dripping and annoying you. Hey, I get runny noses just like everyone else in the family, give me some doctoring!

I remember when you first saw me. I was sitting on the store shelf next to my brothers and sisters, and you were commenting about how much we cost, what features we had, what color we were and if we would be a good fit for your kitchen. I was so excited when you stopped to read my tags because I knew I was the perfect kitchen faucet for you. Then you crushed my hopes a little with your comments about how expensive I was. Good grief! I cost about $125 but your children are running you close to $10,000 a year! I see you look at them lovingly, but I just get a passing glance.

You compared me with my brothers and sisters and after a lot of grumbling you figured out what I knew all along. I was the perfect faucet for you. I am royalty you know. I'm related to all the best family lines; Moen, Kohler and Delta all have influenced my creation in some fashion.

I don't think the general public understands how important I really am. You go to the store expecting to pay about $20 for a faucet and then get angry when you see that quality costs money. We're no different than any other appliance or gadget in your kitchen; the best of us are higher priced. We also come with a lot of neat features such as multiple handles, hot and cold settings with a hundred variations in between, some of us are even gold plated! We protect your kids with anti scald devices and give you the one thing you can't live without: water. Why shouldn't we demand a fair price for our services?

Go on, enjoy your day, but would you please just once stop to notice my beauty and service to your family? Speaking for all ignored kitchen faucets we would all appreciate it. Thanks.

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Types of Faucets

Are your original faucets still in tip-top condition? If not, do they need repair or replacement already? Before repairing or replacing your faucet, first you have to identify your faucet type.

It is important that you know what types of faucets you used at home such as ball type, disc type, cartridge type, or compression type. The first three types are commonly referred to as “washerless faucets” because they do not use neoprene or rubber washers. The compression type, on the other hand, is the basic washer faucet that most household use.

Ball Faucets

Ball faucets are the first types of “washerless faucets”. These are commonly used in kitchen sinks and usually include a single handle that moves over a cap that is shaped like a rounded ball right above the base of the spout. But using ball faucets has a major disadvantage. They tend to leak more than the other types of faucets.

Disc Faucets

If the ball faucets are the first types of “washerless faucets”, the disc faucets are the latest types. You can easily identify these types once you see the single lever over their cylindrical body. These usually include two ceramic discs that are housed in a wide cartridge which slide over each other to control the flow of water and mix temperature. But unlike ball faucets, these are reliable and do not leak often.

Cartridge Faucets

These types of faucets operate with a movable stem cartridge that moves up and down to regulate water flow. You can identify these not by how they look but how they feel when they operate. Unlike the ball faucets, cartridge faucets operate in an up and down motion in order to adjust the volume of water and a left and right motion to adjust the temperature.

Compression Faucets

If the disc faucets are the latest types, the compression faucets are the opposite since these are the oldest types of faucets. You can recognize these types when you see hot and cold water handles and that in order to close off the flow of water, you have to tighten the handles down. These differ from the cartridge faucet because these require you to tighten down or compress the washer to close water flow while in cartridge faucet, you don’t have to put added pressure just to turn it off.

These are the different types of faucets. With this information in mind, you are off to a good start with your repair or replacement job.

Faucets provides detailed information on Faucets, Kitchen Faucets, Bathroom Faucets, Shower Faucets and more. Faucets is affiliated with Composting Toilets.

The Dripping Faucet in Every Organization

 

Each day millions of workers spend 8 hours or more at their respective jobs with many contributing to the dripping faucet within every organization. This faucet much like the leaking kitchen or bathroom faucet’s steadily waste drops of a previous resource – water – every minute of every day until fixed. Yet, the dripping faucet is considered a minor annoyance until the drips become steadier. During this time, thousands of gallons of water are wasted costing the owner probably more money than it took to correct the problem.

Organizations also have dripping faucets not only in their physical plants, but within their people’s productivity. During the last 5 years, I have surveyed thousands of individuals who all believe that their plates are full, but admit to wasting a minimum of 12 minutes each day. For employees who are paid $30,000 not including benefits, this amounts to $14.42 each week for the one lost hour of work or $721.12 annually. If you have a facility with 50 people, the annual cost is at least $35,056. For organizations with at least 1,400 employees, the annual cost rises a minimum of $1,000,000. Dripping faucets are very expensive!

How can you repair this expensive drain on your limited resources? First, consider that most people don’t intentionally come to work to waste your resources. Their performance in many cases is a result of lack of knowledge and skills supported by negative attitudes and habits. These negative attitudes and habits probably contribute much more to their performance.

Second, begin to ask questions about how the organization is communicating its message. If you were to survey 10% of your employees from upper, middle and front line levels and asked them to name the top 3 goals of the organization, would you receive the EXACT SAME ANSWER from each individual. Different responses contribute to people not knowing what they may need to do next and contribute to that ongoing dripping faucet.

Third, determine if your employees truly understand how to plan and achieve their personal goals. If your employees are achieving their personal goals, the likelihood of them achieving corporate goals has been greatly enhanced. Time management is the apex of goal planning and achievement. If individuals don’t have goals, then why worry about time?

Fourth, as you train your employees include interpersonal development along with the job specific skills. If your company promotes from within, the individual is recognized for her or his job specific skills. However, as these individuals moved up through the organization, job specific skills become less while interpersonal skills become greater. Yet, much of the training fails to develop these individuals and the result is that these individuals leave which increases bottom line costs or return to their original position again increasing bottom line costs.

Five, finally, think about the words that you select. For example, ask your employees how they are investing their time instead of spending their time? Frame your questions and statements using positive words that generate powerful mental images. People hear words, but they think in pictures.

Six, align your systems, strategies and people to create loyal internal customers that discover those “moments of truth” leading to external customers. Southwest Airlines understands the power of alignment.

These are just 6 ideas that will help you begin to repair your dripping faucets. So, grab the toolbox and begin to create a culture that does not support wasting your resources, but instead looks to invest them. Remember, the faucet continues to drip and this is very expensive.

Leanne Hoagland-Smith, M.S. President of ADVANCED SYSTEMS, is the Process Specialist. With over 25 years of business and education experience, she implements and realigns processes to build sustainable change for individuals and organizations and delivers ROI solutions within a variety of industries. As co-author of M.A.G.I.C.A.L. Potential:Living an Amazing Life Beyond Purpose to Achievement due for August 2005 release, Leanne speaks nationally to a variety of audiences. If you desire AMAZING RESULTS, please call Leanne a call at 219.759.5601 or leanne@processspecialist.com. http://www.processspecialist.com/organizations.htm

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