The soap dispenser cracked the sink from the drain to the rim:
I bought a sink shortly after the accident, but had been putting off doing the replacement because of the time involved, and because I dislike plumbing. Anyway, taking a short vacation during the recent holidays, I decided it was time to tackle this project.
The sink is wall-hung. It's about the only option for our tiny half-bath, so I had to get another wall-hung about the same size. Fortunately, Home Depot had one. It was the only one they had:
The first thing to do was to disconnect and remove the faucet and drain. Pretty much standard procedures.
And then, the sink was removed:
See that black thing? That's the metal bracket which held up the sink. I was hoping that I could use the same one, but no joy. The new sink would not fit, so I had to install the bracket that came with the new sink. This is when I started running into challenges. First, if you don't already know, these brackets need to have some kind of lumber bracing in the wall. Fortunately, I have easy access to the back of the wall. Here's the old 2x3 bracing:
The new sink has different dimensions than the old, and clips at a different place than the old, requiring a bracing to be several inches below the old bracing. Also, due to a less than optimal design, the new sink tends to rotate about the bracket, creating a lot of torque on the bracket. So it requires additional fasteners to securely attach the sink to the wall. Just a poor design. The old sink used a single bracket and was rock solid on that wall. I had to remove this old bracing in order to attach the new sink. However, it was nailed in with 6 nails and would not budge as I wailed on it with a hammer. I then decided I needed something to make the job a little easier:
Just a couple of passes with the saw, and I was able to knock the block off, first at one end then the other.
Next, I cut some scrap 2x4 I had lying around with my power miter to make another bracing:
After it was cut, I affixed it using some construction screws. It wasn't as stable as the old one, so I added some right-angle braces.
Next I needed to hang the sink on the brackets, and then add two additional toggle bolts to stabilize it on the wall. This required another piece of wood (so it wouldn't pull through the drywall).
The sink was on, so it would be clear sailing to the end. Just had to attach the faucet and drain, hook everything up and be done. Or so I thought. When I attached the faucet, I noticed how NOT flat the sink's deck was. Check out this rather large gap:
You get what you pay for, I guess. I was hoping that I had enough plumber's putty. I tightened down the faucet and it seemed to be OK. Attached the water supply lines. No problems there. Then it was time for the the trap.
What's wrong with this picture? Turns out the sink's drain opening was about 3/4" further from the wall than the old sink, so the tail didn't line up with the trap. Back to Home Depot...
Home Depot had a flexible tail pipe extension which allowed the trap to be connected. However, there was a leak I just could not fix. I found a better solution on Amazon:
It worked like a charm. Now we have a new sink.
Perhaps the worst part of all this was wasting two days of my vacation for something that I thought was going to take a few hours, and aggravating my cervical radiculopathy.
