Why it is a separate tap
Filtered water does not go through your existing mixer. It comes out of its own small tap, mounted beside the mixer on the sink or the benchtop.
There is a reason for that beyond convention. Your mixer blends hot and cold, and a filter sits on the cold line only. Running filtered water through the mixer would mean filtering water that is about to be mixed with unfiltered hot, which is neither useful nor sensible. The separate tap keeps the filtered line clean, short and cold.
It also means the mixer keeps doing its job unchanged. Nothing about the kitchen you already have gets worse.
The hole is the job
Everything else about fitting a filtered tap is straightforward plumbing. The hole is the part that needs thought, because it is permanent.
If your sink already has a spare hole
, this is easy. A lot of sinks come with a knockout where a soap dispenser or an air switch was intended. If yours has one in a sensible spot, we use it.
If it does not
, one has to be made, and what the benchtop is made of decides how.
Stone
is drilled with diamond tooling, slowly, with water. Rushed, it chips at the surface or cracks. It is entirely routine done properly and expensive done badly, which is the whole argument for having a plumber do it rather than trying it on a Saturday.
Laminate
drills easily and then needs the cut edge sealed. Skip that and the substrate takes on water over the years and swells, usually first appearing as a soft patch you cannot explain.
Stainless steel sinks
take a hole cleanly with the right cutter and deform badly with the wrong one.
Tiled benchtops
— still around in some of the older Gosnells kitchens — need care at the glaze.
Choosing the position
We talk about this with you standing at the sink, because it is easier to see than to describe.
A filtered tap wants to be somewhere you can get a tall jug or a bottle underneath it. It wants to be clear of the mixer's swing so the two do not collide. It wants to be reachable without stretching across the sink. And if your sink sits under a window, it wants to be somewhere the window can still open.
On a double sink there is usually an obvious corner. On a single bowl with a short benchtop run there is sometimes only one workable spot, and it is better to know that before the filter is bought.
What suits the kitchen you have
Filtered taps come in different heights, finishes and shapes, and the one that suits depends on your sink and your mixer rather than on a catalogue.
A tall gooseneck looks right next to a tall mixer and wrong next to a low one. A finish that nearly matches your existing tapware reads worse than one that clearly does not. On a deep sink you need the extra height; on a shallow one it just gets in the way.
We go through that with you when we quote, at no charge, so you are choosing with the sink in front of you.
What it costs to do properly
We do not publish prices, because the figure depends on things only visible in your kitchen — whether there is an existing hole, what the benchtop is, what the tap is, and what is under the sink to connect to.
What we can tell you is how the price is arrived at. A licensed plumber comes out at no charge, looks at the sink, the benchtop and the cabinet, and writes the price down before any work happens. Transparent pricing, no hidden costs. If you decide against it, you owe nothing and that is genuinely the end of it.
The parts of the job that change the figure most are the benchtop material and whether a hole already exists. Everything else is fairly consistent.
Fitting a tap to a filter you already have
If there is already a filter under the sink and you want a better tap on it, or the tap has failed and the filter is fine, that is a smaller job and we do it.
Common versions of this: a tap that has started weeping at the base, a tap that was fitted in an awkward spot by whoever did the kitchen, or a tap that never matched the mixer and has annoyed somebody for years. All of those are worth a call.
A weeping filtered tap is worth dealing with sooner rather than later, because the water runs down through the benchtop hole and into the cabinet below. Leak detection
Where the tap fits into the whole system
A filtered tap on its own does nothing. It needs a filter feeding it.
If you are starting from scratch, the tap gets specified alongside the system. Under-sink filter installation
If the system is going to be reverse osmosis, the tap is fed from the storage tank rather than straight from the line, which changes the flow you feel at the spout. Reverse osmosis systems
And the cartridge behind it will need changing eventually, whichever system it is. Cartridge replacement
Getting it done
Ring or send the form and tell us what your sink and benchtop are. A licensed plumber comes out at no charge, looks at it properly, and gives you a written price.
Plumbing Licence 8396 and Gas Licence 13098, held by Tim, who does the work himself. Monday to Friday, 7:00am to 4:00pm. $0 call-out fee, free quote.
All filtration systems · Water filter installation in Gosnells