RICHMOND, Va. (WWBT) – Winter has brought extremely cold temperatures to central Virginia, and we’re on your side, helping you with tips to avoid fronting a steep bill for freezing pipes.
Often times, the go-to remedy is to leave your water dripping, but you may not know, there are many other precautions you should take. Experts say the number one tip is knowing where your outside water main shut off is.
“The outside main water shutoff is indicated by light blue cap and one of these keys that you can pick up at Lowe’s or Home Depot, at about seven bucks. But with this key, if something does happen, you’ll be able to easily put it on this valve and turn your water off,” Anytime Plumbing plumber Illya Davis said.
Davis says that 99% of the time, he experiences freezing pipes from the wind chill factor rather than the temperature.
“As soon as you can, you need to be able to go into this crawlspace during the daylight time and then close this door or pull it shut behind you and then examine it around the whole crawl space to see if there’s any light that’s coming in. Any light that’s coming in that’s indicating that wind chill factor could be able to go through there,” David said.
“Make sure that you go around and you close all of your crawl space vents,” Davis said.
Anytime Plumbing says it’s important to take these precautions because freezing pipes can cost you big money. In Richmond, Davis says the average price is $320 dollars for the first break and another $180 for every additional one.
“Check your siding, it goes around and see if it’s any that’s missing or it has big gaps in it. Those are areas where that windshield factor that could be able to come through,” Davis
Davis says any small gap can cause issues, so if you do have one, be sure close it up.
“Just make sure that there’s no gap if you can’t see it from the inside, a gap around that hose bib, the actual bib, the metal of the bib is thicker than the piping that’s behind it. So, if there’s a gap between there, make sure you put some caulking around that,” Davis said.
After you do all of those tips, Davis says make sure to open up your kitchen cabinets to allow warm air to get to the pipes.
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