BETTER IDEAS FOR PROTECTING PIPES FROM FREEZING

[Raptor]

I swiped this from someone so this is not my original post but the ideas here are great for people in normally warm areas that get hit with abnormal 25F temperatures. The folks in cold climates likely have pipes addressed already. 

BETTER IDEAS FOR PROTECTING PIPES FROM FREEZING

Morning!

It is going to be cold the next couple days. You already know the basics, but here are some other ideas to help you out to try and prevent damages.

-You know the normal stuff - not repeating

-Put a butter knife (Something thin) under the flapper in the toilet tank, just the tip. This will keep water moving at the toilets. If your toilet already runs a little, don't fix it tonight!

-Schedule your dishwasher to wash at 1 in the morning. Most newer dishwashers have delays. (It moves hot water only)

-Schedule your washing machine to wash at 3 in the morning. Once again most washing machines have delays. Do the washing machine after the dishwasher, set it for a warm load so it uses both hot and cold water. Full load, maximize the water movement. Put a one hour soak on it, it will then stretch out the process of water movement yet again.

-Open cabinets with outside walls and turn a fan on blowing into them. Radiant heat will keep these lines ok. (Poor grammar, I get it)

-Take an early morning shower

-Keep doors and registers open throughout the house, turn ceilings fans on and blow up. (Little switch on the fan changes direction) Keep air moving.

-Keep your house a little warmer at the thermostat.

[majorhavoc]

An added advantage of Raptor's suggestions about setting your dishwasher and washing machine to run in the middle of the night: electricity rates in most markets are lower at night than during peak daytime hours. #yesimacheapbastard

Another tip (really just a variation on what Raptor has already suggested): crack the faucet in the coldest part of your house so it's a steady (but very slight) drip.

Also:
Shut off the water supplying any exterior facets and then open them up on the outside to empty water from that last stretch of pipe. 

Another advantage of turning up the thermostat during severe winter weather: if your heat source depends on electricity and you lose power, starting off with a warmer house will give your another few hours before things really start getting cold indoors.

[Anianna]

I'm not sure I agree with that individual in regards to getting hot water running in the coldest parts of the night.  Hot water freezes at a faster rate than water at lower temperatures.  In every cold climate I have lived in, we're specifically taught not to run hot water at all during severe cold snaps.  It's better to keep cold water moving through the system to keep water flowing and expose pipes coming into the house to more warmth where you can open cabinets. I was also taught that if you do use hot water, like for washing your hands, to let the cold water run afterward to flush the hot water out of the system as much as possible. 

In extreme cold, you want more of a trickle than a drip.  It's better to spend a few dollars more on your water bill than to have to pay for a busted pipe.  You should run a low trickle on any faucet against an exterior wall. 

Invest in heat wrap for your main water line.  Honestly, I think even people in places that experience freezing temperatures rarely should do this.  It's not a major expense and it's better to have it and not need it than not have it in the rare case when you do need it.

If you live in a place that doesn't have the infrastructure for freezing temperatures, it may be best to just turn your water off and drain your system, including toilets, in advance of an extreme cold snap and prepare to go without running water for a few days. 

If you leave your home in advance of a cold snap, even if you live in a place where the infrastructures supports the cold, turn your water off and drain your system including toilets.  The last thing you need to come home to from a winter vacation or business trip is not only freeze damage but flooding from a busted pipe just continuing to dump water in your house.

No matter what, make sure you not only know where your water shut off is, but how to turn it off and make sure you keep any tools you may need to shut it off handy.  My house has to be turned off at the county's meter (it's illegal in some places for customers to mess with this, so check your laws in advance) and I keep a meter key at the front door.  Most houses that aren't fucking old like mine will have a shut off at the structure, like in a crawlspace. 

Like majorhavoc said, shut off water to hose bibs/exterior spigots (they should each have their own shut off from the system).  If you live in an area that gets below freezing for any period of time over the winter, you should do that every year as part of your fall maintenance.  Hoses should be drained and stored for the winter. 

Turning your thermostat up in advance of a cold snap and switching your fans to winter mode are good advice.  We have some funky ductwork that results in a couple of our rooms getting too hot, so we keep some vents closed, but opening those for a cold snap is spot on, particularly with fans going winter mode to keep that heat circulating better. 

Additionally, put weather strip on your exterior door frames in the fall and have a door snake on hand for each door to inhibit cold coming in under the door.  This includes garage doors.  Thermal curtains are a good idea, as well.

[wolf_from_wv]

Use caution washing clothes in the middle of the night.  I put a load in one afternoon when the temps were starting to warm back up a little, not knowing the drain line was frozen.  A 2 liter bottle of extremely hot water mixed with table salt opened it up.  I caught it before much water overflowed...

[NT2C]

Two points I want to make, both learned from experience.  If your house has a crawlspace that your plumbing is run through then getting that space sealed off from drafts in the winter will help quite a bit.  The heat from hot water moving in pipes (supply and especially drains) can help keep that space above freezing, as does any heat escaping from your home heating system that may also have ducts or pipes running through.  Normally, you do want some airflow through the crawlspace but when trying to protect pipes from freezing it's okay to seal things off.

The second point I want to make is about some utility companies that have tiered rate structures.  We got a rude shock one hot summer when we got a water bill that was 3x our normal bill.  I had been watering our parched lawns that summer and the additional water usage was just enough to bump us up to the next highest rate tier, resulting in a huge increase in cost.  I don't water the lawns anymore.  Check your water bill and utility rates, both for water and for sewage, to make sure you're not about to get hit with a similar bill.

[MacWa77ace]

I'm not sure I agree with that individual in regards to getting hot water running in the coldest parts of the night.  Hot water freezes at a faster rate than water at lower temperatures.  In every cold climate I have lived in, we're specifically taught not to run hot water at all during severe cold snaps.  It's better to keep cold water moving through the system to keep water flowing and expose pipes coming into the house to more warmth where you can open cabinets. I was also taught that if you do use hot water, like for washing your hands, to let the cold water run afterward to flush the hot water out of the system as much as possible. 

I think I did that experiment in school but don't remember the results. I do remember that boiling cold water and hot water results were indistinguishable [don't remember my grade LOL]. And I do know that boiled water has most of the 'extra' air removed and that extra air in water contributes to expansion of water when frozen. If you want clear ice cubes for your party boil the water first.

I also know that the hot water and cold water 'systems' are separate from each other. They run thru separate pipes. And can deduce that if running water thru a pipe keeps it from freezing. Not running water thru a pipe will not have that advantage. Also the farther from the hot water tank the pipes are, the less heat will be conducted from the heat source, so hot water on the 'other' side of the house from the hot water tank is cold, and will eventually be the temperature of its surroundings if no further hot water is run thru the pipes.

And it's very possible that the cold and hot water pipes are run 'near' enough to each other that running just the cold water will keep the temps in that immediate space warm enough that it will keep the hot water line from freezing. But that would depend on how your house was plumbed.

Steadily 'Running' Hot water won't immediately freeze, but hot water 'running' at a drips pace will cool down to ambient room temps before it gets more than a few feet from the heat source. So you could say that its really just cold water most of the way thru the hot water pipe and won't freeze any faster if it runs at a drip.

If I never heard of the internet and only heard that pipes can freeze. I think when I went to bed I would cut off the water main and open all the spigots to drain the system. Reasoning it won't empty the pipes but will remove enough water that if it does freeze, there will be enough room for expansion. How do commercial building's deal with that? We have a warehouse with fire spinkler system in the rafters here, if it got down below freezing over the weekend they might freeze. And the other pipes.

I've never had to deal with frozen/freezing pipes and have no RW experience regarding prevention. I was born Latitude Privileged in that regard.

[Raptor]

This great input from all involved!

In my AO we get a few "hard freezes" between 30F & 28F about 5 to 12 days a year. But we rarely get more than 8 hours of freezing temperatures. We are not adequately prepared for 30 + hours of temps less than 32f. Coupled with temps below 25F weird things happen in our area.

It is the continuous freezing temps for over 24 hours that is problematic for us.

In my case the pipes and outside faucets are insulated. That said I did run the water for the whole time it was freezing. the other problem for me at least is that the water pipes run through the attic which is not heated. The accessible pipes are insulated and covered by insulation but these would be very messy if they froze and burst. So do be aware of this potential issue. I left the attic door open to allow some heat to flow into the attic as a precaution.

The tricks/tips that I liked in this advice was using a delay to run the dishwasher and washing machine. That and making a toilet "run" were IMO great ideas. In both cases instead of wasting water in a sink this allows you get the water running at a time when it is both coldest and not being used.

Both my washer & dishwasher have such delays. I have never used them because I could not conceive of a use for the feature (the answer to the question nobody asked. )

That said the drawbacks mentioned are good information!

The other bit of critical advice (as has been mentioned) is to know where your water shut off is located and be prepared to shut it off if you suspect the pipes may freeze. I also suggest draining the pipes ahead of time. Fill up the tub with water to flush the toilet and simply do without running water for the duration. It is a lot better than spending a lot of money both broken pipes AND water damage.

[wolf_from_wv]

If you had somewhere to put them during and afterwards, You could connect 5 gallon buckets together and fill them up overnight. 

Use a faucet to garden hose adapter and run the water from the sink into the buckets in the bathtub maybe.  Save the water for flushing, or fill up the washing machine later with it.  If the last bucket overflows, theoretically it will just go down the bathtub drain.

https://www.amazon.com/Garden-Adapter-Kitchen-Connect-Different/dp/B09H4PXYT9/ref=asc_df_B09H4PXYT9/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=553537645661&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=5645562549097899067&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9009452&hvtargid=pla-1461926905623&psc=1 

[NT2C]

Fill up the tub with water to flush the toilet and simply do without running water for the duration. It is a lot better than spending a lot of money both broken pipes AND water damage.

Just want to point out that most bathtub drains leak horribly and keeping a tub full can be problematic.  While they do sell plastic tub liners specifically for this exact situation (saving drinking/flushing water in the tub) an inexpensive plastic drop cloth from the hardware/paint store works just as well and if you buy a big commercial roll of it there's always other things it's useful for.

(My construction company used to buy 100 yard by 25' 4 mill rolls of the stuff by the pallet for about $15 per roll. They've likely tripled in price now but are still a good investment for preps.)

[majorhavoc]

Fill up the tub with water to flush the toilet and simply do without running water for the duration. It is a lot better than spending a lot of money both broken pipes AND water damage.

Fill up the tub with water to flush the toilet and simply do without running water for the duration. It is a lot better than spending a lot of money both broken pipes AND water damage.

Just want to point out that most bathtub drains leak horribly and keeping a tub full can be problematic.  While they do sell plastic tub liners specifically for this exact situation (saving drinking/flushing water in the tub) an inexpensive plastic drop cloth from the hardware/paint store works just as well and if you buy a big commercial roll of it there's always other things it's useful for.

(My construction company used to buy 100 yard by 25' 4 mill rolls of the stuff by the pallet for about $15 per roll. They've likely tripled in price now but are still a good investment for preps.)

In case anyone's wondering, this is what NT2C is talking about.

Huh, never thought of the plastic drop cloth idea. Thanks! 

Fake edit: a prepping justification for buying a large roll of the stuff is to seal off your windows or even isolate a single room in the case of an airborne toxic event (the disaster, not the band  ), zombie virus, etc.

[MacWa77ace]

A more interesting use



Dexter.

[Blast]

Hot water freezes at a faster rate than water at lower temperatures.  

Not to pick on you Anianna but as a Ph.D. chemist this is one of those statements that is like nails on a chalkboard to me. It is absolutely, 100% incorrect. Whoever told you this is passing on dangerously wrong information.
MIT Answers: https://engineering.mit.edu/engage/ask-an-engineer/does-hot-water-freeze-faster-than-cold-water/

Both taps need to be cracked a bit. During the Texas Snowmageddon a few years back many people ended up with frozen, broken hot water pipes because they only let the cold water trickle.
-Blast

[Lambykins]

Up here we also *bank* houses and trailers when possible. You get someone with a snowplow blade on their pick up to shove and pile snow up around your house or trailer...all around the house. It protects the crawlspace and the pipes enclosed there. Also, heat tape, heat tape, HEAT TAPE!

[Rednex]

Down here people put hay bales around there crawl space/ trailer skirting to help insulate.

[Halfapint]

We had fun when temps in our areas hit lows I've never seen in my 40 years. We got down to below 10° how much cooler not sure my thermometer mechanism froze with the freezing rain and it stuck at 10° for a few days.

We live in a 5th wheel (caravan but bigger cuz murica!), well we've had tank issues and for ease of cleaning and well... smell. We've had the bottom dropped. It's a corrugated plastic with a 2mil reflective material and some cheap like R1/2 insulation. So just unbolt and let it hang.

Our steps lessons to the bedroom have a small pass through that brings air from the living area to the storage area, I added 2 ducting vents when we first bought the trailer so our cat couldn't crawl in there and hide. Well it just so happens 120mm computer fans side by side just so happen to be pretty much the same size so I added them in and a small window fan to help push more air into the crawl space to keep things warm and not freeze. When I didn't realize how cold it was when until I turned on the water and it went from WAY over pressured to a tiny trickle. Panic set in.

All the pipes are pex so that's good it expanses but joints can be a weak spot. I didn't know how to get the bottom up quickly. Then I remembered I have a metric fuck ton if ratchet straps. The wife and I abandon the kid (he was in baby jail it's cool) and use the straps to pull the underneath up. We had just bought one of those small MrBuddy heaters for our golf cart. I put that down below in the area just behind the steps (it's where the water heater, water punp, heater, and 90% of all the pipes are) to warm it up even more and because we have a wood stove that was going 24/7 I had to crank the propane heater that has vents around the tanks) to 80 degrees because the wood stove with a few small sticks was keeping us at like 76° (yeah I know I hate it but the wife is in heaven).

Anywho after about an hour I turned the faucets back on and we had water. After that just the fans moving area in there was enough.

On a side note mark your levers on your hose splits which way is on and off. Because I disconnected one hose that leads to our black tank wash out and aimed it outside the trailer so I could force the water in our line going from the well to the trailer. Well.... I turned it off and the xlean water on (which was in the compartment. I then fell asleep and wok to the sound of water spraying. Expecting the water to be spraying outside... nope. It was on full blast spraying inside the sealed area. well the design is smart it has a drain burn it so smart because the door to the storage area isn't sealed and has like a 2mm gap. I can tell you that A LOT if water can pass through that small gap into your storage area. Sigh

[flybynight]

Do not use propane torches to heat pipes in crawlspace 

2013
https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1965131,-96.4596762,3a,75y,22.35h,91.25t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1s1wjnzNVU_U8TEdXIvAVS1A!2e0!5s20130601T000000!7i13312!8i6656

2022
https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1965164,-96.4596556,3a,75y,22.35h,91.25t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1skRO7BnyY-oepFBSS3pkLTQ!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

[Anianna]

Hot water freezes at a faster rate than water at lower temperatures. 

Not to pick on you Anianna but as a Ph.D. chemist this is one of those statements that is like nails on a chalkboard to me. It is absolutely, 100% incorrect. Whoever told you this is passing on dangerously wrong information.
MIT Answers: https://engineering.mit.edu/engage/ask-an-engineer/does-hot-water-freeze-faster-than-cold-water/

Both taps need to be cracked a bit. During the Texas Snowmageddon a few years back many people ended up with frozen, broken hot water pipes because they only let the cold water trickle.
-Blast

It's not picking to share data or correct faulty data, but it still doesn't feel great to be wrong, so thanks for softening the blow.  

[NT2C]

Hot water freezes at a faster rate than water at lower temperatures. 

Not to pick on you Anianna but as a Ph.D. chemist this is one of those statements that is like nails on a chalkboard to me. It is absolutely, 100% incorrect. Whoever told you this is passing on dangerously wrong information.
MIT Answers: https://engineering.mit.edu/engage/ask-an-engineer/does-hot-water-freeze-faster-than-cold-water/

Both taps need to be cracked a bit. During the Texas Snowmageddon a few years back many people ended up with frozen, broken hot water pipes because they only let the cold water trickle.
-Blast

It's not picking to share data or correct faulty data, but it still doesn't feel great to be wrong, so thanks for softening the blow.   

So, like a water softener? 

[SCBrian]

Hot water freezes at a faster rate than water at lower temperatures. 

Not to pick on you Anianna but as a Ph.D. chemist this is one of those statements that is like nails on a chalkboard to me. It is absolutely, 100% incorrect. Whoever told you this is passing on dangerously wrong information.
MIT Answers: https://engineering.mit.edu/engage/ask-an-engineer/does-hot-water-freeze-faster-than-cold-water/

Both taps need to be cracked a bit. During the Texas Snowmageddon a few years back many people ended up with frozen, broken hot water pipes because they only let the cold water trickle.
-Blast

It's not picking to share data or correct faulty data, but it still doesn't feel great to be wrong, so thanks for softening the blow.   

It's not 'totally' wrong.  Just have to have somewhat special circumstances for that to happen.  And generally unlikely to see them coming out of the household water faucet. 
I get to deal with the opposite side of the issue with "Hey! Mr SCBrian, Is it OK to fill this pot with cold water since it'll boil quicker?"