Sink Pop Up Drain Install
Kung Fu Maintenance Demonstrates how to install a pop up drain with silicone on a white cultured marble counter top. This method also works for stone, granite, or other porous materials.
Today I’ll be doing the silicone method of installing a popup drain for cultured marble, because sometimes, the putty might stain the cultured marble especially white cultured marble, and we don’t want that. Today, I’ll be using silicone instead.
First we’ve got our cap, the top portion of the popup. Around this, we’re going to put our silicone all the way around, just build it up nice and thick to make sure everything gets coated, like so. I’ve got the silicone on all the way around; we’re going to insert that into our drain. Then on the bottom, we’re going to feed our popup assembly. With the popup assembly, we’re going to want to coat the inner portions of the parts with the silicone also, this way it’s got it all in the threads. As we tighten this up together, everything gets siliconed up real good. In between both sides of the fittings, applying the silicone, as well as to the top threads, all the way around the inside. Then back to our cap that goes up top; we already put silicone around the outside. We’re going to put silicone around the inside also, that way when those threads get threaded in, they tighten up against that.
Insert that portion in the top and put our popup assembly up through the hole. Up top, we’re going to rotate this all the way on until it’s seated nice and strong. That’s about as far as I can go with that. [inaudible: 02:14] I’m not going to squeeze; I’m just going to hold it to make sure, and I’m rotating the bottom portion until that’s nice and set. Going back down below, what we need to do is make sure that the popup rod is facing towards the back. Now we can go ahead and tighten the net up, pulling down and turning it into place. Before I do that, I’m going to go ahead and put another bead of silicone around the inside of the top, pretty much all the way around, like so. We’re ready to tighten this up. It’s going to squeeze the silicone out of everywhere. Again, this is why you want several layers of gloves. In fact, I’m going to put on more because this way as it gets onto your gloves, you can just undo a layer if you need to. It makes clean- up a lot easier. Also when we go to remove the excess silicone, it makes that easier too.
We’re ready to tighten this up; again, making sure the popup is towards the back. Eventually, we’ll reach a point where we’re tight. I’m going to go ahead and remove a layer of gloves so I don’t get the silicone all over my channel locks. I can use my channel locks to tighten this down the rest of the way. This should be done until its 1/4 -turn past tight. If you have two pairs of channel locks, you can use one pair to hold the bottom. There is another way: You could take your screwdriver and insert that in here, and then use that to hold. Just be careful because this particular one’s made out of plastic so we don’t want to crack it. We’re nice and tight.
On the bottom, you’ll want to take your gloves and go all the way around, and just smooth this silicone in so that you’ve got a nice, even spread all the way around. On top, just take all the excess silicone out of here. We might have squeezed out through the top. At the bottom, going to put another little bead of silicone just around the bottom thread and then smooth that in with a glove so that it’s nice and even all the way around. We can remove the popup rod nut in order to lock it in there a little bit better behind it. That’s all siliconed in. Put my nut back on just loosely so we don’t lose it. We’ll let that all dry.
Come back up top. Again, I’m going to remove another layer of gloves. Down inside here, we’re going to want to smooth in the rest of the excess silicone to get rid of that. You don’t want it slowing our drain down. There we go. We can go ahead and remove the blue protective cover; just getting back under it a little bit. Go ahead and get rid of my gloves. Then maybe you take a rag and clean this up or maybe the gloves. Take a rag for this one. Here we go. It might have been a better idea to take off the blue protective film before, that way it doesn’t leave any residue down in here. This is stuff is going to be a little tough to get out. Always learning more. That looks good. We’ll let that dry, come back and put it back together, and test it out.
Here goes the rest of the popup install. Going to take the rod and put it down here in the back and down in the drain. Going to insert that popup plug and hold it about here, making sure that the bottom hole is facing towards the back, like so. Then underneath, you’re going to take your rod and then slip the back on. You’re going to feel with your other hand the popup plug and insert the popup rod into the plug so that you’re able to move the plug up and down, like so. Once you get there, then you’re able to thread the nut on, taking care not to get it cross-fitted. Just tighten it down finger-tight; don’t want to over-tighten it.
Next, you’re going to take the extension, undo the thumbscrew enough so that you’ll be able to pass the rod down through the 2 holes, and then you’re going to tighten the thumbscrew against the rod. What you’re going to do is line up the holes to the back where you want it to go. What you want to do up top is just raise the post up to about so. Hold that with one hand. Here is inserting the rod on the clip. We haven’t put the clip on yet, but tighten the thumbscrew down first. Once the thumbscrew’s nice and snug, now we can take your clip, and we’re going to push this back and feed one end of the clip on the other end around, squeeze both of them, and pass it on to the rod. Hopefully you were able to see that. We put one end of the clip on, then the rod, then the extension, then the other end of the clip on, like so, just by squeezing it. Now we’re able to control our popup with the rod.
Now is going to be putting the trap back together. First, we’re going to slip the slip-joint plumbing over the popup assembly, and then slip the track up and over that. Then on the bottom of the track, we’re going to lift up and tighten this up. We just hand-tighten this until it’s tight. We’re nice and tight. Next, we’re going to use our slip-joint plumbing and tighten this down. Again, just hand-tighten nice and tight. We’re ready for the leak test.
Leak testing the popup and drain line: What we want to do is go ahead and pull the plug, fill the sink up with water, and this way we’ll do our pressure test. Fill it all the way up then we’ll pull the plug, and then we’ll check for any leaks down below as the weight of the water rushes through the lines. Before we get to that point, we can go ahead and feel all around for any leaks. So far, we’re good. This overflow works as a relief to let the air in, like the old can used to do. When you open a can and you puncture one side and then you puncture the other opposite side so that your contents would flow out easier; it’s the same principle. Water’s going down the overflow now. Let’s go down here and check it out. I’m going to go ahead and pull the popup. We can do it up top or we can go ahead and release it here. You hear the water going through. Again, we’re checking and feeling for any leaks, any signs of moisture, especially at any of the connections. Everything’s nice and dry.
Nice new popup. We can just pull the blue trim cover off which just peels off. It’s a protective covering. Everything is nice, shiny, and brand new. Good to go.