Intelligent Strategies to Preserve Your Pipes in Cold Weather
Intelligent Strategies to Preserve Your Pipes in Cold Weather
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What are your thoughts and feelings on Winterizing Your Pipes?
All home owners who live in temperate climates should do their best to winterize their pipes. Failing to do so can lead to disaster like frozen, fractured, or ruptured pipes.
Attempt a Hair Clothes Dryer or Warm Gun
When your pipelines are nearly freezing, your reliable hair dryer or warmth weapon is a blessing. If the warm towels do not assist remove any kind of settling ice in your pipes, bowling warm air directly right into them might aid. You might end up harmful your pipelines while trying to melt the ice.
Open Cupboard Doors Hiding Plumbing
When it's cool outside, it would be handy to open cabinet doors that are camouflaging your pipelines. For example, they could be someplace in your cooking area or bathroom. This will certainly permit the warm air from your heating system to distribute there. Because of this, you avoid these exposed pipelines from freezing. Doing this little trick can keep your pipelines warm and also limit the potentially unsafe outcomes of freezing temperature levels.
Take Time to Wrap Exposed Pipes
One awesome and easy hack to warm up cold pipes is to wrap them with cozy towels. You can cover them first with towels. After protecting them in place, you can put boiling water on the towels. Do it gradually to let the towels soak up the fluid. You can additionally utilize pre-soaked towels in hot water, simply do not fail to remember to put on protective gloves to guard your hands from the warm.
Switch on the Faucets
When the temperature declines and it seems as if the icy temperature level will last, it will certainly assist to transform on your water both inside your home and also outdoors. This will certainly keep the water moving through your plumbing systems. You'll end up losing gallons of water this means.
Shut Off Water When Pipelines are Frozen
Shut off the main water valve quickly if you see that your pipelines are completely icy or virtually nearing that phase. You will usually find this in your cellar or laundry room near the heating unit or the front wall closest to the street. Turn it off right now to prevent additional damages.
With more water, even more ice will certainly pile up, which will eventually lead to rupture pipes. If you are uncertain concerning the state of your pipes this winter months, it is best to call a specialist plumber for an evaluation.
All house owners who live in pleasant climates must do their best to winterize their pipes. Failure to do so can lead to calamity like icy, cracked, or burst pipelines. If the hot towels do not aid dislodge any working out ice in your pipes, bowling warm air directly into them may assist. Turn off the major water valve promptly if you discover that your pipes are entirely icy or virtually nearing that stage. With even more water, more ice will pile up, which will at some point lead to rupture pipelines.
Planning Ahead for Winter Plumbing!
Given how the weather has been recently here in Kansas City, it may not seem like it, but the truth is winter is quickly approaching. As we near the end of September, it is never a bad idea to start considering which areas of your home could use some preventative maintenance heading into the colder months, as well as what you should remember to do once the colder temps settle in. And considering your plumbing system can certainly be impacted by changing weather conditions, guess what we’ll be talking about today?
For those that are visiting our blog for the very first time, welcome to Stine-Nichols Plumbing. Here on the blog, we post weekly about various aspects of the plumbing world. Whether that be DIY tips, brand highlights or anything else, they’re all designed to make homeowners more knowledgeable about their plumbing systems. Believe it or not, even just some general knowledge about one’s plumbing can go a long way in preventing unneeded repairs and keeping everything running smoothly. As referenced in the previous paragraph, this week’s blog will walk through a few of the steps you can do to your own plumbing system to ensure you’re ready to go for the upcoming winter weather and tips for keeping it all in working order as the winter carries on. Let’s hop right in!
Disconnect Hoses
You’ve likely heard this one on multiple occasions, but it is certainly something worth mentioning. Make sure to disconnect any and all outdoor hoses and then turn off those outdoor faucets at the shut-off. The logic behind this is probably something you would have learned in a grade school science class. When water freezes, it expands. Thus, due to this, it’s going to occupy more space. And if there’s no space to occupy, trouble ensues. It’s as simple as that!
Long story short, if you have room to store them indoors, do so. If not, just be sure to completely drain them and then store them in a dry area, such as the garage or a shed. Failure to disconnect the hoses can easily result in frozen/bursting pipes and plumbing headaches for you, especially if there is still water sitting in the hose! Do yourself a favor and disconnect your hoses once you know you won’t be using them anymore for that season. It’s a quick-and-easy step that’s always worth the time.
Headed Out of Town?
Our next point will likely get more and more relevant as we get into the holiday season. Do you remember the extreme arctic blast that hit the Kansas City area in February of 2021? Sub-zero temps, frigid wind chills, it was definitely not the funnest of times for KC residents. Nonetheless, here at Stine-Nichols Plumbing, it’s safe to say our technicians were quite busy dealing with frozen/bursting pipes. What I’m hinting at here is that you never know when we’ll experience extremely cold temperatures. So if you’re going to be out of town for a little bit, it’s never a bad idea to turn off your water at the main shut-off valve. While this won’t prevent every possible plumbing issue, it will at least limit the damage if something bad were to occur. Especially if you don’t have a family member or friend that’ll be checking on your home while you’re away, make sure to keep this tip in mind!
By the way, it may sound like a no-brainer to most, but if you are headed out of town, make sure to also keep the heat on inside while away. You will have some added energy costs from heating a home while nobody’s there, but if it prevents you from dealing with a plumbing emergency, it’s well worth it!
Leave Cabinet Doors Open
As you may start to notice, the primary winter plumbing problem that you need to be mindful of involves pipes freezing. Whether it be indoors or outdoors, they can freeze for a few different reasons, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of various tactics you can implement to improve your odds of keeping everything in working order. Yet another one of these that you’ve likely heard before is leaving the cabinet doors under your bathroom or kitchen sink open. Will this provide complete protection? Not necessarily. However, this is an easy way to make sure some of the heat in your home is reaching those pipes that aren’t insulated under your sinks.
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