5 Essential Hacks for Winterizing Your Pipes Against Frigid Temperatures
5 Essential Hacks for Winterizing Your Pipes Against Frigid Temperatures
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All house owners who live in warm environments should do their ideal to winterize their pipes. Failing to do so can mean calamity like frozen, split, or ruptured pipes.
Switch on the Faucets
When the temperature drops and also it seems as if the freezing temperature level will last, it will aid to switch on your water both inside and outdoors. This will maintain the water flowing with your plumbing systems. Furthermore, the motion will certainly reduce the freezing process. Especially, there's no demand to turn it on full force. You'll wind up squandering gallons of water by doing this. Rather, go for concerning 5 drops per minute.
Open Up Cupboard Doors Hiding Plumbing
When it's cool outside, it would certainly be useful to open closet doors that are camouflaging your pipes. Doing this tiny method can maintain your pipes cozy as well as limit the potentially unsafe end results of freezing temperature levels.
Take Some Time to Cover Exposed Water Lines
One easy and also great hack to heat up cold pipes is to wrap them with cozy towels. You can cover them initially with towels. After protecting them in place, you can pour boiling water on the towels. Do it gradually to allow the towels take in the liquid. You can additionally make use of pre-soaked towels in hot water, just don't forget to put on safety gloves to safeguard your hands from the warmth.
Attempt a Hair Dryer or Warmth Weapon
When your pipes are almost freezing, your dependable hair dryer or warmth gun is a blessing. If the warm towels do not assist dislodge any type of working out ice in your pipelines, bowling hot air directly right into them might help. Do not use various other objects that generate direct fires like an impact torch. This can cause a bigger calamity that you can not control. You might wind up damaging your pipelines while attempting to thaw the ice. And over time, you might even wind up melting your house. So beware!
When Pipelines are Frozen, shut Off Water
Shut off the major water valve quickly if you notice that your pipes are totally frozen or almost nearing that stage. You will generally locate this in your basement or utility room near the heating unit or the front wall surface closest to the street. Transform it off immediately to avoid additional damages.
Do not forget to close outside water resources, also, such as your connection for the yard residence. Doing this will certainly prevent extra water from filling your plumbing system. Regrettably, with more water, more ice will certainly accumulate, which will eventually result in break pipelines. It is best to call a professional plumber for an evaluation if you are uncertain about the state of your pipelines this winter months. Taking this aggressive approach can conserve you thousands of bucks out of commission.
All home owners that live in warm climates must do their ideal to winterize their pipes. Failure to do so can spell calamity like icy, broken, or ruptured pipelines. If the hot towels do not help displace any type of working out ice in your pipes, bowling warm air directly right into them may assist. Turn off the primary water valve quickly if you discover that your pipelines are totally icy or almost nearing that phase. With more water, more ice will certainly stack up, which will at some point lead to burst 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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