Frost Free Faucet Stem Identification Help

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meulfire

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Location
Everett, WA
Hi all,

I have a leaky frost free faucet, and have been pulling my hair out (what little I have) trying to find out what kind I have, so I can get a replacement. It's time to turn to the experts!

Attached are a few pictures of the faucet; my best guess is that it's an Arrowhead Brass model, but I can't find anything exactly like it on their website (the closest I can get is their Series 420, but even then it's not exact; for example mine is silver, and theirs are all brass colored).

I was so sure it was an Arrowhead 420, that I got the PK2016 "springless check assembly", but upon removing the stem and noticing 2 key differences, I'm really not sure anymore. Differences: There's a spring holding the check valve in the stem on my unit, and there's a square/star washer on the end (the PK2016 is round). It also overall looks very different, but I'm not sure if that's because my check valve rubber may be completely gone.

Please forgive me if I don't do the pictures just right... I'm new to this forum and not exactly sure how it all works.

Please help, and thank you!



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The PK2016:
PK2016-1.jpg
 
The handle looks like arrowhead brass product.

Send them your pictures. They’ll deny or confirm.
 
If you are lazy AF, sometimes you can just flip the old washer over, and get a few more months or years out of it.
A little dab of plumber’s grease under it can also help your lazy attempt.
 
The handle looks like arrowhead brass product.

Send them your pictures. They’ll deny or confirm.

Thanks for the confirmation that it's Arrowhead Brass! And for the idea to just send them the pictures and ask them; I'll do that now!

Have you tried just changing the washer under the screw at the very tip of the stem?
If you are lazy AF, sometimes you can just flip the old washer over, and get a few more months or years out of it.
A little dab of plumber’s grease under it can also help your lazy attempt.

Jeff: I try to be as lazy as possible, so I'm all ears, but I'm not sure I understand... from what it looks like, the rubber is worn away, and I'm not sure changing or flipping the washer (or adding putty) would do much...
 
Remove the screw at the end holding the black flat washer on.

Replace the washer. Reinstall and check function.

That’s Jeff’s suggestion and its a good one. That may be all you need.

I do not believe anything is missing, I don’t believe your valve uses the PK216 part number.

I could be wrong, so email arrowhead brass your pics to verify. I don’t work on many frostproof valves here in my climate.
 
I'm very impressed; I sent Arrowhead an email late last night, and got a reply back fairly early this morning! They pointed to the blue area here, showing me what to order, and how. Because this is most certainly a pre-1999 faucet, I'll be pulling it back apart to measure carefully, and see about finding an "SP" version of a Stem. It'll be a few days, but I'll keep this thread going with how it goes.

Thanks for everyone's help so far!


Spring Stem Info.png
 
Just to close the loop on this one, so hopefully someone else can learn from this in the future.

For anyone in the future looking for Arrowhead valve stem replacements for older faucets, be sure to measure carefully using the diagram above! My measurement wound up being 10-1/8". I asked Arrowhead about it, and they said that counted as "not an even length", so I got the PK2006SP (specifically the "SP") stem, and indeed it fit perfectly.

Unfortunately, it didn't stop the leak. Something within the housing itself must have been bent/damaged (probably from a summer of cranking the handle hard to stop any dripping). So, I bit the bullet, and hired a plumber to come fix it (and a few other things). It's a good thing I hired it out; because since Arrowhead changed the length of their stems ever-so-slightly, the plumber had to cut the pipe, and splice it all back together using the new frost-free faucet connected to new section of pipe, and all that trimmed and spliced to the existing pipe.

It's been said elsewhere to hire out the Faucet work, and I'll add to that conversation: If you aren't very familiar with plumbing, hire it out!
 

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