FY, hard to shop for faucet handle

[micky]

FYI -- don't complain if you find this post boring. You've been warned

-- I've had more time to look for a handle for my 8-point!!!! washing machine faucets. For a while I thought no one had them.

But I think ebay, below, has what I want, and maybe a couple other places. Not in basement or garden faucet style, but in bathroom style. (Mine were plastic, and one of them split at the center when I tried to turn the water off.

This one is discontinued. :-(

These three say they are for 8-point, but it also calls them square. What does that mean? How can it be both?

Fits Square Broach Finish: Chrome Plated Control: Hot and Cold Pair Height: 2 3/8 inch Length; 3/4 inch Height Broach: Square (8 point) ????

1-800-731-8575 [e-mail] Are they like an 8 pointed star? I need a circle with 8 splines. Will it still fit?

I think I found it, if the diameters are right, but I'm still interested in the question above. How it be 8-point and square at the same time, and be used on a faucet handle?

It's interesting that these are Chicago brand when those two pages said only Briggs made 8-point.

These interesting pages,

and says that only Briggs made or makes them, compared to the dozen or two other companies listed that make lots of other "broaches".

But they make 18-point too so I'd better be careful I don't buy them.

This is 8-point

It might be good. Phone [phone]

BTW, I already called the guy in Baltimore who sells hard to find plumbing parts and he didn't think he had it. I've been there and he has a great old store. I should go there again, but maybe the ebay one is good enough.

[Jim Joyce]

Have you checked antique stores? Worst case, you'd have to buy a fixture just for the knob. Or maybe the worst case is that you don't find anything.

[micky]

That's a good idea.

FWIW ny rriend who used to love going to antique store says a lot of them have closed since the internet, but there are still some.

[micky]

BTW, I found one DIY page where the guy also can't find a handle to replace the broken metal handle for his 8-point faucet. He tried t he "repair handle" the same one I saw but didnt' buy because there was no reference to 8-point and no picture of an 8 point adapter, in fact no picture of what the adapter adapted to. Why don't they have a picture of the most important part? And he said it didn't work.

And I'm sure if I tried chat, she wouldn't go out to the floor and look at it and come back and tell me if it had 8 points. She's probably in Idaho or India and nowhere near a store, right?

So the only advice he got from the webpage was to replace the whole faucet. Wow. For lack of a handle.

Why did they switch from 8 point to 12 or 16 anyhow? 8-point seems easier to have big bumps and grooves and harder to strip or slip.

And even if they did switch, why is no one making even one 8-point handle?. They have the molds. Yes, my faucet is 43 years old, but they don't even start breaking until they are 20 or 30 years old. (My handle is plastic.)

Replacement would have a big advantage for an outdoor faucet because I could replace it with a freeze-proof faucet, but my problem is behind the washing machine.

So I ordered the ones on Ebay listed below. The picture shows 8 points and I hope all the other dimensions work out okay. Probably**. He still has two more. **I didn't need a lot of force but still could have damaged it a little the one time I used pliers. Still, I would think any extra part moved out of its original location is still soft.

Link provided for completeness, but really nothing to see there that I haven't described.

[micky]

How it be 8-point and square at the same time,

So I looked specifically for Briggs handles. They must be great demand:

Kissler 99-2134 Briggs Pair Handles List Price: $10.50 Our Price: $100.00

!!!!!! plus no picture and nothing about 8-point or any other point, so I wouldn't buy them even if they were less than $100.

Instead of buying stocks, we should have bought faucet handles.

[micky]

I hadn't looked at each picture the poster included until now. Since 40% of the handle is broken off and the handle is metal, better advice would have been to braze or weld a new metal handle on top of the broken one, but the webpage didn't suggest that.

Wouldn't work for me because the center of mine is cracked and has opened.

>

[Marilyn Manson]

Not just antique stores, but architectural salvage stores. Big difference.

Habit for Humanity ReStore locations are one possibility.

We have a couple of for-profit stores in our area also. Shelves full of one-off plumbing fixtures and odd handles. There's what you see and there's also what the staff knows is hiding in some nook or cranny on the other side of the store. I look, but I also ask.

Flea markets, estate sales and estate sale *stores* too.

There's a local company near me that runs estate sales all over town. They also have a brick and mortar store where they sell both leftovers from the sales they hold in people's houses (stuff they buy up for pennies at the end) and also some really nice stuff. I think they buy some of the nicer stuff before the sale even starts because some of it is really nice, so I can't believe it's leftovers. Living room sets, dining room sets, bedrooms, etc.

Upstairs looks like a furniture store, while downstairs looks like a flea market.

[micky]

I think it's called Re-Store here. I've been there so I can find it again. That's a good idea.

There's one plumbing store. I only talked on the phone, but I could go t here. I could buy some extra stems that he had last time I was there. (I bought a couple but it would be good to have enough for every sink or tub or shower.)

That sounds like a full time job, LOL.

I'll look into that.... but buying from ebay is so much easier. That one should come next week but if it doesn't fit, I'll pursue your ideas.

[Marilyn Manson]

With the hyphen? I’d be surprised if Habitat For Humanity would allow that. I’m pretty sure that they would want the store to use the standard ReStore name/logo with the house symbol in the “o”.

When I said “for profit stores” l meant “for profit architectural salvage stores”, as opposed to HFH ReStore, which is a 501(c)(3).

Hey! They could borrow tools from your tool library. ;-)

[micky]

Why, is that Habitat's name? By "it" I meant a store like you described, not Habitat.

Maybe there is one. I don't know of any.

[Marilyn Manson]

It's all explained here. The ReStore logo is a registered trademark so I think (but don't really know) that HFH would want all of their stores to be branded alike.