Bathroom Tap ... which bit snapped?

[StevieBoy]

Turned the bath tap, went about a quarter of a turn, met some resistance, then a snapping noise. Water was coming out normally. Turned the tap off, water stopped. Turned tap back on, nothing, not a drip.

Tried to see if I'd got an airlock by covering up the mixer element and using hot, but nothing.

Can't get to the taps to remove them as it entails removing *most* of the bathroom, a large plywood box section, and lots of tiling to get to the tap end. Don't you just love it when that happens? :)

The mixer tap (looks the cheapest of the cheap) is the original one that was put in when the house was built 19 years ago. We were planning to gut and re-do the bathroom, but not for another 12 months.

Is it likely that the tap can be repaired from above?

What was the snapping noise likely to be?

Many thanks, Steve

[Matt G]

Broken circlip, so the spindle is free to slide up&down instead of the plunger? Or perhaps something nasty happened to the internal screw thread.

The former could cause the behaviour you describe by allowing the spindle to rise out of the valve body as the tap is fully closed, and then it's no longer engaged with the screw and so can't pull the washer back up.

The latter would cause the same screw-disengaging effect.

Or of course I could be talking nonsense. I've only ever had to change washers and o-rings.

You should be able to just remove the valve by first removing handle (look for a securing screw, possibly hidden under a plastic cap piece) and then carefully undoing the brass valve body with a big spanner or wrench leaving the tap body in place, making sure you dont let the tap swivel or you might damage the pipe under the bath. If the circlip's still in one piece (attached to the handle-end of the spindle), you can take it off and pull all the parts apart to check them.

If the worst comes to the worst, you can buy complete valve assemblies, complete with handle (which will no doubt not match the old one) and washer e.g.

[StevieBoy]

Hi,

Thank you for the advice.

The taps are inset on a mixer jobbie, hopefully it will just be a case of unbolting what's there, and bolting new ones in?

Here's a pic of the offending article:

you can see the tap head has already been removed.

Regards, Steve

[StevieBoy]

Update ... on buying a cheap set of ADAPT-A-TAP ... and trying to install them, found that the thread on the mixer-tap body is somewhere between 1/2" and 3/4" ... does this mean that the mixer-tap body is metric?!?!?!!!

On taking the original tap apart, and putting back together, it seems to now work okay ...

Any thoughts?

Regards, Steve

[Christian McArdle]

I seem to recall the Europeans using 5/8" a lot.

Problem solved. ;-)

Christian.