I am totally bummed that this cold will likely kill two small citrus trees and a passionfruit vine that I've planted since Uri. Hopefully the root of the passionfruit vine will survive. Not too worried about power outages since I've got a small generator that can power my natural gas furnace after Uri.
Is there any downside to turning off your water and draining your pipes overnight then turning it back on during the day time, then repeating every night until the hard freeze is over? I've seen where it is recommended to turn off your water during the entire duration of the freeze, I was just wondering if doing it nightly would be ok and you can protect your pipes without living like a caveman for 3 days.
No downside. The water in the pipe shouldn't freeze during the day this time. The air temperature during the day is only slightly below freezing and Attic temperature should be well above freezing with the sun. Also, when you drain the pipes in the house overnight, make sure you're draining as much water out as possible. If you have any faucets along an exterior wall, I'd make sure to not only drain from the faucets, but also drain from the valve inside the cabinet. Draining from the valve will remove the water in the pipe that's at a lower height than the faucet.
This is what I do. My dad is planning to have the water off Thursday night until mid-day Saturday since Friday's temps may stay in the 20s all day. I might do the same. I sure as hell ain't going to be sweating so I can go without a shower on Friday.
I think I’m going to do this. Haven’t heard of the downside other than wandering outside in the cold to turn it back on.
I'm just going to drip my faucets, cover the outside ones, turn off the valve to the sprinklers, and shut down/drain the pool equipment. Last time during the big freeze, running the pool to keep the water flowing turned into a disaster where a plastic part broke above ground (push-pull valve) under the extreme cold temps and water leaked everywhere. I'm not trying that again because that's money out the pocket. My neighbor tried to run his pool through the big freeze and he had a similar problem. His above ground plumbing failed and it cost him several hundred dollars putting it back together along with delays because couldn't get parts as all the other pool owners were fixing similar issues. It's just easier to drain it imo and shut it down. I'll cover the equipment with some towels and a tarp (it's going to be a dry front). I also float some milk jugs in the spa, pool, and skimmer to help prevent ice pressure problems (like cracking tiles) since it will freeze over. Don't know if it really works, though? No problems when I did it last big freeze.
we just had 18" of snow over night, the easy part was to shovle my driveway and my elder neighbor driveway, the hard part is watching if the giant tree's branches over my roof can hold on https://ibb.co/zbGXPYT
This assumes all the pipes are installed such that water drains out of pipes in the attic and exterior walls. Not sure if this is a valid concern or not, but would be the only potential downside.
I got though Uri by letting the faucets trickle and wrapped my outside spigots with old t shirts and duct tape. The only houses that had issues around me were those with water lines that go to detached/unfinished/un insulated garages.
If you got grass clippings, leaf litter or wood chips, mulch at least 3" high around the root system of the passion vine and water it before the freeze.
Thank you for the link! Watering the plants is a new tip that we haven't thought of before. Fingers crossed!
We made it through Uri relatively unscathed aside from losing several palms in the backyard. I think I'm just going to wrap exposed pipes outside, drip faucets and leave cabinet doors open inside and hope for the best. I'm going to throw a blanket over my pool equipment and leave the pump running starting Thursday afternoon until maybe Saturday.
