Five Essential Hacks for Winterizing Your Pipes Against Frigid Temperatures
Five Essential Hacks for Winterizing Your Pipes Against Frigid Temperatures
Blog Article
Are you searching for ideas around How to stop pipes from freezing during the winter?
All house owners that live in warm climates need to do their best to winterize their pipelines. It is something you have to do during fall prior to deep wintertime truly begins. Failure to do so can lead to calamity like frozen, fractured, or ruptured pipes. If the weather exterior is frightful, here are some handy winterizing hacks to maintain your plumbing system protected even.
Try a Hair Clothes Dryer or Heat Gun
When your pipelines are almost freezing, your reliable hair clothes dryer or warmth weapon is a godsend. If the hot towels do not aid remove any working out ice in your pipelines, bowling warm air directly right into them might help. You may finish up destructive your pipes while attempting to thaw the ice.
Open Closet Doors Hiding Plumbing
When it's cold outside, it would be handy to open closet doors that are masking your pipes. As an example, they could be somewhere in your kitchen or bathroom. This will certainly enable the warm air from your heater to circulate there. Consequently, you stop these subjected pipelines from freezing. Doing this tiny technique can keep your pipes cozy and also restrict the potentially unsafe outcomes of freezing temperature levels.
Take Some Time to Cover Exposed Water Lines
One very easy and also nifty hack to warm up cold pipelines is to cover them with cozy towels. You can cover them initially with towels. After protecting them in position, you can put boiling water on the towels. Do it slowly to allow the towels soak up the liquid. You can also use pre-soaked towels in hot water, simply don't fail to remember to put on safety handwear covers to protect your hands from the warm.
Turn On the Faucets
When the temperature decreases and also it seems as if the icy temperature level will certainly last, it will help to turn on your water both indoors and outdoors. This will keep the water streaming via your plumbing systems. You'll finish up throwing away gallons of water this method.
When Pipelines are Frozen, close Off Water
If you notice that your pipelines are totally icy or practically nearing that stage, transform off the primary water shutoff immediately. You will generally find this in your cellar or utility room near the heating unit or the front wall surface closest to the street. Transform it off right away to prevent further damage.
With more water, even more ice will pile up, which will at some point lead to rupture pipes. If you are uncertain about the state of your pipelines this wintertime, it is best to call a professional plumber for an inspection.
All home owners that live in warm climates have to do their finest to winterize their pipes. Failing to do so can mean disaster like icy, broken, or burst pipelines. If the hot towels do not help displace any type of settling ice in your pipes, bowling warm air straight right into them might help. Transform off the main water valve instantly if you discover that your pipes are completely icy or virtually nearing that stage. With even more water, even more ice will certainly stack up, which will ultimately 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.
https://www.stinenichols.com/kansas-city/planning-ahead-for-winter-plumbing/
We hope you enjoyed reading our article about How to Prevent Frozen Pipes. Thanks a lot for taking the time to read through our posting. Sharing is nice. Helping others is fun. Bless you for your time. Please check our site back soon.
Get An Estimate Report this page