Is this normal for a lever handle?

[Sluggo]

I have a wall-mounted vanity faucet (Newport Brass) with lever handles in a powder room. It looks like this:

The normal closed position is with the handles horizontal. When you want water, you rotate them downward. I recently had to turn off the water at the meter to change out a valve elsewhere and opened a couple of taps to drain the system. While I was walking past the powder room on the way to turn the water back on, I heard water dribbling out of the faucet in the powder room. I thought this was odd since that was not a faucet I opened. The I noticed that the ends of the lever handles had rotated downwards about 15 degrees. When I went to put them in the closed position, they slowly rotated down again. I went outside and turned the water on to the house and came back to the powder room. I put the handles in the normally closed position and they stayed; and, when I opened them, there was a normal amount of gentle resistance to turning. These handles are 14 years old, but don't get heavy use. Is it normal for something to happen like this when there is no water pressure and you have the weight of a fairly substantial lever handle exerting downward force? If not, what, if anything, should I do about this?

 

[hj]

I had that happen to a customer once. The city turned off the water and when they turned it back on the faucet had "opened" by itself because of the weight of the handles, but since they were on vacation, it did a lot of damage before they discovered it. The proper solution is to interchange the two mechanisms so the handles rotate UPWARDS to open and down to close so the weight of the lever handles helps keep the faucet closed.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Sluggo]

I had that happen to a customer once. The city turned off the water and when they turned it back on the faucet had "opened" by itself because of the weight of the handles, but since they were on vacation, it did a lot of damage before they discovered it. The proper solution is to interchange the two mechanisms so the handles rotate UPWARDS to open and down to close so the weight of the lever handles helps keep the faucet closed.

hj-
Thanks for that info. I'll implement your clever solution.

 

[Jadnashua]

The water pressure against the seals is likely distorting them slightly, providing the resistance you note. Lose water pressure, no resistance, and gravity can do its thing.

 

[Sluggo]

The water pressure against the seals is likely distorting them slightly, providing the resistance you note. Lose water pressure, no resistance, and gravity can do its thing.

jadnashua-
I figured the water pressure played a part, but I'm curious if this would have happened when this was a new faucet 14 years ago. They use ceramic cartridges, and there is no sign of leaking; the 1/4 turn motion is smooth and uniform.

 

[Jadnashua]

Maybe...even ceramic. Figure that the water pressure might be in the order of 50psi, but you will only have an opening much smaller than a square inch, but still, it's probably at least a pound pushing on things. Probably more than the weight of the handle.

 

[Sluggo]

jadnashua-
Thanks for the analysis...