Top Ways to Maintain Your Plumbing From Bursting in Cold Temperatures
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All property owners who live in pleasant environments should do their best to winterize their pipelines. It is something you should do during fall before deep winter absolutely begins. Failing to do so can lead to disaster like icy, cracked, or ruptured pipelines. Below are some convenient winterizing hacks to maintain your plumbing system secured even if the weather condition exterior is terrible.
Try a Hair Dryer or Warm Gun
When your pipelines are virtually freezing, your trusty hair dryer or heat gun is a godsend. If the hot towels do not assist remove any type of resolving ice in your pipelines, bowling hot air straight into them may assist. Do not make use of various other things that create straight flames like a blow lantern. This can cause a larger catastrophe that you can not control. You may wind up harmful your pipes while trying to thaw the ice. And over time, you might also end up melting your residence. Be careful!
Open Cupboard Doors Hiding Plumbing
It would certainly be useful to open closet doors that are camouflaging your pipes when it's chilly outside. They might be somewhere in your kitchen or bathroom. This will permit the cozy air from your heating system to distribute there. Because of this, you protect against these exposed pipelines from freezing. Doing this little trick can keep your pipelines cozy as well as limit the possibly hazardous outcomes of freezing temperatures.
Take Time to Cover Exposed Piping
One clever and simple hack to heat up cold pipelines is to wrap them with cozy towels. You can cover them initially with towels. After safeguarding them in position, you can put boiling water on the towels. Do it slowly to let the towels take in the fluid. You can additionally make use of pre-soaked towels in hot water, simply do not neglect to use protective handwear covers to guard your hands from the warmth.
Activate the Faucets
When the temperature declines and it appears as if the cold temperature level will certainly last, it will certainly aid to switch on your water both inside your home and also outdoors. This will maintain the water moving with your plumbing systems. Additionally, the activity will certainly reduce the cold procedure. Especially, there's no demand to transform it on full force. You'll wind up losing gallons of water by doing this. Instead, go for concerning 5 drops per minute.
Turn off Water When Pipes are Frozen
If you notice that your pipes are totally frozen or virtually nearing that phase, transform off the primary water valve right away. You will typically discover this in your basement or utility room near the heater or the front wall closest to the street. Transform it off as soon as possible to avoid more damage.
Don't neglect to shut external water resources, as well, such as your hookup for the garden residence. Doing this will avoid additional water from filling out your plumbing system. However, with more water, even more ice will pile up, which will eventually cause burst pipelines. It is best to call a professional plumber for an evaluation if you are not sure regarding the state of your pipes this winter months. Taking this proactive approach can conserve you hundreds of dollars in repairs.
All property owners who live in warm climates should do their best to winterize their pipelines. Failure to do so can lead to catastrophe like frozen, split, or ruptured pipelines. If the hot towels do not help displace any type of clearing up ice in your pipes, bowling warm air straight into them may assist. Transform off the major water shutoff right away if you discover that your pipes are completely icy or nearly nearing that stage. With even more water, even more ice will load up, which will eventually 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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