Preventing Frozen Pipes

If during the recent cold snap you turn on a faucet and either get nothing or just a trickle you might have had a frozen pipe. If your well supply line or the water main is not frozen, you may have water in part of the house, but frozen pipes elsewhere. There are some things you can do to prevent frozen pipes in the future. A couple of ceramic electric heat cubes, thermocouple, electric blanket and a little strategy can prevent frozen pipes.

The likely pipes to freeze are against exterior walls of the home, or are exposed to the cold, like outdoor hose bibs, and water supply pipes in unheated interior areas like basements and crawl spaces, attics, garages, or kitchen cabinets. Pipes that run against exterior walls that have little or no insulation are also subject to freezing. It is easier to prevent pipes from freezing than to unfreeze them.

In sub-zero weather wells with and without separate well houses can freeze. Keeping the temperature in a well house above freezing or your well pipe insulated can prevent this. It used to be that an inefficient 100 watt incandescent bulb gave off enough heat to do the job, but now with more efficient bulbs insulation and other sources of heat have to be used. An electric blanket can do the job.

While a deep well is unlikely to freeze because the temperature below the frost line (about 3 to 5 feet below the surface) remains at a nearly constant temperature, in the range of 45 -70 degrees Fahrenheit depending on your latitude. However, if the pitless adaptor or pipe from the well is not deep enough to be below the frost line then that line will freeze. Abnormal artic frosts can identify many a private well line that was not buried deep enough at its most vulnerable point where it connects to the foundation. 

The enclosure protects the well head and wraps well pipe with insulating matuerial

Though, our well line runs under the garage into the house. The highest point of my lot is right about there and the basement floor where the water line enters the house is about nine feet below ground. The water pipe enters the wall bout 3-4 feet above the basement floor. That is well below the frost line. Even the winter when the temperature fell to 14 below one weekend the main water line did not freeze. However, if your well pipe is shallower or like me have pipes that run over sections of the garage it is important to keep your garage temperature on extreme days above freezing and you might have to keep a crawl space or the area next to the well pipe entry warm. My furnace and hot water heater are right next to the entry point and pressure tank. It’s always warm there (the cat loves it). 

Because of the usually mild winters here in Virginia, our house was built with a Jack and Jill bathroom partially above the garage. There were indications that a couple of pieces of wall bard in the garage had been replaced. So, the year we bought the house I ripped out all the wall board and insulated the heck out the garage and the dormer above it, replaced the garage door with an insulated door, and wrapped the pipes in foam.

Heat cube with thermocouple in garage

Unfortunately, that 14 degrees Fahrenheit below day still froze the pipe to that bathroom. So now, I keep a small ceramic electric heater ($40) connected to a thermocouple that turns it on when the temperature in the garage falls below 40 degrees Fahrenheit. I turn on the heating cube in the garage and check it functioning when I turn off the hoses in late falls. When the weather is forecast to fall into the single digits or lower I open the cabinet below the sink and in the most extreme weather run an extra ceramic electric heater overnight keeping that bathroom toasty while the rest of the house is at 65 degrees. You might also need to have the same set up in a crawl space or possibly a basement.

Letting the water run in very cold weather can work, but can also create other problems. While running water may prevent the water supply pipes from freezing, in the coldest weather the slowly running water might cause the drain pipe to the septic system to freeze and block the flow or even burst, and it can overwhelm a septic system. My septic line leaving the house is on the lowest elevation and not particularly deep. Certainly, the septic line is not below the actual frost line during exceptionally cold weather. I baby and protect my septic system.