Rosie Romero: What is an angle stop anyway?

QUESTION: I just had a plumber at my home, which was built in 1978. He was trying to get the dishwasher fixed, but he couldn’t do it, he said, because the angle stop on the pipe under the sink was stuck. So he had to leave to get another valve so he could turn off the water before making the repair. What is an angle stop and what does it stop?

ANSWER: Here’s what is going on: Waterlines come out of the wall and we put valves on them that can be used to shut them off. For years we used valves or angle stops that looked like a clock face dial, often called multi-turn compression valves. Those old-style valves had the habit of freezing up due to calcium buildup. You probably had one of those older frozen angle stops.

The plumber is now going to put a newer-style ball-joint valve on the line that won’t freeze up and will be easier to turn off. He didn’t want to force the valve because it would most likely break and cause some flooding. If your home was built in 1978, you may have other old-style angle stops in your home that need replacing.

Q: We live in a subdivision with a homeowner’s association that says we cannot put any white mixture on top of our roof — like a foam roof. All the roofs look the same, and so I had to put shingles on my roof. They’re asphalt, but they look like cedar shingles. What do you do when an HOA has a rule like that?

A: There’s not much you can do about the HOA. I understand that you probably wanted to put a lighter color on the roof to reflect the sun. But if they say no, you have to follow the rules.

Q: I have a small raised pool with a fountain in the middle of it that’s made of masonry covered with stucco. It’s colored but white spots keep leaching through the paint and leave blotches on the surface. I repainted it, but it started doing this again. How can I stop this from happening?

A: Probably that pool — the water reservoir — is not properly sealed. Those spots keep effervescing because moisture leaks through. What you need to do is drain the fountain and pool and let it dry out thoroughly. Then you need to buy a waterproof, cement-based compound called Thoroseal at a masonry supply store; it will come in a powder form in a bag. You mix it with water — and sometimes with an acrylic product as well — to form a mixture that you brush on the inside of the pool. You can also trowel it on. We often use these types of compounds to seal aqueducts or walls on hillside homes.

That should handle the problem. If you still get those white spots after that, it could be because of water splashing out of the fountain. In that case, you might want to put the same compound on the outside of the pool and paint again.