My bathroom tub fixtures have seen better days. Pretty sure they’re original to the house (~60 years). We have fairly hard water, and the prior owners were not the best at maintenance so no clue how long these slow leaks have been going on. But the shower handle is stuck hard on the valve, and the bath spigot is crumbling away and similarly fused in place. Hot and cold come off easily.
Does anyone have any tips for freeing the one handle and spigot? I’ve tried light tapping with a mallet on the back of the handle to no avail. The spigot seems bound pretty tightly, to the point where I’m concerned about damaging the pipe if I apply too much torque.
As for the leaks, I haven’t decided if I’m going to just replace the valves, or try fiddling with/replacing the packing nuts. This is my first time messing with plumbing, but either way seems straightforward enough after watching a few videos.
Any tips/tricks/suggestions appreciated, thanks!
The shower knobs are part of a valve assembly that is likely directly connected to the pipes below the tiles. Unless you are lucky to somehow find spare-parts for this specific 50 year old model, you will have to fully replace it.
It’s anyway an odd design as the mixer seems to be below the tiles as well, making it nearly impossible to replace or fix. Like wtf were people thinking back then?
A modern standard design only has two 1/2" threaded connections (for hot and cold water) exposed through the tiles, and everything else is external, so that there is no need to touch the tiles or the pipes below when fixing or replacing the armature.
Edit: going by some other remarks, this is in the US and it isn’t actually a house with real concrete or brick walls, but rather those cheap drywall contraptions people think are houses? In that case you might be able to open it up from the backside and access it from there, which would explain why they went for such an extremely bad design.
Well. That just threw cold water on my plans. Pun intended. But I’m still confused. Everything looks identical (aside from ornamentation) to something like this:
https://www.lowes.com/pd/Danco-3-Handle-Metal-Tub-Shower-Repair-Kit-For-Gerber/1092421
I should just be able to remove the old hardware: loosen the set screw on the flanges/caps, slide them off, unscrew the sleeves, then ratchet off the valve stems. The sticking point (literally) is the shower knob and bath spigot seem to be frozen/corroded in place.
ETA: yes this is in the US. Drywall under the tile, access panel behind… but I really shouldn’t need to do that. Everything I’ve read so far outside of this thread says it should be a simple swap job.
Well, you can certainly try. Maybe this specific design is sufficiently standardized to repair it with such an kit. As a European I am not familiar with that specific design, but these things tend to have subtile differences making repairs across decades hard. But if you can access it from the backside a full replacement as a backup plan seems doable without breaking the tiles.
If hardness is the likely cause of internal incrustations, you can try to loosen it with some vinegar or other acid. But some strategic use of force is nearly always required when undoing old plumbing.