Hi

We have a bathroom in Nova Scotia which needs renovating. Can someone tell me if bathroom taps / shower mixers bought in the UK will be compatible with Canadian plumbing ?

Thanks !

D

Are they metric?

I'll check.

Presumably the US is non-metric ? I know Canada is generally more metric than the US but does that stretch to plumbing ?

Depends. Some plumbing is metric, some isn't, some houses have both. How old's the bathroom in NS?

Canada isn't very metric when it comes to stuff like that. I have had to re-learn imperial since coming here.

The re-learning was easy. It was the re-tooling that made me grumpy!

No, in Canada and US the thread is NPT and from the UK it is BSP (some metric). It can be done, but I would not trust indoor plumbing to a rough fix. If you have soldered joints don't see a problem.

Talking of tools, I've been borrowing my neighbour's drill press. I'm going to buy one. His is an 8". The ones in Home Depot are 10" or 12". What do those numbers refer to and difference does it make?

As above, if the taps you get from the U.K. have copper "tails" I can't see a problem. You can buy thread converters to bridge the two standards but you are probably better off buying them in the U.K.. As Aviator says above if you're handy with a gas gun & you're soldering your joints you'll be fine..

Doesn't it refer to the height that the bit can be raised to above the table?

EDIT: Wikipedia gives ... "The size of a drill press is typically measured in terms of swing. Swing is defined as twice the throat distance, which is the distance from the center of the spindle to the closest edge of the pillar. For example, a 16-inch (410 mm) drill press will have an 8-inch (200 mm) throat distance."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drill

OK. I still don't see how it can really matter. You'd need to be drilling through tree trunks to require that sort of travel.

I thought it's usually about the distance between the tip of the bit to the pillar. If it's 10" you would in theory be able to punch a hole in the centre of disc with a diameter of 20"..

Oh, I see. I had a brain fart. I thought it was a vertical measure. It's not; it's horizontal. All is now clear.