Kitchen Faucet Installation

Just a few days back I was at my cousin's place and her father was all into the kitchen sink, totally engrossed in something. He was armed with a wrench pipe, pliers, some tape and the likes. I greeted him and when he turned to greet me back, he was totally flustered and seemed kind of soaked in water. I asked him what was he up to, and he explained me about how he was installing the kitchen faucet and that is why he was wet. So I probed him further about the whole kitchen faucet installation process, and it was quite interesting to hear him explaining it, although it was mechanical.

Hence, the bottomline to be inferred from this is that, kitchen faucet installation is not a very uphill task or you need not be a hot shot mechanic, rather a plumber to do that. Neither do you need some jazzy tools to do it. So, are we ready to get started on how can you install a kitchen faucet? Here it goes!

How to Install a Kitchen Faucet?

Usually, if its a new sink, the task becomes easier than when the sink is already in place, and you have to install the faucet. Now, in the case of a new sink, what you can do is, you can firstly always install the faucet before fixing the sink, which you cannot in the case of an already existing sink. But nevertheless, here's a step by step illustration of the same.

Things You Would Need:

New kitchen faucet, tube of silicone caulking, basin wrench, channel lock pliers and teflon tape. After you assemble all this, just do not forget to move the kitchen appliances away from the sink, particularly the electric ones.

Method:

• At the beginning, shut off the water supply, specially if you are replacing an old faucet for kitchen faucet installation. Then, around the faucet, fix a bead of silicon caulking. Between the faucet's base plate and the sink, put or rather insert a rubber gasket. This will create a watertight seal.
• If there is no gasket, seal the cavity of the faucet using plumber's putty.
• Now let the faucet go through the holes in the sink meant for the faucet and press properly in order to form a seal.
• Tightening, using the basin wrench, fix the washers and the nuts to the hot and cold tail parts.
• For making the tightening and mounting of the nuts simpler and convenient, sometimes there is a long socket provided in the kit.
• The shank of a screwdriver is accepted by a hole in that socket, guiding while tightening the nuts.
• Take the tape and wrap it around (4 times) the hot and cold tail part threads, and follow this by connecting the water line to the faucet.
• While doing this, if you are stumped at a juncture, have the manufacturer's instruction manual handy. This will tell you if you need some other tools or hardware. It will also provide you with proper faucet repair instructions or otherwise.
• Now, do the previous step, wrapping the teflon tape, but around the hot and cold water valves, and as the earlier step, connect them with the water lines.
• For tightening the nuts, use channel lock pliers.
• Now assuming that your faucet has spray hose, again fix a bead of silicon caulking around the base of the spray hose, guiding your hose through the sink opening.
• Now tighten and securely attach the spray hose base to the sink using washer and nut. Tighten with a basin wrench.
• Using 4 turns of teflon tape on threads, link the sprayer hose to faucet. Now fasten and secure it using channel lock pliers.
• Turn the waterline on and check for leaks.

Finally, after your kitchen faucet installation, make sure you get rid of the aerator from the faucet and flush the lines. This will result in washing away, if debris and will avoid clogging and low flow of water.

Note that, one does not need to be a super smart to install a kitchen faucet. I am sure the next time your kitchen faucet goes kaput, you would know how to deal with it!