Grohe faucet handle removal: explosive technique?

['Pants]

The images are from the Grohe installation booklet for this aging lav faucet.

What I really need is a removal manual, I guess. Appears that, as with some other Grohe models, the caps atop the faucet valve-stems just pushed in - when new - but are presumably now retained by a decade or two of calcium and toothpaste residue.

Efforts to remove these caps with a scraper-blade or screwdriver have thus far brought me just past the brink of damage to the chrome/brass.

Anyone got any tricks for this?

Was it a metal-to-metal fit that retained these originally, or was there anything resilient involved?

Wish I had an easy source of liquid nitrogen...more realistically, if I can manage it, a vinegar or CLR soaking will be next...probably followed by a hacksaw and a new faucet...

 

[hj]

I cannot make your picture larger, but the caps DO come off, so they either pop off or screw in, but cannot tell from your photo.

 

[Sponsor]

 

['Pants]

I cannot make your picture larger, but the caps DO come off, so they either pop off or screw in, but cannot tell from your photo.

Sorry - but that's the clunkiest, most confusing forum photo-upload process I've run across to date. But I think the full-size images are up now.

Yesterday I sharpened a screwdriver to a chisel-point and tapped all around the joint between cap and handle, for a good fifteen minutes, leaving the chrome slightly damaged here and there. Zero movement.

Also attaching the pertinent snippet from the Grohe maintenance booklet. "Detach" is the verb. So...I gotta go get one o' those detachers, maybe?

 

[Stu]

I'm also stuck with the same question! Did you manage to find how to get the tops off or is there some other way?

 

['Pants]

I'm also stuck with the same question! Did you manage to find how to get the tops off or is there some other way?

Stu - just stumbled back here - not sure I got a notification. But if you're still in that bathroom struggling with these... yes, they do indeed unscrew. I utterly destroyed one getting it off, but at least I found out that they do come off that way. I've got spares if you need. The next faucet of that type I worked on? Unscrewed with bare hands. Pfffft.

Also on that subject: following some folksy advice that seemed entirely reasonable, I soaked the whole faucet in vinegar in order to remove the calcium deposits. FATAL mistake. I couldn't believe how bad it came out of that bath the next day. It looked like every single damned tiny formerly-invisible scratch had been eroded out to magnify and grossly exaggerate any flaws that had been there before, to the point where it was so ugly I suddenly couldn't bring myself to re-use it. (cue muted trumpet: wah-wah-wah) It went to scrap metal after a suitable period of mourning, but I saved the caps since I've got another one.

 

[Raggermany]

I cannot make your picture larger, but the caps DO come off, so they either pop off or screw in, but cannot tell from your photo.

I spent the internet trying to find this solution for the Grohe separated faucets which are very similar to this. A lot of people wrote that they pop right off after removing a screw, which these don't have and if you read the instructions it looks like they simply slide right in. The way they are installed is the bottom thick polished washer is what holds it in. You simply unscrew it with a pair of pliers and gently turn it to remove it and then the entire faucet comes right out.

You can see the threads in the pictures and it simply twists right off.