How do I increase water pressure in cold water faucet?

Wendy Koltes
by Wendy Koltes

There was a water main break in our neighborhood. The city turned off the water for about 3 hours. When the water was turned back on, there was only a drip coming from the kitchen cold water faucet. The faucet works fine when turned to hot, and all other faucets in house are fine. Our house is 100+ years old. Maybe some sediment was knocked loose? What can we do?

  2 answers
  • Seth Seth on Jan 16, 2019

    Wendy,

    That is exactly what happened and is quite common in your situation. There are a couple of things you need to do. Remove the aerator for that faucet. Run the cold water to clear the line, rinse the screen in the aerator, and reinstall it. Make sure you do not have an issue with your washer or shower heads as well. if clearing the aerator does not solve the issue, the problem is sediment trapped in the faucet valve. You will need to disassemble it to clean it out. There are tutorials on youtube that will show you how to do this.

    • Wendy Koltes Wendy Koltes on Jan 16, 2019

      Thanks for the tip. The only thing is, the hot water flows just fine through the same faucet. Turn the handle to cold, nothing but a drip, so it's not the aerator (both temps share same faucet).

  • Seth Seth on Jan 16, 2019

    Got it. Then it's the valve that is blocked.