8 August 2026 · 3 min read · By the JJ Pro Plumbing team
Why Your Tap Keeps Leaking (Even After You Tighten It)
Everyone's done it: the tap drips, so you crank it harder. It stops — for a week. Then it drips again, worse. Here's what's actually going on inside the tap, and why brute force makes it worse.
What's inside a dripping tap
Traditional Australian taps seal with a small rubber washer pressed onto a brass seat. Every year of use wears the washer; every over-tightening crushes it further and grinds the seat beneath it. Once the seat itself is scored, new washers won't seal properly — which is why the drip keeps coming back.
Modern mixer taps work differently, using a ceramic disc cartridge. When they drip or the handle gets stiff or loose, the cartridge has usually failed and needs replacing — there's no washer to change.
Why tightening harder backfires
Extra force doesn't fix the worn seal — it deforms it, and damages the brass seat it presses against. A tap that needs muscle to shut off is a tap asking for a service. Each extra-firm turn shortens its life a little more.
What a proper fix looks like
- Worn washers and O-rings replaced with quality parts
- The brass seat re-faced with a seat-cutting tool so the new washer seals on a smooth surface
- The spindle serviced and lubricated so the tap turns easily
- Ceramic cartridges replaced like-for-like on mixers
When replacement beats repair
If the tap body is corroded, the chrome is failing, or it's a cheap mixer with an obsolete cartridge, replacement is usually the smarter spend. Repairing a fixture that's structurally at end of life just schedules the next call-out.
And the cost of doing nothing? A steady drip can waste over 20,000 litres a year — you're paying for water that goes straight down the drain.