First Winter with Pier and Beam - Tips? (home, vs.)

[FarNorDFW]

Originally Posted by EDS_

1. Resist the temptation to cover the ventilation openings around your foundation. If they are covered now fix that but probably after the freeze.

2. Your floors simply will not freeze unless your heat sources are off for 48-72 hours and it stays well below freezing the entire time and there is little sunshine.

3. Leave your thermostat set to the same as your normal day time temp throughout the freeze.

4. During the day flush every toilet every several hours and right before bed and at wake up.

5. Leave at least one inside cold tap and at least on inside hot tap each running as the smallest possible streams. A slow drip isn't enough. There is a mysterious factor........running a couple of hot and cold taps at a small stream rate significantly protects far away water dead ends like washing machines and what not. If your home is large - two or three water heaters run a hot and cold tap associated with each. If you have tankless don't worry as below about half gallon per minute flow rates the heat source will not activate.

6. Open every single vanity/cabinet/closet door that features a water outlet or water lines inside.

7. If you have a pot filler run it for 20 seconds 6-8X per day.

8. Outside spigots:
A. If installed in a wall with heat from inside the house - install a foam cover.
B. If installed in a wall without heat from inside, say a garage wall - 1. Run the water at a slow stream. 2. Rig up some way such that water from the spigot does not freeze upwards into the spigot (leave at least a foot of fall). 3. Divert the water away from your foundation. I have a spigot like this.......I run it at a slow stream into a 7 gallon bucket and I empty the bucket about every 4-6 hours.
C. Any old school spigots coming out of the ground and mounted low - cover insulation/old towels will work in a pinch and a 5 gallon bucket......when set low these types of spigots are easy to freeze proof (around here).

9. Cook a lot. Cooking generates a lot of heat.



Also look around outside if you have an irrigation back flow preventer report back and I'll tell you how to remove the important parts. Around here they are often under a stupid looking big fake rock. If your house is older you probably will not have one. My old house in Dallas built in the '60s didn't have one. My lake house (Texoma) built in 1979 does.


Excuse the typos no glasses. Good luck.

This is very helpful. Thank you. We’ve previously only been on slab foundations (as the user name suggests). And we did not lose power at all during Uri in our old house. What’s thrown me off is that new house wasn’t much different in summer (if anything slightly easier to cool because of super high ceilings), but man this house has gotten *colder* much faster and deeper as the seasons changed. In particular the floors have been noticeably colder than the old slab foundation floors.

[WRM20]

Originally Posted by SanJac

Oh my! And in Baytown! It must have been super cold!

It was 26 degrees in the room. The house my Dad grew up in. No insulation and no space heaters allowed to be on after bedtime. I think that was a 20 degree night.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by FarNorDFW

This is very helpful. Thank you. We’ve previously only been on slab foundations (as the user name suggests). And we did not lose power at all during Uri in our old house. What’s thrown me off is that new house wasn’t much different in summer (if anything slightly easier to cool because of super high ceilings), but man this house has gotten *colder* much faster and deeper as the seasons changed. In particular the floors have been noticeably colder than the old slab foundation floors.

You are welcome.

As the cold sets in report back if needed.

And yea. That's legit. Your old slab was, more or less, a 300K-500K lb or more heat sink. A. your slab's mass was a heat sink in and of itself. B. your old slab was tied to Earth as a much more important (over time) heat sink. Keep in mind when it's 7 or 9F on Sunday three inches underground it'll be way above freezing.



Don't worry about this now. But lots of DFW P&B homes have ZERO floor insulation.

[rabbit33]

Originally Posted by FarNorDFW

This is very helpful. Thank you. We’ve previously only been on slab foundations (as the user name suggests). And we did not lose power at all during Uri in our old house. What’s thrown me off is that new house wasn’t much different in summer (if anything slightly easier to cool because of super high ceilings), but man this house has gotten *colder* much faster and deeper as the seasons changed. In particular the floors have been noticeably colder than the old slab foundation floors.

Well, in part that's because you should close the vent openings in winter.

[Talpa]

My 1950 p/b bungalow has hot/cold dripping well on the far end of home indoor piping, but -

My kitchen faucet hot side is frozen..I had set the Koen spray/stream nozzle in receptacle [set in the middle position] w/ water running tiny stream. But yesterday morning when I swiveled the wand to the left [full hot] I got zero stream. Cold side is fine/clear.

Since I have hot at the further end [kitchen is midway to bathroom]; surmise the water line section between the tee split [to bathrooms] & kitchen line is frozen. Have a mini space-heater [safely] directed at the hot water valve underneath the kitchen cabinet, since yesterday to no avail. Just have to wait it out and see. Was hoping the heat would conduct up-piping a bit to thaw..no joy yet.

This same issue happened during the Big Freeze, but resolved post-thaw w/ no bursted piping.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by Talpa

My 1950 p/b bungalow has hot/cold dripping well on the far end of home indoor piping, but -

My kitchen faucet hot side is frozen..I had set the Koen spray/stream nozzle in receptacle [set in the middle position] w/ water running tiny stream. But yesterday morning when I swiveled the wand to the left [full hot] I got zero stream. Cold side is fine/clear.

Since I have hot at the further end [kitchen is midway to bathroom]; surmise the water line section between the tee split [to bathrooms] & kitchen line is frozen. Have a mini space-heater [safely] directed at the hot water valve underneath the kitchen cabinet, since yesterday to no avail. Just have to wait it out and see. Was hoping the heat would conduct up-piping a bit to thaw..no joy yet.

This same issue happened during the Big Freeze, but resolved post-thaw w/ no bursted piping.

1. It is a real thing that lines can freeze and not rupture.

2. I'm not there but if you have other taps close by I'd try running them just a little full hot for a while as copper is a tremendous conductor of heat doing so may work.

Does any water at all come out of the hot side - even a very slow drip?

[rabbit33]

If you had closed your foundation vents, you wouldn't have 10 degree air whistling around your pipes in your crawl space. Those little metal covers are not insulated, but the normal crawl space - if the vents are closed - will gain heat by conduction and convection from the underside of the floor (walk around my house barefoot in winter, and you'll believe me!)

Close the vents when winter's coming, open them in spring. Basic pier-and-beam homeownership, just like wrapping your outside hose bibbs if you don't have cutoffs.

[WRM20]

Originally Posted by rabbit33

If you had closed your foundation vents, you wouldn't have 10 degree air whistling around your pipes in your crawl space. Those little metal covers are not insulated, but the normal crawl space - if the vents are closed - will gain heat by conduction and convection from the underside of the floor (walk around my house barefoot in winter, and you'll believe me!)

Close the vents when winter's coming, open them in spring. Basic pier-and-beam homeownership, just like wrapping your outside hose bibbs if you don't have cutoffs.

That assumes the crawl space is covered. That is not always the case.

[rabbit33]

Originally Posted by WRM20

That assumes the crawl space is covered. That is not always the case.

What do you mean, "covered"? It's covered by the house!

Of course if what you mean to say is "open" as in one of those really old houses where there's no perimeter beam to the foundation, just latticework to keep dogs and kids from crawling under there, then my advice is irrelevant, because there aren't any vents, the whole thing is a vent.

[Talpa]

EDS,

- agreed on the freeze/non-burst. at least for this home now it's happened twice *
- all taps have been in slo/flo mode - steady drip. also ran hot full in bathroom several times a day to do just as you said.
- water never flowed out of hot side on any drip..it was frozen out from the tee line to kitchen, as described above.

* Issue resolved itself yesterday; hot began flowing finally in kitchen. Applying the small space heater over the target bib worked. Back to SOP.

Rabbit, I keep my vents closed year round - so may have helped accelerate the thaw time vs. uncovered - agreed.


Thanks for the help/tips, much appreciated.