“What’s up with your faucet?” is a typical question from friends who are visiting for the first time since our Pedalworks™ faucet control was installed. When an uninitiated person tries to turn on the kitchen faucet, they get the impression that our water has been shut off. Once we show them the pedal and they get a little practice with it, however, most people are sold. It doesn’t take long to like a system that allows you to control a faucet without touching the handles. Suddenly full hands or messy hands are no problem.
With Pedalworks you set the water temperature with the handles and then step on the pedal to start the flow. When the pedal is released, the water stops. It works great, and the water definitely does not run as much. If you need to leave the water running for any reason (or if a guest is using the sink and doesn’t want to learn the pedal), you can just engage the lock-on button at the front of the pedal, and the faucet works just like it used to.
Installing Pedalworks is straightforward. The pedal controller is mounted inside the cabinet, with the pedal sticking down into the kickspace. Faucet supply lines are replaced with stainless steel braided hose that connects to the faucet via the controller. The only criticism our plumber had was that it would be nice if there were more room around the connections at the back of the controller.
The floor-mounted commercial version, Footworks™, is the same as Pedalworks except that it comes with its own metal housing. Unlike electronic controls in public bathrooms that provide water only at preselected temperatures, Footworks allows the user to adjust the water temperature. And unlike standard two-pedal controllers commonly used in hospitals, Footworks doesn’t require the user to control the temperature with his or her feet. Company President Peter Gilbert claims that at a nurse’s station the device typically reduces water use by 80%. He explains this remarkable figure by noting that nurses are trained to leave the water running while washing their hands to avoid contaminating faucet handles. Footworks comes with a black rubber pedal, while a choice of six colors of Corian™ is available for Pedalworks.
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