I once saw an interesting statistic about how much water a leaking faucet wastes over the course of a year. I don’t remember what it was exactly, but it was a lot.

That being said, I’ve been in this house for about 12 years so I’ve done my bit of plumbing. The interesting thing about plumbing fixtures is that they’re not that standardized. In concept, yes; with respect to compatibility, not so much.

Take kitchen faucets, for example. Besides there being so many brand names, the thing you have to know when you need to repair a faucet is that it can be a mishmash of replace cartridges, washers, O-rings, and diaphragms.

I recently replaced my kitchen faucet. I went to Home Depot with the intent to track down the right cartridge by the right manufacturer. They didn’t have one in stock so I just bought a whole new unit. About thirty bucks and thirty minutes labor and I was back in business, washing dishes.

Same thing with the shower cold/hot water mixer. The manufacturer was long out of business so the first time it had problems I changed out the O-rings. The next time I just replaced the whole unit.

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