Bathroom faucet replacement in Southeast Michigan

Bathroom faucet replacement is a short job when the valves underneath cooperate and a longer one when they do not. The fixture itself comes off in minutes. The shutoff valves below it are often decades old, seized open, and unwilling to close for the first time in their working lives. Wright’s bathroom repair crew carries valves as well as faucets, so that discovery does not end the visit.

Getting the hole count right

Sinks are drilled for one, two or three holes and the spacing matters. A single hole fixture has one body carrying everything. A centerset fits a three hole sink where the outer holes sit four inches apart. A widespread fits three holes at eight inches or more, with separate handles.

You can fit a single hole fixture to a three hole sink using a deck plate that covers the outer two. You cannot fit a widespread to a sink drilled at four inches. Measuring center to center on the outer holes before you buy takes a moment and avoids the most common return at the plumbing counter.

The valves underneath, and the reason they matter

Old multi turn stop valves are the part of this job that surprises homeowners. A valve that has sat open since 1994 frequently will not close, and when it is forced it weeps at the packing nut instead. Now the water has to be shut off at the main to finish a fifteen minute job.

We replace those with quarter turn stops as a matter of course when they are questionable. Beyond finishing the job, it means the next time something under that sink goes wrong, you can stop the water yourself without going to the basement. That is a small thing until the night you need it.

Replace, or rebuild

Plenty of fixtures that look finished are not. A drip, a stiff handle, a weak stream or a leak around the base is usually a cartridge, an O ring or a blocked aerator, and a faucet repair costs a fraction of a replacement. A solid brass fixture from a decent maker is worth rebuilding two or three times over its life.

Replacement is the right call when the body is cracked, the mounting shanks are corroded, the finish is flaking, or the fixture is cheap enough to have no serviceable parts. We will tell you which one you have before quoting, because selling a homeowner a new faucet they do not need is a short term way to run a repair business.

Finishes, and what actually survives hard water

Chrome is the most durable finish available and the easiest to clean, which is why it has outlasted every trend that was going to replace it. Brushed nickel hides water spots better than anything, which matters across much of Southeast Michigan. Matte black looks superb and shows every deposit that dries on it, so it wants wiping rather than admiring.

Living with hard water is the deciding factor here more than fashion is. If nobody in the house is going to wipe the fixture down, brushed nickel is the forgiving choice.

What the visit includes

• Old fixture removed, including corroded mounting nuts that no longer turn
• New faucet set on a clean deck, sealed, and tightened from below
• Supply lines replaced, and shutoff valves swapped for quarter turn stops
• Pop up drain assembly and pivot linkage adjusted or replaced to suit the new fixture
• Everything run and checked for leaks before we leave the room

Working in a cabinet you cannot get into

The reason this job takes professionals longer than the video suggests is access. The mounting nuts sit at the back of a shallow cabinet, above a drain assembly, out of sight and out of reach. On a pedestal sink there is no cabinet at all and the fixture has to be worked on from beneath a bowl mounted to the wall.

Corroded nuts frequently will not turn and have to be cut off. That is routine for us and it is where most homeowner attempts stop, usually with the water shut off and the sink out of commission.

Handles, and the hands that have to turn them

A single lever fixture can be worked with a wrist, an elbow or a closed fist. Two round knobs need a grip and a twist, which is the specific movement arthritis takes away first. In a bathroom used by an older adult, changing the faucet is one of the cheapest improvements available and it rarely gets suggested.

Touchless fixtures exist for bathrooms and they work well, with the caveat that they need power. Battery units need the cells changed somewhere awkward, and a hardwired one needs a receptacle under the sink that most vanities do not have. Adding that receptacle is a licensed electrician’s work rather than our carpenters’. For most households a good lever does the job without any of that.

The stopper linkage nobody mentions until it fails

A new faucet usually arrives with a new pop up drain assembly, and fitting it means pulling the old drain body out of the basin and resetting it on fresh putty. That is the part of the job where an existing leak often comes to light, because the old flange has been weeping quietly into the cabinet for a while.

We fit the new assembly and adjust the linkage so the stopper actually seals rather than sitting a little proud. A basin that will not hold water is the most common complaint after a self installed faucet, and it is nearly always this adjustment rather than a faulty part.

Doing it with the vanity rather than after it

If the cabinet is also due, the faucet should go in with it rather than before. Fitting a fixture to a new top on the bench is faster and cleaner than fitting it in place, and the old one comes out with the unit. A vanity swap in the same footprint is a single visit that covers the cabinet, the top, the faucet and the drain.

Where a licensed plumber takes over

Fixture level work is ours. The main water line, the sewer line, anything gas fired and any new plumbing that requires a permit go to a licensed plumber. Moving a sink to a new wall is a renovation with a permit attached rather than a fixture swap.

When a faucet is one line on a longer list

• Turnover work, where every fixture in the unit gets checked at once
• Before a listing, since dated fixtures date the whole room in photographs
• A first pass on a new house, before anything has a history you know
• Drain and trap work in the same cabinet, which is usually the same age
• A wider fixture upgrade when the whole room is of one vintage

Where we work across Southeast Michigan

Our crews cover Washtenaw, Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Livingston and Monroe counties from Platt Road in Ypsilanti, and we are in Ypsilanti, Ann Arbor and Canton most weeks.

Get the new faucet fitted

Tell us the hole spacing and whether the valves under the sink still turn. View our Portfolio to see the bathrooms our crews build, or contact us now for a free quote.