So, my tub faucet is leaking. I live in an apt and I'm not too sure when the landlord is actually going to get this issue fixed. Right now, there is a steady, light stream of water coming out of the faucet. I know fixing this would be pretty easy , but I don't have access to my water heater, etc so I can't do it myself. To temporarily stop the faucet from leaking until it actually gets fixed, I found I could divert water to the shower head and turn off the flow of water with the flow control on the shower head. This results in dripping from both the shower head and the tub faucet, which is less than the stream with no water diverted to the shower head. My question is, is there any consequence to temporarily slowing the leak like this? I'm just concerned that there could be some sort of pressure build up or something that could affect the pipes or something.
Plumbing – prevent the tub faucet from leaking by diverting the water to the shower, and shutting off the shower head
faucetleakplumbingshowertub
Related Solutions
This is a picture of one example of a rough shower plumbing install:
As you can see, at the top there is a cross brace, and there is a 90 degree angle that's been mounted into that brace secured, preferably with screws but possibly with nails.
My guess? Your shower head was braced with nails, some idiot hit your shower head pipe pretty hard and pulled the nails loose, and the sound you heard was one of the nails falling out.
It's not serious - as long as you don't put any weight on the shower head - and the fix will involve opening up the walls. Technically you can fix it from behind, so you won't have to destroy tile in the process, but that's a harder way to do it. Basically you have to pull the wall behind the shower, cut the pipe to the shower head, pull the brace, re-secure the shower head, replace the brace, and then fix the feed to the shower head w/ a connector.
What did you use to connect your tub spout?
I plumbed my bathroom with Pex and was heavily cautioned NOT to use Pex to run from the main valve to the tub spout because it would create exactly the issue your describing.
Since the inner diameter of Pex is slightly less than regular copper (or threaded brass fittings, which is what I used) it will create a slight flow restriction to the tub spout and (inadvertently) divert it to the shower head.
Just a thought...
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Best Answer
Diverting the leak up to the shower head using the diverter valve should not be a problem, but your assumption that fixing it will be "pretty easy" may not prove to be true. You are correct in that hot and cold supply to the tub/shower valve needs to be shut off. Sometimes apartment shower valves have built in shut-off valves called integral stops.
Sometimes apartments are equipped with individual remote shut-offs. Sometimes the whole building will need to be shut down. Removing the valves may require special tools like deep valve sockets.
The repair may be simple washer replacement or may require more complicated cartridge replacement.
I do recommend that you try it but make sure your landlord is cool with it in case something breaks, and have back up shower facilities available in case it ends up being out of service for a while.