Replacement westy water tap knob from Maplin

[Westy End]

I saw that someone had said this was an option and as my tap was knobless I thought I would check it out.

£1.39 groovy knob purchased:



It has a round spline with a grub screw to attach it to whatever it is going to control. However, the shaft of the tap is square and actually lowers with the rest of the mechanism leaving the grub screw clutching air. I needed a round extension to the shaft with a square aperture. Step up the rawlplug! i cut a couple of the plastic pieces shown so that they fitted in to the knob.



I then used araldite to fix this to the knob and tightened the grub screw in for good measure resulting in:





which I think looks pretty cool. I just should have checked the height first - it touches the top of the kitchen lid when closed - a couple of mm shorter would have been better. I may cut a bit off the bottom of the rawl plug as this is not glued to the tap - just fits snugly.

I also replaced the tired microswitch with one from maplin and to give the tap actuator more chance of pushing the arm of the switch I bent the lever of the switch back on itself rather than cutting it off. worked quite well.

I also chucked all the relevant pieces into a descaler for a while to make them nice and shiny. Just need to hook it up to electric and water now!

[waltraud]

Genius!!

[AdrianC]

I saw that someone had said this was an option

Yes, that was me...

However, the shaft of the tap is square and actually lowers with the rest of the mechanism leaving the grub screw clutching air.

Or, if you fit it so that it grips, you can't turn the tap off. Sorry, I discovered that later, but forgot to post back...

Nice work to get round it!

I also replaced the tired microswitch with one from maplin

Oooh - which one, and got any pics of how you fitted it? I'm still on an external switch at the mo.

[Westy End]

This should do the trick:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/low-cost-standa ... tches-6453
the one with the flat arm - bent over double then gives the tap actuator less travel to activate the switch. There should be a couple of plastic pins on your original switch holding it in place - push these out and reuse to fit the new switch. it just requires a bit of fiddling with the adjuster screw on the switch housing to get it so that the switch switches .

The rawl plug was picked as one with four splits in the opening where the screw goes in (see the fins on the plug in the picture). this gave a good snug fit to the shaft.

I should caveat all this with the fact that the unit is out of the van at the moment so I dont actually know if it works but you can hear the switch clicking on and off when the knob is turned.

Job done!

[Westy End]

Genius!!

That's where a day of beard stroking in the quiet solitude of redundancy will get you.

[PetenAli]

Very helpful thread - thanks a lot. Ours has just stopped working and we use it all the time. This should be the fix I need.

[The Bishop]

Do Westy's have sinks? I suppose that's for putting out any fires under the grill!

[waltraud]

No need when you can cook toast on the top ring and be all toasty with your eber running on a cold winters day.

[The Bishop]

Ok just jealous

[AdrianC]

...and be all toasty with your eber running on a cold winters day.

With that lovely double-glazing, and heavily insulated roof, the Eber's rarely needed...