Kitchen sink shutoff valves not shutting off water

[BikeRider64]

We live in a walkup apartment in a nearly 70 year old 2 family home in Queens, NYC. Around 10 years ago the kitchen sink, faucet and cabinets were replaced with a basic Delta unit with a sprayer, with the spray hose attached to the faucet under the sink. However, since then the sprayer hose connection to the faucet has rusted and rotted and is leaking and needs to be replaced, but the hot and cold shutoff valves aren't shutting off the water supply which prevents the replacement. When turned clockwise as far as they'll go, the cold still lets out a small flow and the hot is still flowing at full strength.

Is this typical of valves this old from the 50's? We're renters without basement access to shut off the main water supply so I'm afraid of trying to apply more pressure to the valves in case they can still be turned in some more, for fear of breaking them and causing a flood. We told the landlord about this and they came over, but they're incredibly cheap and didn't commit to fixing either issue, the leaking sprayer hose connection or the non-working valves. In the end this could backfire on them if the hose falls off and causes a flood because we're unable to shut off the water, and I tried to tactfully explain this to them, but they're also kind of stupid that way, penny wise and pound foolish.

Anyway, I'm not looking for anyone to help us with landlord issues, just wondering if these valves are likely broken or just stuck and need to be turned in some more and can handle the extra force, or if we should leave them alone and have a pro fix it, after we work things out with the landlord. Either way the solution seems to be to install secondary shutoff valves between the hot and cold hoses and the supply pipes, so we don't have to mess with the older, primary valves. Would that work?

 

[Geofd]

More than likely the rubber washers inside the valves have worn away from age or something like that a professional would be best because one way or another there's a way to solve your issure

 

[havasu]

I hope you understand that as a renter, you are legally entitled to safe living, and drip free plumbing. If the landlords play stupid, forcing you to touch the plumbing, and it goes sideways, this would become your responsibility to repair. So basically, you break and you pay!

If you have a leak, and your valves will not shut off the water supply, place these defects in writing to the landlord. What ever you do, do not touch the plumbing.

 

[BikeRider64]

I hope you understand that as a renter, you are legally entitled to safe living, and drip free plumbing. If the landlords play stupid, forcing you to touch the plumbing, and it goes sideways, this would become your responsibility to repair. So basically, you break and you pay!

If you have a leak, and your valves will not shut off the water supply, place these defects in writing to the landlord. What ever you do, do not touch the plumbing.

Yeah, I know. I just wanted to get a sense of what might be going on with our plumbing even if we aren't going to try to fix it ourselves. We've already sent the landlord several texts mentioning all this, so it's documented. If they don't fix it, or tell us to fix it, to save on plumbers or hoping something breaks and it's then on us, we'll have to escalate to the appropriate authorities.

 

[BikeRider64]

More than likely the rubber washers inside the valves have worn away from age or something like that a professional would be best because one way or another there's a way to solve your issure

If so, is the solution generally to take the original valves apart to fix whatever's going on, or to just install secondary valves on the faucet supply hoses? The latter sounds easier, cheaper and less likely to damage existing infrastructure, but perhaps code requires the former.

 

[havasu]

You would still need to shut off the main valve to facilitate adding another in line valve, so why not just repair/replace the one bad valve.

 

[BikeRider64]

You would still need to shut off the main valve to facilitate adding another in line valve, so why not just repair/replace the one bad valve.

True, not my call, just curious. The landlord's pretty cheap so I thought this might save him some money since it seems DIY while replacing the main valves seems more of a pro job.

Incidentally he spoke to several plumbers and all say that his best bet is to replace the whole faucet, so he's going to schedule a visit and order the part. I guess the corrosion is so bad with these cheaper faucets that you can't just replace the sprayer hose. Why it's usually better to spend more initially to save more down the line. But, again, not my call.