The Boston Water and Sewer Commission is out with some recommendations on how to keep your pipes from bursting with the temps making like a submarine and diving.
There's nothing particularly new, you may already know this stuff, but just in case: Let your faucets drip a bit to help keep the water flowing, open the doors under your kitchen sink to let some warmer air get to the pipes, as well as do some stuff you probably should've done earlier, like insulating your basement and garage pipes, filling in any cracks where the pipes come in from the outside and the like. Also:
If your pipes freeze, use a hair dryer to thaw the lines safely; thawing will not be fast, but it will be safe: NEVER USE AN OPEN FLAME TO THAW PIPES
And make sure you know where you're house's overall water shut-off valve is so you can turn it off to minimize the damage from any burst pipes (BWSC says it's usually near your water meter).
Like the job UHub is doing? Consider a contribution. Thanks!
Ad:
Comments
Why not?
By anon
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 2:25pm
What exactly is wrong with using a blowtorch to melt a frozen pipe? It's kind of arrogant to say "never do this" without an explanation to back it up.
Okedoke
By adamg
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 2:53pm
Homeowner using blowtorch on pipe sparks house fire near downtown Colorado Springs.
Man starts fire in Nashville home by using blow torch to thaw frozen pipe
And those are just...
By Charles Bahne
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 3:11pm
the tip of the iceberg.
(Seriously, it happens a lot.)
Some of us (i.e. most of us)
By Homer Bedloe
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 3:13pm
didn’t need the explanation.
Why unfreeze pipes at all?
By fungwah
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 3:25pm
kind of arrogant to not explain why having frozen pipes would be a problem at all here.
Why BWSC
By anon
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 3:58pm
Have to tell people this? Indoor plumbing has been around since the mid 1800’s, people don’t know this.
We are not all the sum of all knowledge
By adamg
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 4:55pm
It must be good to know everything everywhere all at once.
Since when?
By SamWack
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 6:01pm
The ancient Romans had indoor plumbing. They did not, however, have blowtorches, so the subject didn't come up. Too bad; if they had had blowtorches, they might have decided that lead pipes weren't such a great idea. As everybody knows, it was lead pipes that caused the Fall of Rome.
“ As everybody knows, it was
By Lee
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 9:32pm
“ As everybody knows, it was lead pipes that caused the Fall of Rome. ”
Urban myth.
Some kind of myth, anyway
By SamWack
Fri, 01/19/2024 - 7:36am
I don't know what's particularly urban about it, but, as everybody knows, "everybody knows" is a sure-fire indicator that what follows is a myth of some sort.
"the fall"
By Vicki
Fri, 01/19/2024 - 10:15am
There is no agreement on when Rome fell--I remember a history lecture that said the earliest plausible date for "the fall of Rome" was in the 5th century (first time barbarians sacked the city) and the latest was Gibbon's 1453, the end of the Eastern Roman Empire.
Lead pipes, and using lead sugar to sweeten wine, certainly didn't help. The use of lead in Europe declined enough in the 8th century for the difference to be noticeable in sample cores from the Greenland ice cap.
If you're worried about lead, and drink alcohol, don't use cut crystal decanters for your wine or liqueurs, alcohol will pick up lead from the glass. Save those pretty glass things to use as vases, if you like.
Why 1453?
By SamWack
Fri, 01/19/2024 - 12:56pm
Even your lecturer's dates are somewhat arbitrary. Why stop at 1453? The Western Empire was definitively done by 476, when Romulus Augustulus, the last Emperor in the West, accepted the generous offer of Odoacer (a barbarian general of uncertain heritage) to retire to a villa in Campania. Odoacer became King of Italy. The Eastern Empire, which spoke Greek rather than Latin, continued for another millennium, but was it Roman? It claimed to be, but there have been other claimants. Long before the Eastern Empire was conquered, on Christmas day in 800, the ruler of a Germanic tribe named the Franks, Charlemagne, was consecrated as Emperor of the Romans, in Rome, by the Pope. That version of the Roman Empire survived in one form or another until it was finally euthanized by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1806.
In reality the Roman Empire died so gradually, of so many causes and in so many places, that there is no saying when or why it fell. It's obvious that the Holy Roman Empire that Napoleon declared defunct in 1806 was not the Roman Empire in any meaningful sense (neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire, as Voltaire said). Was the little Byzantine rump state of Constantine XI Palaiologos that Mehmet II conquered in 1453, which by that point did not even rule Greece, let alone Italy, any more Roman than the Holy Roman Empire?
Please delete this post
By ScottB
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 7:10pm
Double-post due to trying to use an emoji...
Also good
By ScottB
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 7:11pm
Using your and you're correctly ;)
Blowtorch?
By Rob
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 7:24pm
Blowtorch?
Silly people.
Pre-treat the pipes to keep them from freezing. Frank's Red-hot Sauce works well. In fact, I use that **** on everything!
Pipes Frozen, What Now?
By Username Unknown
Thu, 01/18/2024 - 9:13pm
What now? Let me tell you what now...
Imma call a couple of hard, pipe-hittin' dummies to go to work on the homes here with a pair of pliers and a blow torch.
You hear me talking, hillbilly pipe?! I ain't through with you by a goddamn sight. Imma get medieval on yo' ass.
Only a couple?
By fungwah
Fri, 01/19/2024 - 10:57am
Everyone knows the best plumbers come in groups of three, each with their own distinctive hairstyle.
Had to stay true
By Username Unknown
Fri, 01/19/2024 - 1:50pm
That's the movie quote so I had to stay as close as possible minus the actual foul language used in the movie.
Oh, a wise guy, eh?
By fungwah
Fri, 01/19/2024 - 4:30pm
Nyuk Nyuk Nyuk!
Add comment