In message , Ronald Raygun
writes
Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , Ronald Raygun
writes

I think I've misunderstood the description of the OP's setup, because
my memory is tainted with the tap arrangement I used to have once.

On mine, the axis of rotation of the knobs was horizontal (and indeed the
two knobs were co-axial). Taking the cold (right hand) knob, you would
rotate it clockwise for on, which meant pushing the top side of the knob
away from you. In other words, the lever would be horizontal facing
towards you for off, and would be vertical for fully on, though
conceivably you could pull the knob off the valve stem and put it back on
90 degrees out, so that the lever would be vertical for off and horizontal
pointing away from you for on.

On re-reading the OP, it seems his knobs rotate in a vertical axis, with
the levers *always* horizontal, and the original arrangement has the
levers pointing towards him for off and away from wach other for on (i.e.
cold clockwise off, hot clockwise on). And he wants them pointing away
from each other for off. Not clear whether he wants them pointing towards
or away from him when on. If the latter, could he not just mount the
whole assembly rotated round by 180 degrees, and re-colour the buttons?
That way he wouldn't need to delve into the valve innards.

It's a normal mixer tap (the kind with a swivelling 'spout' in the
centre).

If you turn the whole tap around, you do make the hot tap cold, and the
cold tap hot,

Yes, but you can swap the hose connections underneath to correct that.

But that's not something that anyone would 'want' to do!

but you don't change the direction of rotation of the handles.

Yes you do, that was the whole point of my suggestion! See below.

Ah, yes. You're absolutely right on that. My mistake. [I don't know why
I said that!!]

And you are unlikely ever to want the handles pointing away from you
(towards the wall) - which they would (when off) if the virgin tap was
rotated.

I guess it depends on how much room there is behind the sink for the
handles, but I don't think it would bother me. Anyway, that's why I
suggested rotating the knobs.

If what the OP wants is for the handles to be off when pointing away
from each other, and on when pointing towards him, then my suggestion
delivers exactly that.

Yes indeed. As rotating the whole assembly transposes the taps, it also
transposes the hot and cold inserts. If you now reposition the handles,
you get what I want.

Actually, this is exactly what I did when I first installed the mixer
tap, fours years ago. It has the added advantage of moving the position
of the grub-screw (which retains the swivelling spout) from the back
(where you can't get a screwdriver to it) to the front (where you can) -
although, when replacing the O-ring (as you have to do every year or
two), you have to take care not to lose the grubscrew down the plughole!

And if you re-positioned the handles, you would be back where
you started!

As I confessed, I was wrong about that.

No you wouldn't. As originally configured, you have cold on the right,
hot on the left, handles towards you for off, handles away from each
other for on. This means that the cold handle is clockwise off and the
hot handle is clockwise on. They're mirror images of each other and
therefore different.

If you turn the whole thing around, then the cold handle is still
clockwise off, but is now on the left. It's now off when the handle
points away from you, but if you re-position the handle, it does
exactly what's wanted.

No, I think you've misinterpreted my original question, which was "Other
than turning in opposite directions, is there any real difference
between the hot and cold inserts", ie "Is there any reason why the cold
insert should not be used for the hot water, and vice versa?"

I didn't misunderstand the question (which has in any case been answered
by others), I just looked for the question behind the question, and
addressed that! :-)

I am making assumptions which I'm not sure are warranted, namely that
it's an easier job to turn the thing around[*], re-plumb the hose or
pipe connections[*], and shift the knobs, than it is to take the valves
themselves apart and reconfigure their innards.

The two tasks labelled
[*] of course are null tasks if one thinks this through before plumbing
it in the "wrong" way to start with.

Another key assumption is that the spout has full 360 degree swivelling
freedom. It wouldn't do if it has a stop.

If the tap is already installed, far the easiest thing to do is simply
to transpose the inserts and, when you re-fit the handles, with the taps
'off' position, put them pointing left and right, away from each other.
It's then only a question of whether, because of some subtle difference
between the hot and cold inserts (which are now controlling the 'wrong'
type of water), you should really have done it! But from what has been
said, it seems that there shouldn't be a problem.
--
Ian