HELP i have reason to believe that the power company in my New york area WILL NOT HAVE THE power on for days after 1/1/00. How long can my house last without the water pipes breaking. I have no basement, which means the pipes are close to the ground. I can not get to them, 1970"s construction idiots put the crawl space out of the reach of anyone over the age of 6. If the temp is going down to 10 - 15 F how long to i have and should i shut the valve off just in case.

PS we are relocating to our safe house in the event anythin happens. Just do not want to come home and MOP up for days???

BLUE

-- BLUE (bluefish@thepond.com), December 07, 1999

Answers

Your pipes will freeze at 32 degrees. You will not know when or if it happened untill it warms up and water starts running out of the break. If the power does go out for longer than1/2 hour, I would shut the water off and drain your system.

-- FLAME AWAY (BLehman202@aol.com), December 07, 1999.

Drain water system bu opening faucets at lowest level of house. If you anticipate possible water shut down at night, leave a faucet running so can drain. Water expands when it freezes. That is why the pipes break. If you drain, then there is more room for whatever water is left to expand without pipe busting.

-- marsh (armstrng@sisqtel.net), December 07, 1999.

In my area last week, the temperature went down to 25 degrees F. As a test to see how well my fireplace would heat the living room, I turned off the heat and left it off for 5 hours. NO busted pipes, no deaths.

Cheers

-- Forget it (mistermagoo@hanna.com), December 07, 1999.

You have to turn off the water, drain the pipes (run lowest tap and leave tap upstairs open to let air in), empty the hot water tank and put PLUMBING (or RV) antifreeze in the sink and toilet traps. Do not use AUTOMOBILE antifreeze as it is very poisonous.

Also make sure you turn off the breaker to your water heater as it will be empty. You also need to empty your fridge and freezer and leave them open if you don't want to come back to a green smelly mess if it warms up.

-- John (jh@NotReal.ca), December 07, 1999.

Thanks for the answers. My house is well insulated, and i will drain the pipes. What kind of antifreeze if not Auto??

BLUE

-- BLUE (bluefish@thepond.com), December 07, 1999.

Yep, turn off the main water feed to your house in the front yard. Then open lower level faucets till empty (hot and cold). Get plumbing balloons from hardware store to seal all drains (sinks, showers, tubs, toilet too if able) so you will be spared any sewage backup.

-- Hokie (nn@va.com), December 07, 1999.

You need PLUMBING OR RECREATIONAL VEHICLE antifreeze. We use it to winterize our swimming pool and can get it from hardware chains, Home Depot, etc.

-- John (jh@NotReal.ca), December 07, 1999.

Pipes don't freeze at 32 degrees, they'll have to be colder than that. Pipes in a crawlspace are warmed by the house above it, so if the house is warm the crawlspace might NEVER get to freezing. If you lose power, quickly seal off the crawlspace (put small pieces of wood over the vent spaces, which are usually just blocks left out of the bearing walls). Even at (say) 25 degrees of no power, it MIGHT take several days for the pipes to freeze.

As a last-ditch plan, if you can't drain the pipes, a kerosene heater/blower (those things that look like jet engines) can blow a lot of hot air under the house, once a day or so for an hour, and keep things from freezing. Still got time to get one, get fuel, etc.

582 hours and counting.

-- bw (home@puget.sound), December 07, 1999.

Oops, "25 degrees of no power" should be "AND no power".

-- bw (home@puget.sound), December 07, 1999.

Blue

The pipes in your crawl space won't freeze until the dirt freezes. The heat comes from the earth. I suspect at 10-15F the crawl space won't freeze (if insulated) but you should be concerned about frost on the main level.

Also, there should be city/customer interface just outside your property line. Remember that your "main valve" is likely on the load side of the water meter. Therefore your meter is susceptible to leakage if it becomes frozen (unless the city can isolate you via the street valve).

I would have the city shut off water at the street. Also pour recreation vehicle antifreeze down all waste water holes so as to fill the "traps.

-- earl (ejrobill@pcpostal.com), December 07, 1999.

Bluefish,

If your house was properly constructed, the pipes under the floor will be ABOVE the floor insulation. A lot of freezing problems in our area are caused by the fact that, as the insulation requirements increased, the water pipe/freeze/potential didn't keep up. What happened is that a lot of builders/plumbers continued to hang the pipes below the floor joists, as they had always done in the past. In the past, before floor insulation was used, the crawl space would stay warm. But with the advent of stricter energy codes, this does not work any more, as the heat of the house is mostly cut off from the crawl space, on most houses which have crawl spaces.

Now some builders still put the pipes under the insulation, some put them inside the insulation, and the rest of us put them above the insulation.

Now, if your pipes are above the insulation, they will never freeze as long as your house is kept above freezing.

Oh, almost forgot. The same principle applies inside the walls. Most newer homes have their riser pipes for sinks, etc. inside the walls. If the wall is an exterior wall, the pipes need to be on the HEATED side of the insulation. Believe me, a lot of insulation contractors don't get it. This is an even more common place to have a pipe freeze up than the crawl space.

A good friend of mine, another builder, had a pipe freeze, and it thawed out while they were in town. The water flooded into the upstairs for a few hours, dripped through the floor, screwed up sheet rock, a hardwood floor downstairs, etc. I thought he knew better.

Maybe you should hire a six year old to go down there with a video camera and film what's down there for you. Have him/her locate pipes to see where they are in relation to the insulation.

Good luck! ALK

-- Al K. Lloyd (all@ready.now), December 07, 1999.

Thanks again for all the help. I have a warm and fuzzy feeling that somehow some of us are giong to make it through the crisis.

Best wishes,

BLUE

-- BLUE (Bluefish@thepond.com), December 07, 1999.

I like in a mobile home and when it gets below 25, we just leave the water running in a couple of sinks(a trickle)

-- Jamie (Jamie42861@aol.com), December 07, 1999.