Lubricant for plumbing fittings?

[treenoakio]

Just unscrewed the nut to take out the ceramic cartridge from my shower mixer. I'm pretty sure the brass nut and ceramic internals should be a single removable unit. But the nut came off and left the whole ceramic assembly firmly fixed in the brass body of the unit. I haven't yet tried applying force to remove the remains of the cartridge, though finger pressure won't budge it in the least.

If it does need some welly to get it out, I'm wondering how easily the replacement will slide into place. I guess the cartridge body needs to be able to rotate as the integral nut is tightened. So whatever is causing the old cartridge to resist extraction may make inserting the new one difficult.

If it turns out there is some resistance, is it ok to use a grease, such as Vasaline for instance, on the combined ceramic and brass parts?

-- Regards, Dick Treen

[R]

[Rod]

For things like this I would use a silicone grease. Don't fancy gobs of Vaseline on my head... :-)

(BTW You signature has just - needs a trailing space to work properly.)

[treenoakio]

Thanks, I'll have a look for some silicone grease. I was also hoping someone would comment on whether the stuck cartridge is a common feature, with some tried and tested remedies. It all looked so simple and straight forward in the guide.

Thanks also for the sig tip. How's this?

-- Regards, Dick Treen

[Rod]

Still no good. Needs to be "-- " - what I see is "--".

(There again, that is what my own sig. looks like in your post where it is included. What *should* happen is that the whole sig. should be stripped when you prepare your reply. Maybe something to do with using Google groups?)

[The Medway Handyman]

What make of shower?

[treenoakio]

[treenoakio]

It's a Trevi from Ideal Standard. Here's a link to a pic of the cartridge.