Simple Question
#1
08-12-05, 08:44 PM
Join Date: Apr 2003
Location: Denville, NJ
Posts: 107
Upvotes: 0
Received 0 Upvotes
on
0 Posts
Simple Question
When attaching the flexible supply lines to the shutoff valve for my bathroom sink, do I use teflon tape?
#2
08-12-05, 09:15 PM
Member
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: KY/OH
Posts: 3,362
Upvotes: 0
Received 0 Upvotes
on
0 Posts
I never do. I always use a very small amount of plumber's grease so that if the connection does leak for some reason down the road, that penny's worth of grease will allow it to come back off with ease without causing other problems like accidentally loosening another compression fitting by accident.
#3
08-13-05, 08:11 AM
Whether it is a compression joint on a tube or a flex line with gasket seal, the best way to insure it WILL leak is to add teflon tape. These fittings seal in other ways. Teflon tape is ONLY for tapered pipe thread connections where the seal is the mating of the male and female threads. Tape or compound is uses to aid this connection.
#4
08-14-05, 12:20 AM
The seal there is in the ring seating nicely in the valve body, then getting squished down tight around the tube, by the nut. So the threads here only serve to advance the nut, and the nut itself won't hold water no matter how snug the threading is.
Teflon tape acts as a sort of lubricant and packing for threaded connections.
I do use teflon tape on the threaded parts of compression fittings, for the same reason DUNBAR PLUMBER uses grease - just to make some future plumber happy the threads haven't seized up with corrosion. In fact I sometimes wrap teflon tape on bolts having nothing to do with plumbing.
If you have the tape, it can only do good *unless* a stray bit gets between the actual compression surfaces.
Teflon tape acts as a sort of lubricant and packing for threaded connections.
I do use teflon tape on the threaded parts of compression fittings, for the same reason DUNBAR PLUMBER uses grease - just to make some future plumber happy the threads haven't seized up with corrosion. In fact I sometimes wrap teflon tape on bolts having nothing to do with plumbing.
If you have the tape, it can only do good *unless* a stray bit gets between the actual compression surfaces.
