Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => The Knowledge => OT Knowledge => Topic started by: drossall on 14 November, 2021, 06:02:38 pm
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Our kitchen taps are dripping. I've just checked and they've got DTC 32 cartridges. I can match up replacements, I'm sure, with a bit of reading, but why? What is the advantage of these abominations over traditional taps that took the 1p washers that I've fitted so many times before? And why does it have to be so complicated that, I read, professional plumbers will often suggest replacing the taps?
Can I still buy a kitchen mixer tap that takes proper washers? For one thing, it would be more environmentally friendly!
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I had this and bought a replacement cartridge. But before I fitted it I dismantled the old one and applied a light smear of vaseline on the ceramic faces.
That was two years ago and it's the kitchen cold tap. Still not dripping.
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Dripping isn't actually a good description of what's happening. The flow is just slow to stop when you turn the tap off.
But my main point is, why has a perfectly good design been replaced with something far more wasteful to fix?
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That's Market Forces. And Capitalism.
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Style over substance. We had our Blanco cartridge tap replaced with the cheapest Plumb Centre mixer.
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Annoys me too. Most of these apparently were not properly greased before installation. I have to pull one apart, descale and grease then keep it as a spare for next time.
There's little profit in tap washers.
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So traditional designs are still available? I haven't checked. I think I might swap ours back too, for something that Just Works.
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I have had several traditional taps where the seats get eroded so drip even when the washers are replaced and have to be re-cut by a plumber (or someone with the specialist tools). This fix lasts a while then it starts to drip again and then the entire tap needs replacing. (and if you are unlucky like I was once, the tap is corroded in so badly that the basin gets cracked trying to get it out!)
A ceramic cartridge swap is a 5min fix that anyone can do and generally lasts for years if the cartridges are decent quality.
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We have this problem. The ceramic ones take less than five minutes to change and cost about four quid. They generally last about 18 months, maybe a bit more. Doing the first one was a palaver that lasted an hour or more. Now i don't even think about it. I have a note of which ones to buy, this is important as there are dozens of designs on the market. But once you've sorted it, problem solved.
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Reseating a traditonal tap is not difficult as the tool screws into the tap body and they are not expensive. My 1/4 turn cartridges costs a bit more than four quid ( Franke Ascona). In a similar vein simple, reliable, traditional siphonic wc valves have been replaced by all this push button bottom feed types of legion design, but all more expensive.
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Main disadvantage of a trad tap is when gorilla hands person comes along and over tightens them. That can make it nearly impossible for someone with weak hands to open them, plus they damage the washers (which then leak until replaced).
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Now i don't even think about it. I have a note of which ones to buy, this is important as there are dozens of designs on the market. But once you've sorted it, problem solved.
When we had to replace the whole tap as we couldn't find replacement ceramic valves we made sure to get the part number for the new valves and noted it on my phone. Also bought a pair of replacements straight away and taped them to the pipes under the sink so they don't get lost in the garage/shed mess and are readily available when the existing ones inevitably start leaking.
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Normal washered taps can't be overhauled after a year's service around here, due to the hard water seizing everything up. Same goes for ball valves. You always need a whole new one. You can still get cartridges out, though.
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I had to replace the traditional bathroom taps this year, because years of hard water had made it impossible to get at the washer.
I had a cartridge type start to drip the other week. The tap is only about 3 years old. The cartridges aren’t in the local shops, so had to be ordered. But the drip stopped before they arrived - I’m not sure if it was just being taken apart and put back, or whether it was a temperature change.
So, like RZ, the cartridges are looking less wasteful so far.
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I've had a ceramic cartridge start to drip etc. and found that if I can't see any sediment etc. causing the problem, then invisible scale could be causing it. A dismantling and a soak/scrub in descaler might do the trick - it has worked for me on a particular tap that seemed to be developing drips more often than a ceramic cartridge should do. I replaced the cartridge the first time but not since - iirc, I have descaled it twice in about 10 years now.
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Does anybody know if the actual cartridge inners are available separately? A bag of them and a small tub of the appropriate grease would keep my cartridges going for decades.
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My kitchen tap started leaking, and I fixed it with a new O-ring easily. That was a quarter turn tap.
My bathroom taps never turned off and they were "traditional" ones, and were beyond repair. I've recently had the plumber change them to quarter turn taps (while he was in for a boiler service, and so it was his responsibility for a failure as opposed to my DIY). Not only am I looking forwards to it being an easier fix in the future, but the kids are now remembering to turn the taps off after using the loo as it's just a flick of the lever instead of "nearly" screwing them shut.