Installing an Outdoor Water Spigot
Adding an Extra Outside
Spigot to Your House
Introduction:
In modern house construction,
builders cut every corner possible to keep the cost
of building the home down. Unfortunately this
leaves the homeowner with some needed accessories
that make living in the home more convenient. One
of the areas where builders cut corners is by
installing only the minimum of outside water
spigots. Normally they only install a spigot on the
front and the back of the house. Unfortunately,
this can be inadequate for watering lawns, shrubs
and gardens. How many times have you asked
yourself, why couldn’t there be at least one more
outside spigot?
This problem can be solved by
installing an additional outside water spigot
yourself. It is a relatively easy homeowner DIY
task that can be done in a couple of hours and cost
less than fifty dollars.
Installing an outdoor spigot:
1.
Shut off the main
water valve in your home by turning the shut off
valve 90 degrees.
2.
Open an outside
spigot so the water in the pipes can drain.
3.
Determine where you
want the additional spigot and drill a hole through
the sill plate into the basement or crawl space.
4.
Find the closest
water pipe (copper tubing in most cases) to the new
spigot location and remove approximately ¾ of
tubing. This is for installing a “T” fitting to
connect a piece of tubing to the new spigot.
5.
Mount a new frost
proof spigot (sillcock) by running it into the hole
you made in the sill plate instep 3 and attach it
to the wall using two mount screws.
6.
Remove the locking
nut from the faucet on the outside, turn it with a
wrench and remove the internal mechanism. Removing
it will protect the washer from melting while
soldering.
7.
Cut a length of
copper tubing to run from the “T” fitting to the
end of the sillcock tube. This may be a straight
run or it may require several turns in the tubing
to reach the sillcock.
8.
Thoroughly
clean all copper soldering joints with an emery
cloth until they are high shined.
9.
Apply soldering
paste to all the soldering pieces and fit all
pieces together.
10.Solder
each joint.
11.Reinstall
the mechanism you removed in step 6. Do not over
tighten the locking nut.
12.Turn
on the main water valve and test for leaks.
That is all there is to it.
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