American Standard Pivot Rod

[pasadena_commut]

The pop up in one of our American Standard two handle bathroom sinks stopped popping up. On investigation, the pivot rod had corroded and snapped off right next to the pop up. The outside part of the rod is still shiny. Carefully examined the same part in the other sink's drain, with the same faucet, and that rod was still shiny everywhere.

I need to dig out the paperwork to see if there is a lifetime warranty on that sink, and so that part. Assuming no, the part looks like this (but maybe not "extra long"):

https://qualityplumbingsupply.com/american-standard-025088-0070a-pivot-rods-extra-long/

Are all AS pivot rods the same geometry (other than length of the bar on the outside of the drain) or do they have different ball and rod diameters/lengths? Home Depot doesn't seem to carry this part, only the whole drain, or a Danco part. Should I consider replacing the whole drain rather than the part, on the theory that whatever ate through that rod probably has done a number on the drain too? (No idea why it corroded that badly, we don't pour anything acidic into these sinks. Maybe one of my kids has acid saliva like in Alien.)

 

[Geofd]

You can try to find just the rod, might be faster to buy the whole drain assembly

 

[pasadena_commut]

Apparently I didn't save the paperwork in the usual place, so poked around in the garage and found a box that one of the faucets had come in. 2904222.002 "Williamsburg". No letter after the numbers. No notes in the box, but it had an unused drain assembly in it, the pipe parts of which are all metal, which looks a lot like this:

https://www.homedepot.com/p/America...go-in-Polished-Chrome-M953450-0020A/203670989

I don't see "American Standard" on the drain assembly anywhere, just an "N" on the big metal piece where the pivot rod plugs in. Is that how American Standard marks that part? There is also a possibility that it is from a Moen bathroom faucet and was just placed into the wrong box.

Examined the pop ups on the unused assembly and the existing two in the sinks, and they were all different.

Odd.

Since I have an unused and apparently functional drain assembly, I guess I might as well use it.
Edit: Or not? It has been in that box for 24 years.

 

[Geofd]

Nice find !!!! Sounds like a plan

 

[bkspero]

Since I have an unused and apparently functional drain assembly, I guess I might as well use it.

Why don't you try to just use the new pivot rod in the old assembly? Takes 2 minutes to test, and if (I suspect "when") it works you would have saved an hour or more of work swapping out the whole drain assembly.

 

[pasadena_commut]

Finally got around to this.

Took the old broken rod/ball and cap to the closest ACE Hardware and compared it to this:

https://www.acehardware.com/departments/plumbing/faucet-and-faucet-repair/plumbing-stoppers/4568655

That is for a Price Pfister. As far as I could tell the parts were identical. Didn't have calipers with me but the length of the rod, its diameter, and the diameter and position on the rod of the ball were indistinguishable by eye. The caps looked the same too.

But at it turned out, they were not quite identical. The plastic cap would not thread onto the existing drain, even without the rod. Not a problem because the old cap was still good.

More of a problem, the place where the ball sits in the drain was somewhat rusty and felt rough. Stuffed some vinegar soaked paper towels in there for a while and spun them around to dissolve/dislodge as much rust as possible. Then rinsed with water. Still felt rough, but not as much. So the new ball was covered with some silicone grease, placed into position, and the cap tightened down. It moved easily and several full basins of water drained past it without any leaking through. We will see how long that holds up. If it leaks I still have the spare drain.

The old rod/ball, besides having corroded and snapped off, turned out to have a split ball. The crack was only on one side of the ball and may have reached all the way to the rod. It apparently let some drops of water through because the rod was coated in mineral deposits just outside the drain assembly.

As long as I was under there the supply hoses from the shutoff valves to the sink were changed. 16" both ends FIP. The existing ones, something like 20 years old, were Brasscraft so the same model was used to replace them. I couldn't see the bottom of the connections on the sink well due to it being recessed, poor lighting, and my mediocre vision through the safety glasses. Flat on my back looking up around the drain pipe with bits of mineral deposit and dust falling on my face, so the glasses stayed on. For a while I thought that the threads had stripped on the distal end of one of the faucet connectors because the threads wouldn't engage. Also the last couple of millimeters felt narrower at the end. Turned out that one of the rock hard hose washers had stayed on that connector when the hose came off. Pried it off with my fingernails and the rest of the reassembly was smooth sailing.