Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Wise words about preventing burst pipes

I've a friend who worked many years as a high muckety-muck in a major insurance company. According to him, it's important to not only let water trickle during extreme cold, but also open cabinets in areas with pipes & water connections, like under sinks. This allows warmer air in and may save you a mess. Outside walls are particularly vulnerable.

Just a tip.

Very true.

My Father and Grandfather worked as plumbers in high muckety-muck for many years, and they gave the same advice.

I spent a couple hours thawing out a frozen Ritchie fountain this morning.

Three horses and every tweetie bird in the neighborhood just aren't enough to keep those things from locking up when it's ten below outside.

Around here, people drain their cabin plumbing dry to prevent frozen pipes when they are not there. Something to consider if you fear frozen pipes, and you only have a few days of this to endure.

Squid, that’s what I try to do. Since I don’t live there I turn off the well, let all of the water out of the pressure tank and remove the drain plug from the pump motor. With the extended freeze, I expect I’ll be hosed on something. Then start an electric heater on low power.

BTW, I also pour a little bit of windshield washer anti freeze in the drains of the kitchen sink, flush the toilet after turning off the well, dip out most of the water, antifreeze in the tank and bowl. Then pour a little into the trap on the sink and the tub drain.

These things usually work but with extended single digit temps,I expect to do some plumbing when it gets warm enough to go there without my hands freezing. I’m a weenie when it comes to not being able to use my fingers.

Dave:

Here's what we would do to the place in Wisconsin when we were done deer hunting and shutting the place down. It would be closed up and the heat turned off from Thanksgiving to April.

Drain Water Softener tanks. (they had a petcock on the bottom of them, and they sat on a bed of gravel in the basement so it could drain to the soil.)
Drain Water heater
Pull plug/drain well pump
Drain all water lines in the house (had drains in the basement to allow us to do that).
Flush toilets to drain water, then use wet/dry vac to suck out water.
There were 3 sinks in the place, 1 dishwasher, 2 bathtubs, 2 toilets. We would use between 2 and 3 gallons of RV anti-freeze and pour that in all the "P" traps and drains to prevent them from freezing. We would pour it in everything that had a drain. Tubs, sinks, toilet, dishwasher, etc. Even the wash machine.

One year the owner forgot to drain the water softener tank that held the beads in it. That spring when they opened the place the fiberglass tank was burst from the pressure of the water freezing and expanding.....

We never had a problem using the RV anti-freeze.

The RV anti-freeze is much better than windshield fluid IMO

Back in the day I would cut a 4” long 1X4 cedar bird and out in bowl of toilet and that gave the ice some expansion room. Then we got to putting a dollop of antifreeze in it

Will, I woke this morning to find no water so I am guessing the pipes finally froze, even with some water running water at the kitchen sink. I am hoping no busted pipes so far because I don't see any water running around the house through busted pipes. I made it all week but this last day or so of this weather got me.