New bathroom sink faucet

Old faucet

New faucet

Oh, I know exactly what you're thinking! Yesterday I'm all stre-pressed (stressed and depressed) about not being able to fix things, and today I am changing the faucet in my bathroom sink. Well, I'm still not a plumber!

It actually took me one day to diagnose the problem, and a second day to fix it. Thus legitimizing my contention that I just can't do things quickly.

For the record, Jane uses the bathroom off our bedroom, and I use the one in the hallway. For some time the hot water has been losing pressure, so the other day I decided to try the ol' tighten-the-valve-then-loosen-it-again trick. I'd read or heard somewhere that sometimes gunk can settle in there and block the path of water.

Well, I did that yesterday afternoon, and when I opened the valve back up again... there was no water at all! The cold water faucet worked fine, but literally nothing came out of the hot faucet. So I closed the valve again and took the faucet supply line to the hot water off and opened the valve a little. Water came out fine. Therefore I deduced that the old faucet had a blockage and would likely need replaced.

I was going to go ahead and take the faucet off, but when I closed the valve to the cold water side, and turned the faucet on, there was still a full stream of water coming out. That's when I decided this was going to be a two-day job.

So I headed to Menards and got two new valves, two new supply lines, and a new faucet. Altogether it was just under $60. That was enough for one day...

Today was when I actually did the replacing of the faucet, lines, and valves.

First I shut off the main water valve in the basement. Then I took everything apart and made sure my parts all fit. Of course they didn't. The new valves I bought didn't match up to the copper tubing coming up from the basement. I went back to Menards and took one of the old valves, and they didn't have anything that matched. So I headed down the street to the neighborhood 'Do It Best' and found what I needed.

I started by installing the new valves. Then I turned the main valve back on and made sure there was no leakage. There was a little drip on the hot water side. I tightened it up some more and am hoping it will eventually take care of itself.

Next I put the new faucet on. I got a single-handle faucet instead of the two-handle one that had been on it. Sometimes it's just easier to use one handle. Plus it was only $23. I taped all the fittings and started putting things back together. I even put the drain plug back in. I'd taken it out years ago because it never worked very well. It seems to be better now.

So, I now have a nice new faucet in my bathroom sink. Other than a slight back ache from discombobulating my body under the vanity to do all the work, I think everything turned out okay!