Dear Tim,
I recently had to replace the shower handle body of my shower. I cut the copper lines and re-soldered a new shower assembly in. This was my first time to ever solder anything and everything appeared to be OK. Well, until we tried to use the sink in the same room. When I turned off the water at the main, I would leave the sink on so as to help drain the water and to verify it being off. But when I turned it back on, it was very low pressure, then nothing no air no water. Later as I repaired another fixture, I turned on all faucets before turning on the water. I systematically turned each one off and I got water to return to the sink but it is still very low pressure. I have verified that the main meter was turned on fully. Any other ideas as to what happened and how to fix? I greatly appreciate any help you may offer
Kenny Anderson
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Kenny,
Whenever you or someone else works on water lines in a house or out in the street, pieces of sediment get knocked loose off the sides of the pipe when the water rushes back into the pipes after the repair. The flow restrictors in the tips of faucets as well as the cartridge bodies themselves in the faucets can get clogged with these fine pieces of rock, grit and sand. Soldering flux also makes a mess of the faucet aerators and flow restrictors.
The first thing I would do is just take off the aerator tip of the faucet and turn on the faucet. Be sure you get the rubber washer out of the faucet body before you turn the water on. If you have lots of water exiting the faucet, you know exactly where the problem is. Start to carefully dis-assemble the aerator and you will find the flow restrictor and a fine mesh screen. Clean all of these components and put everything back together again. You should be back to normal.
Tim Carter
www.askthebuilder.com
W3ATB