As the calendar flips and winter truly sets in, many of us enjoy the cozy indoors with our friends and loved ones. But the cold outside air brings a big threat to your home – water damage. The biggest cause of water damage during the winter is typically frozen pipes. These can burst and cause huge messes, resulting in thousands of dollars in repairs. Since no homeowner wants a flood as their first big event of the year, you can start the new year right by implementing some simple tips.
Insulate and Protect Those Pipes
To keep trouble at bay, you must take steps to keep your pipes from freezing at all. This is because when water turns to ice, it expands with incredible force and causes bursting. Any pipe located in unheated areas, such as a garage, crawlspace or attic, is especially vulnerable to freezing temperatures. If you have any pipes in these cold spots, you should wrap them in pipe insulation.
You can purchase foam sleeves from any local hardware or home improvement store. This material is inexpensive, easy to install and acts like a small blanket for the pipe because it keeps the cold air at bay. Furthermore, you should seal up any small cracks or openings in your exterior walls near where water pipes enter the house. Even tiny drafts can bring enough cold air to freeze a section of pipe and cause a catastrophic situation that can potentially cost you thousands of dollars to fix.
Disconnect Outdoor Hoses
Another frequently overlooked source of winter water problems comes from your outdoor hose bibs. These are the faucets located outside your house. Before the temperature drops below freezing, you absolutely must disconnect and drain all garden hoses. Water left inside a hose can freeze and cause pressure to build back up into the outdoor faucet itself.
This pressure travels backward and can easily cause the pipe connected to the outdoor faucet inside your wall to burst. This can even happen if the indoor part is warm. Turn off the indoor shutoff valve for that outdoor faucet. Then open the outside tap to drain any remaining water.
Keep the Heat on Even When Away
If you plan to travel during the winter, do not make the mistake of turning your heat off completely to save a little money. Keeping your home warm is critical for preventing burst pipes. This is especially the case if the temperature outside is predicted to be very cold for several days.
Even if you are just leaving for a long weekend, it is important to set your thermostat no lower than 55 degrees F (13 degrees C). This minimum temperature keeps the air circulating and warm enough to protect the pipes that run along your exterior walls or through cabinets. Since the heat from your main living areas helps protect the plumbing hidden behind the walls, maintaining a consistent, low temperature is the best defense against catastrophic freezing.
If a situation arises that causes water damage, you must deal with it right away, or mold can develop. Once mold grows in your home, other problems can result, such as illness and compromised structural integrity. For water damage help, contact United Water Restoration Group to restore your Charlotte, NC home.
