Replaced

Juicelog Wed 160408: Having visited Danny & Martial’s flat recently and seeing the work that they had carried out on renovating their kitchen, I got inspired to do some mini DIY myself. On Monday I embarked on a mini challenge and finally had a go at trying to replace my kitchen tap/faucet.

Having done some pre-reading and familiarising myself with the theory and technique, I got on my hands and knees ready to do the dirty. My first hurdle was trying to work out how to remove the old tap. With my past history and experience of contorting myself into sweaty tiny little spaces accompanied with petite metallic instruments, I really did not enjoy laying underneath my sink. Not quite making any progress for quite some time, I finally worked out that my old tap had been soldered together (rather than fitted together with modern day parts), and decided that a touch of brute force together with some cutting implements was required. After spending a little while snipping and twisting away, I successfully removed the old fucker:

As I was fitting the new tap in, it was brought to my attention (by Danny) that I was missing a braided tap connector. Stopping mid-operation I rushed out to purchase this essential piece of equipment. With everything in place, I turned on the water but was annoyed to discover that there was a tiny leak coming from my cold pipe. One final attempt before jacking this in, I got a tap replacement and everything now appears to be in working order.

Spending a bit longer than I had expected, I feel immensely proud of my efforts and the valuable additional knowledge I have gained of very basic household plumbing.