Toilet & Faucet Replacement in Arcadia, Phoenix

The EPA explains that the Reduction of Lead in Drinking Water Act lowered the lead allowed in the wetted surfaces of pipes, fittings and fixtures “from 8% to a weighted average of 0.25%.” Its summary of the law adds that any bathroom sink faucet sold after January 4, 2014 must meet that lead-free definition. The same definition caps solder and flux at 0.2% lead. A faucet made before 2014 was built to the older limit.

The City of Phoenix's 2025 water quality report says lead and copper “usually enter our drinking water from corrosion of household plumbing, pipes and fixtures that contain these metals, such as copper piping, lead solder or brass fixtures.” It adds that the City “cannot control the variety of materials used in the plumbing in your home,” and that residents can protect themselves “by identifying and removing lead materials within your home plumbing.” A faucet is the easiest of those materials to reach.

Phoenix replaces a service line it has recorded as needing replacement at its own cost, from the meter box to the connection at the house, and the customer flushes the water lines afterwards; the City's report notes that a galvanized line may need flushing for a longer period than most. That last step is the whole reason the date matters, because a line that has just been opened, replaced, and put back into service pushes loosened scale and grit downstream, and the first thing it meets is the screen at the tip of a spout. A new faucet set the week before all that happens takes the grit into a fresh cartridge. Old faucets set to be thrown out are the better thing to catch it.

This is the ten-minute job worth doing before you call anyone, and it needs nothing but your fingers and an old towel. The aerator is the small threaded screen at the tip of the spout. Turn it counterclockwise, tip the screen and the washer out into your palm, and hold them up to the light. A screen furred with white scale is telling you the tap slowed for its own reasons, and a clean screen will bring it back. A screen carrying dark grit, sand, or metal flakes is telling you that something upstream has been disturbed, and that is worth saying on the phone, because it changes what goes in and when. Rinse it, screw it back on finger-tight, and run the tap. The City gives the same advice for any tap in the house: run the cold water before drinking when it has sat for hours, use cold for drinking and cooking, and clean that screen from time to time.