Delta and many other top kitchen faucet manufacturers sell several touch and touchless faucet products. They make life much easier, even if it is just washing your hands without having to touch the faucet handle. However, like all other technology, touch and touchless faucets are bound to have hiccups here and there.
If your Delta touch or touchless faucet will not turn on, no matter how many times you flap your hands in front of the sensor or touch the tap, it can be rather frustrating. If you wanted a manual faucet, you would’ve just bought one, right? Well, we’re here to help, so continue reading for a troubleshooting guide to get your faucet up and running in no time.
What Causes My Delta Kitchen Faucet To Stop Working?
Your touch or touchless Delta kitchen faucet may be on strike for several reasons. While pinpointing the exact reason for the malfunction can be tricky, you should be able to do it. Start with each possible culprit, ruling them out one by one.
How Do Touch And Touchless Delta Faucets Work?
Before we get started, let’s examine how these faucets work. Touch faucets, also known as touch-on or touch-tech taps, use a similar technology to your smartphone. The faucet is equipped with two capacitance sensors, one in the handle and the other in the spout. If you touch either of these sensors, it triggers the solenoid valve, causing the water to turn on or off.
Touchless faucets operate similarly, though they don’t require physical contact. The sensors in the tap detect motion, like your hands moving in front of the faucet, and trigger the solenoid valve, thus turning the water on or off. Now that we understand how they operate, let’s move on to troubleshooting.
How To Check The Status Of The Battery Pack
Delta makes troubleshooting battery pack problems super simple. Your faucet’s LED indicator light will tell you precisely what the status of your battery pack is. When the faucet is on, the light will turn blue while cold water is actively coming out and red when the water is coming out hot.
However, if your faucet is off and is flashing, it’s trying to tell you something.
What does a red light mean on a Delta faucet?
If your faucet is flashing red while the faucet is off, there are a couple of things it could mean. Delta makes the system easy: if it blinks every five seconds, this is your warning to change the batteries. If the blink frequency increases to every second, the batteries are on their last limb and need replacing.
If the light remains solid red while the water is off, your chance to catch the batteries before they fail has passed. Luckily, nothing dramatic will happen. Just change the batteries, and you’re back in business.
Lastly, if the light flashes long red blinks, the faucet is in an error state, so it’s time to contact Delta support.
What does a blue light mean on a Delta faucet?
The blue LED at the base of your Delta faucet indicates everything is A-OK, and the touch sensor is active.
What size batteries do I need for my touch or touchless Delta kitchen faucet?
The size of batteries you’ll need for your faucet is dependent on the kind of faucet you have. For example, Touch2O technology kitchen faucets are powered by 6 AA batteries. On the other hand, some of Delta’s other faucets are powered by 4 AA batteries.
How To Diagnose The Solenoid Valve
If you replaced the battery, but the faucet is still giving you angry red flashes, then the culprit may be the solenoid valve. Although this process sounds horrible, it’s actually not that bad, but it isn’t as easy as figuring out the faucet’s blinking lights or replacing the batteries.
Start by locating the solenoid valve in the cabinet underneath the sink. Before working on the valve, take the batteries out of the pack and set those aside. Back to the solenoid valve: pull the clip off the mounting shank.
There should be a clip that slides into a slot on the faucet’s shank. Remove the wire extending from the solenoid assembly by pulling. The wire extension travels from the faucet body alongside the hot and cool water supply lines. It plugs into the solenoid valve with a tip that looks similar to a headphone jack.
Once that’s out, you can replace the old solenoid with the new one. Before you start, make sure you ground yourself so you don’t send a static charge through the connections, as they’re touchy enough as is.
The solenoid valve could still be blamed if the spout displays the correct light color but still refuses to work. Before you pin the valve as the culprit, though, check the spray head. To do this, ensure the handle is in the off position, then unscrew the hose from the spray head. Check in the spray head inlet for debris. If there’s gunk, clean it out before replacing it.
If that didn’t do the trick, ensure the handle is in the off position again. Underneath the sink, remove the hose from the solenoid, then go back above the sink and check for water flow. Then, reconnect the hose to the solenoid.
Disconnect the hose from the faucet to the solenoid, and check for water flow again. This will tell you if the water goes through the manual valve and reaches the solenoid. If there’s water flow to the solenoid, then the solenoid is the issue, and you’ll have to replace the solenoid and electronics kit.
Troubleshooting No Water
A lack of water to your faucet is problematic, considering that’s its job. If the light flashes, indicating the sink is on and active, but there’s no water, try these steps.
To figure out what may be causing this, start by clearing out the area underneath your sink. The wiring to the touch technology is finicky, and you don’t want anything touching it. Ensure that the water shut-off valve underneath your sink is on and wasn’t bumped into the off position.
If neither of those solutions is helping, check the batteries (if you haven’t already) to reset the system. Then ensure that the ever-so-particular wires aren’t in contact with any metal beneath the sink. Make sure they’re connected correctly. Check each wire for a loose connection, adjusting each as you go so they’re not crossed over each other or touching metal.
Part Of The Touch Area Doesn’t Work
Sometimes, one of the sensors on your touch faucet will refuse to cooperate or only works intermittently. If that’s the case, check underneath the sink. Examine the wires of the affected area, ensuring they’re not crossed or touching metal. If you can’t find anything wrong with it, you might need to enlist the help of a plumber.
How Do You Reset A Delta Touch Faucet?
Resetting your Delta Touch faucet is quick and straightforward. You need to remove the batteries from the pack and wait about 30 seconds. Then, replace them in the battery compartment, and your tap has been reset.
What To Do If You’ve Tried Everything
If you’ve tried everything you could possibly think of to fix your malfunctioning touch or touchless Delta kitchen faucet, but nothing seems to be working, it might be time to call in a professional. Sometimes, specific components may be faulty. Given the number of components in the touch technology system, pinpointing that one particular component can be tricky.
So, if you’ve done everything you can, but your efforts haven’t been fruitful, call in a plumber or reach out to Delta support.
H2o touch faucet only works when the water is cold. Once water gets hot the light s work but nothing else.