Replace Valve Packing in a Hose Bibb 2014

Next to replacing the toilet flapper doohickey, the leaky faucet is probably the most common household plumbing repair. Kitchen and bathroom faucets come in an astonishing selection of styles and a bewildering array of valve types, but once you've gone through the repair process once (or twice), shutting down a leak with a new washer or a cartridge rebuild is actually pretty easy. That's for indoor faucets, however: those tough, utilitarian outdoor faucets (actual names, hose bibs or bibbs) are different, however. When one of them leaks, it may not be a worn-out washer: it might be the valve packing.

"The what?" you may ask.

 Valve Packing
A hose bibb consists of a simple valve, usually brass, that screws into a molded metal body. To prevent leakage around the valve stem, bibbs are designed so that soft, waterproof material seals against the stem. This is what's called valve packing. When packing wears out, which it eventually does, the bibb starts leaking at the stem. Leaky packing is different from a worn-out washer, which allows water to leak out of the spout.


Valve packing comes in different types: you can fill the space with a felt washer or use some expensive, waterproof string. That string is either graphite-impregnated or made of polytetrafluorethane (PTFE), which you may know better by the trademark Teflon®.  Real old-timers might recall using oakum for packing, which is little more than the fibers from rope with a little grease added to make it waterproof.

If you use a felt washer, you'll have to measure to determine the size needed. String-type packing is more versatile, since it fits any size stem; we'll do that for our project.

What you Need
• Screwdriver
• Adjustable wrench
• Replacement packing (graphite or teflon string)
• Replacement faucet handle (probably)

Steps
1 - Turn off the water to the hose bibb
2 - Use the screwdriver to remove the screw in the center of the faucet handle and pull off the handle. The skeleton-style ones usually break, so you'll probably need to replace this when you're done.
3 - Remove the bonnet nut with the adjustable wrench and then unscrew the valve to take it out of the body.
4 - Clean any leftover packing from the bonnet nut and the valve stem.
5 - Wrap packing string around the valve stem several times counterclockwise.
6 - Screw the valve stem back into the body and tighten down the bonnet nut
7 - Reinstall or replace the handle (you might want to get a replacement T-handle.
The bonnet nut will compress the wrapped packing string to form a tight seal. You'll probably need to tighten the nut some more after the first few uses