- A "valve tap" is a noise made by the valves of internal combustion engines; see Poppet valve > Internal combustion engine.
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Water for baths, sinks and basins can be provided by separate hot and cold taps; this arrangement is common in older installations, particularly in public washrooms/lavatories and utility rooms/laundries. In kitchens and bathrooms mixer taps are commonly used. In this case, hot and cold water from the two valves is mixed before reaching the outlet, allowing the water to emerge at any temperature between that of the hot and cold water supplies. Mixer taps were invented by Thomas Campbell of Saint John, New Brunswick and patented in 1880.
For baths and showers, mixer taps frequently incorporate some sort of pressure balancing feature so that the hot/cold mixture ratio will not be affected by transient changes in the pressure of one or the other of the supplies. This helps avoid scalding or uncomfortable chilling as other water loads occur (such as the flushing of a toilet). Rather than two separate valves, mixer taps frequently use a single, more complex, valve controlled by a single handle (single handle mixer). The handle moves up and down to control the amount of water flow and from side to side to control the temperature of the water. Especially for baths and showers, the latest designs do this using a built-in thermostat. These are known as thermostatic mixing valves, or TMVs, and can be mechanical or electronic. There are also faucets with color LEDs to show the temperature of the water.
If separate taps are fitted, it may not be immediately clear which tap is hot and which is cold. The hot tap generally has a red indicator while the cold tap generally has a blue or green indicator. In the United States, the taps are frequently also labeled with an "H" or "C". Note that in countries with Romance languages, the letters "C" for hot and "F" for cold are used (from French "chaud"/Italian "caldo"/Spanish "caliente" (hot) and French "froid"/Italian "freddo"/Spanish "frio" (cold)). This can create confusion when English speakers visit these countries or vice versa. Mixer taps may have a red-blue stripe or arrows indicating which side will give hot and which cold.
In most countries, there is a standard arrangement of hot/cold taps. For example, in the United States and many other countries, the hot tap is on the left by building code requirements. Many installations exist where this standard has been ignored (called "crossed connections" by plumbers). Mis-assembly of some single-valve mixer taps will exchange hot and cold even if the fixture has been plumbed correctly.
Most handles on residential homes are connected to the valve shaft and fastened down with a screw. Although on most commercial and industrial applications they are fitted with a removable key called a "loose key", "water key", or "sillcock key", which has a square peg and a square ended key to turn off and on the water; the "loose key" can be removed to prevent vandals from turning on the water. In older buildings before the "loose key" was invented it was common for some landlords or caretakers to take off the handle of a residential tap, which had teeth that would meet up with the gears on the valve shaft. This Teeth and cog system is still used on most modern faucets. Although most of the time a "loose key" is on industrial and commercial applications, they may also be found at homes by the seashore to prevent passers-by from washing the sand off their feet.
Taps are normally connected to the water supply by means of a "swivel tap connector", which is attached to the end of the water pipe using a soldered or compression fitting, and has a large nut to screw onto the threaded "tail" of the tap, which hangs down underneath the bath, basin or sink. A fibre washer (which expands when wet, aiding the seal) is used between the connector and the tap tail. Tap tails are normally 1/2" in diameter for sinks and 3/4" for baths, although continental Europe sometimes uses a 3/8" (still imperial) size. The same connection method is used for a ballcock.
While in other contexts, depending on location, a "tap" may be a "faucet", "valve" or "spigot", the use of "tap" for beer is almost universal. This may be because the word was originally coined for the wooden valve in traditional barrels. Draft beer dispensed with a valve is said to be "on tap" (as an idiom). A "beer tap" now may be one of several items:
- Pressure-dispense bar tap
- Almost universally in modern times, bulk beer is supplied in kegs that are served with the aid of external pressure. In a normal bar dispense system, this pressure comes from a cylinder of carbon dioxide in North America or the UK (a mix of carbon dioxide and nitrogen may be used in the UK) which forces the beer out of the keg and up a narrow tube to the bar. At the end of this tube is a valve built into a fixture (usually somewhat decorative) on the bar. This is the beer tap, and opening it with a small lever causes beer, pushed by the gas from the cylinder, to flow into the glass.
- Portable keg tap
- Sometimes, beer kegs designed to be connected to the above system are instead used on their own, perhaps at a party or outdoor event. In this case, a self-contained portable tap is required that allows beer to be served straight from the keg. Because the keg system uses pressure to force the beer up and out of the keg, these taps must have a means of supplying it. The typical "picnic tap" uses a hand pump to push air into the keg; this will cause the beer to spoil faster but is perfectly acceptable when it will be consumed in a short time. Portable taps with small CO2 cylinders are also available.
- Cask beer tap
- Beers brewed and served in the traditional way (typically cask ale) do not use artificial gas. Taps for cask beer are simple on-off valves that are hammered into the end of the cask (see keystone for details). When beer is served directly from the cask ("by gravity"), as at beer festivals and some pubs, it simply flows out of the tap and into the glass. When the cask is stored in the cellar and served from the bar, as in most pubs, the beer line is screwed onto the tap and the beer is sucked through it by a hand-operated low-pressure pump on the bar. The taps used are the same, and in beer-line setups the first pint is often poured from the cask as for "gravity", for tasting, before the line is connected. Cask beer taps can be brass, which is now discouraged for fear of lead contamination, stainless steel, which is effective but expensive, plastic, which is cheaper but still effective, and wood, which should be avoided if possible due to its poor longevity.
Although a gas tap may be a valve that releases any gas, the word is most commonly used to refer to taps that control the flow of fuel gas[disambiguation needed] (natural gas or, historically, coal gas, syngas, etc.) in the home (for gas fires or other appliances) or in laboratories (for Bunsen burners). Inside the tap a tighly fitted (brass-only versions had to be greased once) cone with a cross bore has to be aligned with the in- and outlet-line to open the valve. The handle is longitudinal and parallel to this bore, that one sees the status of the valve. It can be closed quickly but provides only coarse control of the gas flow rate.
Physics of taps
Most water and gas taps have adjustable flow. Turning the knob or working the lever sets the flow rate by adjusting the size of an opening in the valve assembly, giving rise to choked flow through the narrow opening in the valve. The choked flow rate is independent of the viscosity or temperature of the fluid or gas in the pipe, and depends only weakly on the supply pressure, so that flow rate is stable at a given setting. At intermediate flow settings the pressure at the valve restriction drops nearly to zero from the Venturi effect; in water taps, this causes the water to boil momentarily at room temperature as it passes through the restriction. Bubbles of cool water vapor form and collapse at the restriction, causing the familiar hissing sound. At very low flow settings, the viscosity of the water becomes important and the pressure drop (and hissing noise) vanish; at full flow settings, parasitic drag in the pipes becomes important and the water again becomes quiet.
One reason that most beer taps are not designed for adjustable flow is that the beer itself is damaged by the pressure drop in a choked-flow valve: holding a beer tap partially open causes the beer to foam vigorously, ruining the pour.
The first screw-down tap mechanism was patented and manufactured by the Rotherham brass founders Guest and Chrimes in 1845. Most older taps use a soft rubber or neoprene washer which is screwed down onto a valve seat in order to stop the flow. This is called a "globe valve" in engineering and, while it gives a leak-proof seal and good fine adjustment of flow, both the rubber washer and the valve seat are subject to wear (and for the seat, also corrosion) over time, so that eventually no tight seal is formed in the closed position, resulting in a leaking tap. The washer can be replaced and the valve seat resurfaced (at least a few times), but globe valves are never maintenance-free.
Also, the tortuous S-shaped path the water is forced to follow offers a significant obstruction to the flow. For high pressure domestic water systems this does not matter, but for low pressure systems where flow rate is important, such as a shower fed by a storage tank, a "stop tap" or, in engineering terms, a "gate valve" is preferred.
Gate valves use a metal disc the same diameter as the pipe which is screwed into place perpendicularly to the flow, cutting it off. There is no resistance to flow when the tap is fully open, but this type of tap rarely gives a perfect seal when closed. In the UK this type of tap normally has a wheel-shaped handle rather than a crutch or capstan handle.
Cone valves or ball valves are another alternative. These are commonly found as the service shut-off valves in more-expensive water systems and usually found in gas taps (and, incidentally, the cask beer taps referred to above). They can be identified by their range of motion—only 90°—between fully open and closed. Usually, when the handle is in line with the pipe the valve is open, and when the handle is across the pipe it is closed. A cone valve consists of a shallowly-tapering cone in a tight-fitting socket placed across the flow of the fluid. In UK English this is usually known as a taper-plug cock. A ball valve uses a spherical ball instead. In either case, a hole through the cone or ball allows the fluid to pass if it is lined up with the openings in the socket through which the fluid enters and leaves; turning the cone using the handle rotates the passage away, presenting the fluid with the unbroken surface of the cone through which it cannot pass. Valves of this type using a cylinder rather than a cone are sometimes encountered, but using a cone allows a tight fit to be made even with moderate manufacturing tolerances. The ball in ball valves rotates within plastic seats.
Hands free infrared proximity sensors are replacing the standard valve. Thermostatically controlled electronic dual-purpose mixing or diverting valves are used within industrial applications to automatically provide liquids as required.
Foot controlled valves are installed within laboratory and healthcare/hospitals, as well as in industrial settings where extremely dirty hands operating taps might leave residues on them.
Modern taps often have aerators at the tip to help save water and reduce splashes. Without an aerator, water usually flows out of the tap in one big stream. An aerator spreads the water flow into many small droplets.
Modern bathroom and kitchen taps often use ceramic or plastic surfaces sliding against other spring-loaded ceramic surfaces or plastic washers. These tend to require far less maintenance than traditional globe valves and when maintenance is required, the entire interior of the valve is usually replaced, often as a single pre-assembled cartridge.
Of the trio of well-respected faucet manufacturers in North American plumbing circles, Moen and American Standard use cartridges (Moen's being O-ring based, American Standard's being ceramic), while Delta uses easily-replaced rubber seats facing the cartridge(s). Each design has its advantages: Moen cartridges tend to be easiest to find, American Standard cartridges have nearly infinite lifespan in sediment-free municipal water, and Delta's rubber seats tend to be most forgiving of sediment in well water.
Most U.S. jurisdictions now require bibcocks to have a vacuum breaker or backflow preventer, so that water cannot return through the bibcock from the hose. This prevents contamination of the building or public water system should there be a pressure drop. In the UK, a double check valve is required to conform with water regulations; this is often incorporated within the body of the tap itself.
Nomenclature and usage variations
In the British Isles and most of the Commonwealth, the word "tap" is used for any everyday type of valve, particularly the fittings that control water supply to bathtubs and sinks. In the U.S., the word is more often used for beer taps, cut-in connections, or wiretapping. "Spigot" (or "spicket", a United States disambiguation, used primarily in the south) or "faucet" are more often used to refer to water valves, although this sense of "tap" is not uncommon, and the term "tap water" is the standard name for water from the faucet. Between "spigot" and "faucet", the connotative distinction is outdoor-versus-indoor, and utilitarian-versus-decorative; thus a spigot is an outdoor tap such as the bibcock (sillcock, hose bibb) for a garden hose, whereas a faucet is an indoor tap such as on the kitchen sink, bathroom sink, or bathtub, which typically includes decorative features such as styling cues and polished chrome plating.
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- Mario Theriault, Great Maritime Inventions 1833–1950, Goose Lane, 2001, p. 33.