Due to cold weather and power outages over Christmas, many households had to leave their homes to find a warm place. My son was one of these. He was worried about his water pipes freezing and bursting. A neighbor gave him some great advice that worked very well, giving him peace of mind and avoiding expensive repairs. Others may like to use this tip if they find themselves in the same predicament.
Just go to the shut-off valve at the meter, and shut it off. Then open all the faucets in the house and let the cold water run until there is no more water coming out of the faucets. This means the pipes are now empty. The reason pipes burst is because the water in them expands as it freezes. So no water----no freezing. Winter is not over yet, so someone may be able to use this tip.
Harlean from AR
This page contains the following solutions.
We had an unusually cold snap during the last few days in Houston. Many folks had pipes which burst. Others were outside in their cold weather gear wrapping pipes and covering outdoor faucets.
To keep your outside water faucet from freezing and getting damaged, keep the hose unhooked during freezing weather. Also, Walmart carries a Styrofoam cover made to hook onto the faucet and keep it covered.
In areas with freezing temperatures, if you don't have your pipes wrapped, you can leave your inside faucet dripping (just a small trickle will do, from the furtherest faucet from the water pipe entrance of your home) while you're sleeping so your water lines won't freeze and burst. By Terri H.
Here are the questions asked by community members. Read on to see the answers provided by the ThriftyFun community.
We live in a very old house in Maine. The subzero weather we have been having lately has our pipes bursting constantly. (We use mostly a woodstove to save on money, so our cellar is cold). Is there anything we can do to stop the pipes from bursting? My husband has been repairing pipes for 3 days straight. Our cellar is dirt and the pipes are only copper water pipes, (not heat, as we have forced hot air). We also we were wondering if its OK to turn off the water at the base where it comes into the house or will it make matters worse? Thank you for any advice.
Home Depot or Lowes sells heat tape specifically for this purpose. Also, good idea to leave cold water trickling at all times. Don't know about turning the water off but hope this helps.
On really cold days, I was told to let the faucets trickle on outside walls. My pipes are 100 years old haven't froze yet, maybe I've been just lucky.
Before shutting off any water be sure that faucet is left open!
thanks for all your replies...do you think by not using our furnace it is making things extra cold in the cellar and that may be why we are having this bursting pipe problem?
I keep the faucet furtherest from the well ( or watetr source) dripping, this causes the water to move and doesn't freeze. I also heat with wood stove, but don't have a basement, I also keep all outside faucets dripping slowly -= no broken pipes in over 360 years!
In Britain, where the main water water pipes into the house are often routed via the unheated roof space burst pipes happened occasionally in winter, (many houses only had heating from open fires in individual rooms). The recommendation then was to 'lag' or insulate your pipes. This used to be by wrapping them in a hessian type material but now you can buy long split tubes of synthetic rubber type material you just open up and slip onto the pipe. As well as the other suggestions you may want to think about insulating the pipes that rupture the most frequently.
I don't quite understand the question about turning off the water. Do you mean turn it off and empty the pipes each night when you go to bed? I suppose that would work, but even if you didn't empty the pipes and they still burst it would save a lot of mess as the leakage would be minimised.
It may be helpful to ask what your neighbours do as they must have the same problems and solutions.
Regards
Jo
If you have a place to plug them in use heat tapes. This is used on mobile homes and it really works. You can purchase them at Loews or other hardware stores.
Hello,
if you could set up a light bulb in the area that freezes it would be a big help.It is amazing how much heat one light bulb puts out. Also insulate the pipes with the tube insulation .
Yes, if you turn off your furnace, it can make the cellar too cold and cause the pipes to burst. I have heard you should not turn off your furnace, but leave it set at (I think it was) 58 degrees. Also, the suggestions about leaving a faucet dripping are true too. Think of the expense of fixing these pipes as opposed to leaving the furnace on or the faucet dripping. Good luck!
I live in upstate NY and just had my pipes freeze this past weekend. Not only my water, but my sewer pipe too. I have found out that if you position a blow dryer on your water pipe it will thaw it out in a jiffy.
HI. We live in the mountains of Colorado in a mobile home and the wind here is awful. Before we moved in my husband put the heat tape all over our pipes. And since we have just skirting and not a foundation he put that bubble wrap silver lined stuff over the foam pipe covers throughout the lenght of the mobile home on every pipe that was not in the house. It froze once and that was because the tape had gotten unplugged by accident when we were putting some tires underneath the mobile home for storage. That was over 6 years ago and never a frozen pipe since. Great stuff and a very insiteful husband. RoseMary
I live in Michigan and have a summer home up north and we put heat tape on our pipes to keep them from freezing. A light doesn't work well cuz sometimes the freezing weather blows out the bulb and then you have freezing pipes again. Make sure the heat tape has a thermostat on them and you don't ever have to remove them and they will come on by themselves when it gets cold.
The heat tape is an excellent idea but turning the furnace back on would be a great start. The furnace is an integrated part of the house and when used properly it will deliver the right amount of heat to the basement to keep the pipes from freezing. You can reduce the flow of heat to the basement to keep it around 40F or so while keeping the upper portion comfortable. If you choose to use the fireplace also you want to be cautious about the location of it to the thermostat. If the fire gives off too much heat the thermostat will never kick on. You may also want to try leaving the furnace off but the furnace fan on all of the time. That will get a good air flow through the house and may warm the basement just enough... That only works if you have cold air returns to the furnace from the upstairs... Best of luck to you
We live in the Arizona desert and during the sometimes freezing weather have had frozen pipes. That is until we covered them with old blankets or burlap.
There is a product called IceLoc, it is a passive material that is made with an FDA approved material. Its easy to install (feed into pipe) and forget about it. It won't prevent freezing, but your pipes won't burst. www.iceloc.com
Good luck!! Iceloc is starting to be used in the state buildings here in NM and has been used in several different locations back east.
I live in the Boston Mass. area.I have a wood stove on the first floor and I put one in the basement so my pipes won't freeze.The first floor stove heats so well that my furnace won't come on then my cellar becomes cold.The stove in the basement now keeps my cellar nice and toasty.
ICELOC Works awesome www.iceloc.com
We sell an insulated conduit , Insul-seal that is excellent to use. please see it at www.mainewooddoctor.com
I suggest NOT leaving your faucets dripping if you live in a mobile home or if you have an overly cold basement. I made this mistake and had ice build-up in the sewer line which froze completely over time. Lesson learned!
Would shutting off water to your house in extremely cold weather prevent pipes from bursting?
By Kally M
If you are planning to shut down the water you will need to bleed the water out too. Meaning clear the pipes of all traces of water. Also to prevent freezing drain pipes, anti freeze works well for that.
This would help, but to prevent pipes from freezing, you would have to empty the lines by draining as much as possible (open all faucets and drain your hot water heater) and then blowing out the lines with an air compressor. It would also be a good idea to shut off the main water valve to this house and remove your water meter so it doesn't freeze and burst.
In order to keep the pipes from freezing you have to drain the lines. This is not a simple process. If you are only occasionally blessed with cold weather, you can keep a tap running and this will keep the pipes from freezing. However, you do waste a phenomenal amount of water this way. If you are talking about a vacant house, that will not be heated, then you should likely shut off the water and drain the pipes. If you are living in the house, then insulation, heat tape, a heated crawl space, etc. are the things you should investigate.
We had a cabin at Falcon Lake, in a very cold area of Canada...minus 45 celcius and colder. Every fall we would shut off all the water, and drain the water pipes, by leaving all the taps open, then wrap the pipes with insulation. Never had frozen pipes. Remember to drain the pipes!
I have just purchased a house in Middletown, CT and thought I was being smart by buying a pellet stove to beat the high oil costs. My house is a two-story house with a basement. I installed the stove on the first floor. As it gets cooler I have realized how cold the basement gets now that the furnace never kicks in. My worry is frozen pipes.
You could put a thermometer in the basement to see how cold it will get. I doubt it will go below 55 degrees. I say that because I live in Maine and that is how cold my basement will get during the winter.
You could insulate the pipes in the basement as I have done. I bought the insulating stuff from the home center and it is made to cover pipes. It just slips over the pipe. You will find it in the plumbing section. I don't understand why you want to move the thermostat. If you put the thermostat in the basement and set it to 58 and the basement cools to 55 I would think the furnace will run a lot and defeat the purpose of the pellet stove. I would insulate the pipes,put a thermometer in the cellar to check the temp and forget about it.
My DH says the thermostat should be where the heater is and the pipes that your worried about all in the same place.
Leave the thermostat where it is and turn it down accordingly so that it won't turn on unit until it's necessary. What I would do is turn the furnace fan on only (recirculate the warm air from the pellet stove) and see if that helps with the basement temp. I would be worried about freezing pipes!
I placed my pellet stove in the basement (along with the furnace) very warm, I'm trying to do the opposite - move the air up in lieu of down.
As Harry suggested I think insulating the pipes is paramount...One thing he did not address was location of the stove. Heat rises, so perhaps basement location for stove good idea, but do you want to run up & down to replentish pellets. Most pellet stoves will heat so well they almost run you out of the house so don't understand the additional need for furnace. Good luck & God Bless and stay warm!
Gale aka stormy10000
Hi Cropner,
You might try a ThermGuard from Bear Mountain Design:
www.bearmountaindesign.com
It attaches to your thermostat....no need to move your thermostat...and you can program it to cycle water through your pipes periodically. I had a similar problem. I burn wood in my house and my heating pipes would freeze and burst because the stove kept the house warm enough so the heater never kicked on. It happend twice and I couldn't find a solution that would work for me until ThermGuard.
It has a microprocessor controller and doesn't need any batteries. It remembers the programming even if the power is lost.
It only costs $70 and it is a lot cheaper than antifreeze or fixing the mess when the pipes go.
Cheers,
Bridgerman
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Start now preparing for winter weather. Winter is coming. Be sure and wrap your outdoor water pipes or use the pipe insulation you can buy at a hardware store.
