Bathroom shower faucets used to be the weak link of the entire bathroom because sooner or later you were bound to get a leak, either from the exposed handle or behind the wall. In many cases if the problem was internal you would never know until water stains appeared on the ceiling below. Then, the unhappy homeowner had to tear out the walls to get at the leak, hire a plumber to fix it and then re-tile the whole shower.

Bathroom showers and faucets have come a long way in the past forty years. Showers are constructed with trap doors to get at the water and the mechanisms are a lot simpler. This also saves the fear of getting scalded in the shower when someone flushes the toilet. The new valve systems have automatic equalization for both cold and hot water and eliminate this dangerous occurrence.

Even today you have to be very careful on what shower equipment you buy for two reasons:

• Dependability
• Cost of Installation

Plumbers cost a lot of money and so having a cheap model installed may cost more in labor than having a better faucet installed simply because he or she may have to fiddle with it in order to get everything to fit. This has suddenly made your bargain more expensive that a good quality system like The Moen Exact Temp Vertical Spa Set. These are preferred by plumbers because there are no surprises such as pipe that may have to be bent. With a cheap faucet there is always the problem of having it fail in a few years and then the process will have to be repeated at more cost. Moen products are based on a cartridge system so if a part wears out the assembly is simply replaced in a short time.

The new style of showers are becoming more versatile for both comfort and cleaning ability. The wall mounted shower handles and adjustable water jets not only gets you clean but gives and amazing massage in the process. The  The Moen Exact Temp Vertical Spa Set is reasonably-priced and makes you want to spend more time in the shower!.

The big adventure in our basement bathroom remodel was installing a new faucet.  Everything else for the room was pretty self-explanatory.  We had installed a kitchen faucet before, but the pop up drain made the bathroom one much more daunting.  We decided to get the Peerless Bright Chrome Lever 4″ faucet because we liked the Peerless we had in the kitchen.  It is a little more than we had planned on spending for a basement, guest, extra bathroom, but I did not want clear plastic handles.

Pop up drain instructions are confusing by nature, I think.  I read through them a couple times and laid everything out before starting to assemble everything.  As long as you do not jump into installation without going through the how-to, even the pop up drain assembly will go quickly.  It may take more time, but do not be afraid to dry fit both the drain and the pop up to see if it opens enough for your water flow – we needed to adjust ours after installation.  And it is really just not that easy when everything is already in place.  But once past that, dropping the faucet in and hooking up the supply hoses only takes a few minutes.  The faucet works and looks great, which was important since it is the first thing you see in our new bathroom.

When we were converting our basement bathroom from dingy and unusable to pretty and functional we left the corner shower in place.  It just needed a good cleaning and a new showerhead and knobs.  We really like the rain showerhead we have in our bathroom and we wanted to find something similar.  The showerhead that was there previously actually put out too much water for the drain to handle, so we also needed something that would not overflow the shallow shower basin.  Aesthetically, we wanted something that hung out into the shower a bit to prevent the possibility of leakage through the shower doors.

We decided to go with the Mini Aquafall from WaterPik.  It is adjustable several different ways, which is handy since this is our “guest” bathroom and guests are always different heights. The showerhead meets all of our quirky needs.  It installed directly on the pipe coming out of the wall with just a bit of Teflon tape.  I would not recommend using any sort of wrench on the showerhead without a rag or even painting tape as a barrier.  The finish is chrome, but the showerhead and arm are made of plastic.  This may not work for a high-traffic shower, but for this application the combination of looks and other features outweighed the material.

Now that you’ve got the toilet base installed, you’re in the home stretch.  You’ll find this part to be a real breeze, even for the most novice handiperson.

Your base should look something like this:

You see those holes?  Well, now all you’ve got to do is lift the tank and fit it into the holes.  All toilets are different, so make sure to read your instructions on fitting any necessary padding (provided in your kit, of course), et cetera., before you start bolting things down.  Also, make sure you have a bubble level handy - it’s VERY important to keep your tank as close to level as possible!

With the toilet tank seated on top of the bowl, you can now attach the supply line and turn on the water:

Great Caesar’s ghost - you’re about 90% finished!

If you’re anything like me, you want to see your tank fill up - I even snapped a picture:

So obviously, you’ll need to put the tank cover on, but go ahead and give it a test flush — it’s always nice to see your hard work in action! With everything installed properly, it’s now time to bolt the seat to the tank.  Again, this is *very* straightforward, but reference your toilet seat instructions, just in case there are any pitfalls or odd directions.

Your mileage may vary, but the toilet will look a little something like this:

So now that you’ve removed the old toilet, you’re ready to prep the area for the new commode.  The biggest potential problem you’re faced with is the mess the old wax ring left behind when you lifted up the old toilet.  This isn’t a problem — just grab a putty knife or five-in-one tool and get to work!  Make sure to scrape the area clean so the new wax ring seats properly on the new toilet.

Yes, that’s our waste stack. And yes, it’s very old. And rusty. But it’s clean!

I know I’ve been saying this the whole time, but you’re really close to wrapping this procedure up - you’ll just have to trust me!

With your toilet’s waste stack clean as a whistle, it’s time to turn the new toilet bowl upside-down on a towel or bathmat (so you don’t scrape/scratch/ding the porcelain) and seat the new wax ring.  Push firmly - but not too firmly - and you’re set.  Now head back over to the waste stack and make sure your bolts are still standing tall.  If not, your toilet kit should have come with new bolts, so install ‘em.

Fitting the wax ring

You’re now ready to lift the bowl back to an upright position (but careful not to get the wax seal all over the floor!) and set it down gently over the bolts and waste stack.  Since you’re now positioned over the waste stack, you can start tightening the nuts and bolt the toilet to the floor.

So you’ve made the decision to install a new toilet. Great!  But there’s one problem - you need to remove your existing toilet first.  Don’t fret - it’s actually very easy and should only take you about 15 - 20 minutes, tops.

The first step in removing your old toilet is to shut off the water supply to the tank, then flush to empty the tank.  There are some tricks to help you get the remaining water out of the tank, and odds are you have one in your kitchen - a sponge suddenly becomes a multi-purupose utility!

After you’ve sponged out the remaining water, you’re almost there.

The next step is to remove the wing nuts that attach the toilet tank to the bowl.  That was easy, right?  Now remove the supply line from the wall to the toilet tank and you’re ready to remove the bowl from the tank.

Again, congratulations - you’re oh-so-close to having your old toilet removed.

Finally, pop the caps at the base of the toilet to expose the nuts and unscrew ‘em.  If your toilet is caulked to the floor, use a utility knife to cut the caulk for some super-easy removal.  You can now safely remove the toilet from the floor and either repurpose it, or make life hell for your garbage collector.

First, a little housekeeping - I apologize for not being very active on the blog this month. There are some really cool things happening with my family (that I’m not really at liberty to divulge at the moment for fear of spousal backlash) that’s kept me away from the computer and not very active in things that I enjoy doing on a semi-regular basis.  I’m also wrapping up a second degree program and have been bogged down writing papers and doing a massive research project.

Excuses are a-plenty, but I do apologize.

One project that my wife and I recently embarked on that had “oh, yeah - this is totally blogable” written all over it was our upstairs bathroom toilet replacement.  The previous owners of the house had installed a somewhat horrible, small, round bowl-shaped toilet that used an awful lot of water per flush and just wasn’t very good looking.  We got the gumption when walking through our local hardware store to check out toilets and made an impulse buy.  Like it or not, we were installing a new toilet.

This series will walk you through how to remove your old toilet and install a new one.  Believe it or not, it’s not that difficult.  In fact, the hardest part is lugging the stupidly-heavy toilet from the store to your house.

In our last post, we talked about how to connect the spray nozzle to the faucet.  Now comes the fun part - attaching the faucet to the supply lines underneath your sink.

As always, the standard disclaimer applies - your mileage may vary. Our house was built in 1952, our kitchen was updated in 1970(ish)… so we’ve got solid plastic supply lines. You, on the other hand, may have something a bit more pliable, which would lend to easier connecting.  Since we’re going to “refresh” our kitchen in the summer, we opted to leave the plastic supply lines for now until we install our dishwasher and reconfigure our sink and cabinet situation.  (You can bet that there will be quite a lengthy series of posts about our kitchen remodel.)

Meanwhile, the faucet! Let’s get that dude installed!

First, double check that your surface is clean. You’ll want to make sure that there isn’t any standing water, bacteria, mold, mildew, dirt or grime hanging around. While it won’t actually make its way into your water supply, you obviously don’t want to take any chances with encouraging contamination.

Next, take your faucet and set it in the three remaining holes in your sink.

Okay, this is the fun part - get under your sink and tighten the nuts to hold the faucet in place. Just like when we removed the old faucet, if you have a decent basin wrench, things could go a lot quicker.  Now run the supply lines to the bottom of the faucet handles and secure tightly.

You’re done.  Almost.

Turn the water to the supply lines back on slowly and test the faucet by turning on the cold water only and monitor for leaks underneath the sink.  Let the water flow for a good minute and use a flashlight - if you see any drips, turn off the water and check the connection between the cold water supply line and the bottom of the faucet handle. Wipe the drips away and run the test again.  If there are no more drips or leaks, repeat this process with the hot water.

Congratulations - you just installed a new faucet!

This is the sixth post in a series about installing a new faucet. If you happened upon this post through a search engine and would like to read from the beginning, please click here.

With the surface area clean, now the fun begins - let’s get that brand-new faucet installed!

Before we go any further, make sure to double check those instructions.  Remember, while all faucets function the same (i.e., dispense water, have on/off handles, et cetera), not all faucets are installed the same way.  Again, the standard disclaimer applies: your mileage may vary!

Ok, with all of the reading, re-reading and checking of instructions out of the way, go grab that faucet and the spray nozzle.  You’ll want to install the spray nozzle first, so take the housing and attach it to the sink according to your instructions.  You’ll then want to feed the hose through the housing and run it up between the supply lines, through where the spigot will reside:

Now you can start attaching the hose from the spray nozzle to the bottom of your faucet, like this:

If you can’t get the connection tight enough with your bare hands, I recommend using a wrench to make sure you have a water-tight connection.  If you’re really paranoid, you can break out some teflon tape, but odds are, you won’t need it.

Cool! With that connected, it’s now time to go into the cabinet and secure the faucet to the underside of the sink and connect the supply lines.  We’re almost finished!

This is the fifth post in a series about installing a new faucet. If you happened upon this post through a search engine and would like to read from the beginning, please click here.

Now that we have the old faucet removed, it’s time to prepare the surface for the installation of the new faucet.  I used a putty knife to scrape the dirt, debris and caulk off the sink surface, then cleaned it with mild soapy water.

With our surface squeaky clean, it’s time to begin the other prep work.

Take your new faucet out of the box and read those instructions - because not all faucets are equal, you may have manufacturer’s recommendations to account for.  With our Peerless faucet, we found the directions to be really amusing (no, really - the directions were hilarious!).

Congratulations - the easy part is now out of the way. Time to move on to something a bit more, uh, “hands-on.”

This is the fourth post in a series about installing a new faucet. If you happened upon this post through a search engine and would like to read from the beginning, please click here.