Prevent Frozen Pipes: Best Ways to Protect Your Pipes from Freezing

Introduction To Frozen Pipes

Winter season has arrived and that means we are all starting to pull out our winter clothes and bundle up and try to them keep warm, at that time it is important to remember that the pipes in your house need protection from the cold to prevent frozen pipes.

Although the temperature alert to households for freezing pipes is 20 degrees F in warmer places such as southern states, pipes can freeze at that warmer temperature.

External pipe, which is exposed to elements have a greater chance of freezing during the winter season, and wind chill also plays an essential role in the pipe freezing problem, also pay attention to both situations such as wind chill temperature and actual temperature, especially if you have pipes located where wind can get to them.

Follow the below steps to prevent frozen pipes,

1. Evaluate your plumbing or water system to expose the plumbing pipe
2. Call a professional, who maintains the situation
3. Better insulate your house
4. Insulate your pipes
5. Use cables or Heat tapes for prevention purposes
6. Protect your water sprinkler systems
7. Circulate the warm air surrounding the pipes
8. Leave the water running condition
9. Take precautions while travelling

Here, the above mention steps to prevent frozen pipes are explained briefly,

1. Evaluate Your Plumbing Or Water System To Expose The Plumbing Pipe

If you have a blueprint of a building or home, then this process may be easier, but one way for starting is to look in garages, basement, or anywhere where your house is unheated, at that time follow any visible pipe to see which areas are most vulnerable a good to evaluate is on a cold day when you can use a sensor for seeing which area of building expose your pipes to temperatures simpler to those outside.

Another excellent preventative measure is to trace where you go through your house and outdoors so you can identify how big a problem arises from the freezing temperatures present in your pipes.

Also, those pipes located outdoors and in uninsulated areas of your house are mostly burst, that sign will allow you to determine the right measures for protecting your pipes against freezing.

Finally, evaluate which rooms in your house or building that contains pipe are coldest so you can easily recognize when temperatures get too low in that problematic area.

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2. Call A Professional, Who Maintains The Situation

Before comes winter season, call a professional who helps to protect your plumbing system against frizzing conditions according to the plumbing network use mostly use HVAC system during the cold month, this plumbing system help to lower the energy bill and keep your house cozier also.

In that case, if you are not sure where your pipes run or where they are located through the walls of your house, then you can call a professional plumber who performs well and easily identify our pipeline.

3. Better Insulate Your House

One of the best things you can do to prevent frozen pipes is to increase the insulation in the area where your pipes run before extreme cold situations hit.

Check that you have sufficient pipe insulation in your crawl space, garage, and attic, this not just help protects pipe in that area but also will keep your house cosy and decrease the energy bill.

While checking on insulation, keeps an eye out for any drafts coming from cracks in the wall or you can say opening, around doors and windows, near the foundation. Use caulk for sealing cracks or gaps around the doors, window, and ventilation area.

4. Insulate your pipes

You can add self-sealing pipe sleeve insulation all around the exterior pipes and pipes located in unheated areas such as a basement, crawl space, and garage.

This pipe insulation won’t increase the temperature of your inside water or pipes, but it can help to maintain the temperature of the pipe, and itself closer to the temperature of the water inside, reducing like a cold pipe will freeze the water inside. If water is exposed to freezing temperatures in any other parts of the pipe.

5. Use cables or Heat tapes for prevention purposes

If you are really scared about frozen pipes, then try wrapping them with a heat cable or heat tape connected to a thermostat controller so that cables or tapes turn on when the temperature drops below the level.

This is generally recommended for interior or exterior pipes along exterior walls, always use this product according to manufacturer recommendations because using them incorrectly can lead to a fire hazard.

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6. Protect your water sprinkler systems

If plumbing conception is disconnected in any garden hoses at that time put them away and turn off the water sprinkler timer and use the shutoff valve to turn off the water for the sprinklers and then easily blow out the water.

Nowadays modern houses have frost-proof faucets which drain themselves, but if you live in a traditional or older house, then you need to turn off the water to your outdoor faucets and drain the water, then tightly turn the handles for ensuring they are fully off.

Before covering each pipe with a foam faucet cover, wrap any drained above-ground pipes with insulation, and for exterior pipes which still water contains, use a heat cable or heat tape for protecting the plumbing pipes.

7. Circulate the warm air surrounding the pipes

Keeping your door closed helps protect pipes in the garage from freezing temperatures, for pipes inside the house, open you’re under-sink cabinet doors for allowing warm air to circulate around the pipes.

For any reason, keeping your thermostat on even when you are going away from the house at that time also keeps your pipes warm.

If you know that your pipes are going through a particularly cold area of your house that does not get sufficient heat such as a constantly chilly bathroom or wash area.

In that situation, you want to run the space heater on low during really chilly times to maintain sufficient heat in the room or that area.

8. Leave the water running condition

If you want to save water and money then you probably hate leaving the water running, but when the temperatures go below that time freezing situations occur, then this is a good way to prevent frozen pipes.

The running water prevents your pipe from bursting action and saves lots of water and money also, for every sink in your house, turn on the cold water tap and hot water tap for ensuring water is passing through both pipes. Even if you notice just running water at a tiny trickle can prevent frozen pipes.

9. Take precautions while travelling

If you are planning on leaving a house for a long period specifically in the winter season then use a shutoff valve to turn off your water supply lines, drain the water from pipes, and don’t forget to drain your hot water heater too. This is one of the important ways to prevent frozen pipes in the house.

Because draining all the water from pipes and the hot water heater is a pretty major undertaking, it is best for leaving your heat on, as usual, to keep your pipes warm inside your house.

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