Shower Valve Replacement, Repair & Installation in Fort Worth, Texas

Signs your shower valve needs work

• Drips after it's off: a worn cartridge, washer or valve seat.
• Stiff, loose or spinning handle: a worn stem or cartridge, often crusted with hard-water scale.
• Sudden hot or cold bursts: a stuck pressure-balancing part, or an old valve with no scald protection.
• Never gets hot enough: a limit stop set too low or a clogged cartridge. If every tap is lukewarm, look at water heater repair instead.
• Water still pours from the tub spout with the shower on: a worn diverter.
• Stains or soft drywall behind the shower wall: a leak at the valve body or its connections.

Shower valve repair or full replacement?

Most single-handle valves are fixed by replacing the cartridge, with no wall opening. Older two- and three-handle valves get new stems, washers and seats. Replacing the whole valve makes sense when:

• the valve body is cracked, corroded or leaking inside the wall
• parts for an old or discontinued valve can't be found
• you want a single handle instead of two or three
• the valve has no anti-scald protection
• you're remodeling and want new trim or a thermostatic valve

Scalding and temperature swings

Plumbing codes now require shower valves to be pressure-balancing or thermostatic. A pressure-balancing valve keeps the mix steady when a flush or the washing machine pulls cold water away; a thermostatic valve holds the temperature you set. Many 1920s–60s homes in Riverside, Oakhurst and Six Points still have two-handle valves with neither, and there the real fix is a new valve, not a new showerhead.

On newer valves, it's usually a worn cartridge or a limit stop set too low; we reset the stop so the shower gets hot without scalding.

Low shower pressure

If only the shower is weak, start with the showerhead. Fort Worth's hard water leaves scale that clogs the nozzles and flow restrictor. If the head is clear, grit in the cartridge is next, often after main work or a shutoff stirs up sediment.

If every fixture is weak, the problem is bigger than the shower. In older Fort Worth homes, galvanized pipes rust shut from the inside. See water pressure repair and piping and repiping.

Leaks behind the shower wall

Watch for ceiling stains under an upstairs bathroom, soft drywall on the far side of the shower wall, loose tiles and a musty smell. The water can come from the valve body, the supply connections, the elbow behind the shower arm or the drain.

On a slab, a leaking shower drain can go unnoticed for months while North Texas clay swells and shrinks under the house. In pier-and-beam homes, common in Fairmount, the drain can be checked from the crawl space. We use leak detection to find the source before opening anything. See also slab leaks, or drain cleaning for a shower that drains slowly.

Tub-to-shower conversions: the plumbing side

Turning a tub into a walk-in shower changes more plumbing than it looks:

• Drain and trap: a tub drains at one end, a shower pan at its center or edge, so the drain moves and is sized to code for the new shower.
• Valve: the tub-and-shower valve becomes a shower-only valve with no spout or diverter.
• Heads: the shower arm can be raised, or a handheld or second head added.
• Supply pipes: in older homes, the open wall is the moment to replace galvanized pipe with copper or PEX.

The pan, waterproofing and tile come after the rough-in, so the drain and valve must land where your tile installer expects them.

Shower repair and valve replacement FAQ

Get your shower working right

Dripping, scalding, weak or leaking, call (817) 755-5621 and tell us what your shower is doing. New customers get $50 off; seniors, military and first responders get 10% off; and the dispatch fee is $0 with a repair. Terms are on our coupons page.

We serve Fort Worth neighborhoods like Riverside, Northside and Near Southside, plus Haltom City, North Richland Hills, Saginaw, Lake Worth, Benbrook, Kennedale and Burleson (service areas). Other fixtures acting up? See faucet repair, fixture repair or emergency plumbing.