by Louise Christensen

Created on: December 01, 2009

Winterizing plumbing can be simple or complex, it can be cheap or expensive. First of all the type of winterising that can be used will depend on if the home is occupied or not. There are still many folks who have a summer cabin situated in the mountains that need to be safeguarded to ensure a warm welcome come summer.

Winterizing an unoccupied home is easy and cheap. It will be necessary to turn off the water at the main source to the house. Then all the water lines need to be drained. It is also a good idea to empty all the water out of the toilets as well. Empty the water heater and turn it off and then make sure the line to the refrigerator is empty. It used to be common practice to then fill the water lines with antifreeze but that has proven to be environmentally unsound and is not necessary if all the lines have bee properly drained. Depending on where the house is located might necessitate putting a lock on the main water valve to discourage -unwelcome visitors- access.

Winterizing an occupied house is a different matter altogether. If the house is situated over a basement the job will be fairly easy. If the house is situated over a deep crawl space a little more complicated and if the house sits on a standard crawl space it will be a difficult job. A well built house in hard winter country will be designed to deal with the problems associated to cold weather hazards and pipes.

Older homes or homes that were not properly designed will need to be supplimented. Surprising changes in weather patterns might also affect people who never before had to address this problem. Regardless of your situation you will need to decide how much time, money and effort you are willing to invest in winterizing your plumbing. For most people access will be the biggest determining factor. If access is difficult then doing the job more than once will not be the optimal choice. However, funds may have an impact on which materials you can afford to invest in. Comparing the cost of materials to the cost of replacing pipes should help make the decision easier.

Before any type of installation is attempted a thorough inspection of all pipe surfaces must be completed. This will be especially important for those standard crawl spaces; a leaky pipe will compromise insulation efficacy. If you have a standard crawl space and you know which insulation you plan to use it is not inconceivable that you could inspect as you install. Using this method will require attention to detail to avoid

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