Winter seems to have decided to stick around for a while. Its been genuinely cold the last few days and the evenings have been pretty darn nippy. Its times like these I like to wargame in my head what I would do if the power (and heat) went out. See, if you lose power in the summer, it’s an inconvenience, but ny and large it won’t kill you. Oh, you’ll sweat at night without air conditioning, and you’ll have to toss out your freezer, but otherwise it’s just not a big deal. Winter, on the other hand, will mess you up, homie.
The biggest worry I have isn’t freezing to death. A buncha food and a good stack of blankets will prevent that. My concern is damage to my humble abode. Biggest danger is the pipes freezing and bursting. The obvious solution would be to turn off the main supply, open the basement tap, open the tap at the high point of the house, and let everything drain. Some folks pour antifreeze or other non-freeze liquids down the drains to keep the residual liquids in the traps from freezing.
Me, I’m more inclined to just keep the house at a balmy 50-degrees or so. Not too hard with a couple kerosene heaters. Craigslist is a boon for finding $20 new-in-box kerosene heaters in the summer. Between a couple heaters, all the kerosene I’ve stored, and isolating various parts of the house, I think I could keep things going for a few weeks. Any longer than that and there are bigger problems going on than just frozen pipes.
Not sure how Pex responds to getting frozen. It seems like it might be more resilient to the problem than traditional pipes would be. Certainly it has a bunch of other tings going for it, I wonder if a heightened resistance to freeze-induced bursting is one of them.
Anyway, its probably ten degrees out right now and I’m quite pleased to be sitting in my warm house. But, I know nothing lasts forever and that something you like can change like that *snaps fingers*…so, kerosene….lots of it.
Next house, though….its gonna be wood heat, oil heat, propane heat….cover all the bases.
Each house I have owned I have put a ventless natural gas (in the city) or propane heater in the basement. Power goes out in the winter we fire it up and with old ballon construction it keeps pipes from freezing. Our 2500 square foot house was without power for 3 days and it stayed 50 degrees inside. They are cheap too.
Just recognized your name – you wrote the survivalblog article? Good luck!
Yes I did and Thank You. Hope you enjoyed it.
“Not sure how Pex responds to getting frozen.”
From what I hear, very well. It’s quite resilient below freezing, generally won’t burst, and had a molecular ‘memory’ such that it’ll return to its original shape once it thaws. My house’s plumbing is 98% PEX.
If your current house has a fireplace, get a wood burning insert for it. They are supposed to be fairly efficient.
I wonder if there is a pellet stove insert for a fireplace? The drawback to them is they only function with pellets. My sister had a pellet stove, and had to order by the ton to get deliveries. (truck had to drive through a river, and if there was bad weather it wasn’t happening)(the problems with schlepping large bags of pellets over the suspension bridge from parking to the house is why they switched to deliveries)
I know that there are pellet inserts for fireplaces, however all of the pellet stoves I am familiar with require electricity to feed the pellets, so would not be useful in a power outage.
All of the fireplace inserts I have experience with also require a blower to get much warmth from them; if you want to be able to warm with no electric, I suggest a wood stove or a ventless NG/ LP heater that also does not require electricity.
An insert on a fireplace is great if you have electricity for the internal fan to distribute the warm air. Otherwise, not so much.
I’d recommend a woodstove. It puts out lots of heat, with or without electricity, is simple in operation, and can heat water or cook a meal.
In the winter of 2000, we had a huge ice storm which took down every power line in a 20 mile circle. We were without power for 24 days straight. Got power back, then a new ice storm lead to another ten days without power. That will really test your preparations. I had a generator but it couldn’t run the furnace. Make sure you have way more firewood split and stacked (preferably under cover) than you think you need for the winter. It will keep till next year if not used.
Also, a Coleman lantern puts out a surprising amount of heat when sitting on the kitchen table.
I have burned wood for forty years in my house. Yep been here for awhile. Changed out my old stove in 2000 to one of the types that use a catalyst reburn system. Prior to that I did have a kerosene heater but no longer have the need. Last year I used nine face cord of wood during a normal Michigan winter. This year has been milder wth much less snow. I have a nice New Englander stove and recommend them highly. Only thing I have replaced is the blower unit. To note, I always have more wood on hand than I need. So far I am on track to burn the same as last year. I use a face cord every three weeks. Of course the type of wood matters. I use hardwood. Mostly red oak, white oak, cherry and ash which thanks to the Ash borer infestation here we have lots of it.
Pex is supposed to be burst proof. From personal experience, it is not burst proof. The upside though is that is considerably easier to repair than PVC.
Would you say it is more burst resistant?
I heard it’ll withstand 500psi, but never tested that myself.
pex is much more resistant to bursting than PVC or ABS, or any of the other options really. It’s also really easy to repair (if you have access to the runs) I used to be a copper pipe purist, but pex is way better.
But it is not invulnerable, still, it would have to get pretty dang cold to burst it.
The question about PEXx was an interesting one. I gave my bro-in-law a call since he works as a steam fitter/plumber and asked him. His short answer was that PEX pipe is very freeze-damage resistant. When the water inside freezes, the PEX pipe will expand but shouldn’t burst. Then when the water thaws. the PEX will contract to its original shape.One other thing he said was that while the PEX pipe will not burst, the frozen water will block the flow. .
I would imagine the weak spot would be at the manifold or other connection points.
In Houston, the problem with pex is flooding damage to your home after the rodents gnaw thru it.
I’ve got a buddy who had his house re-plumbed from iron to PEX and has had floods twice since. There is something in or on the pex that the mice and rats love. They chew thru and you’ve got a flood.
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My nephew who is a plumber told me that PEX can expand up to 40% its size. Since water doesn’t expand that much I would say that it is burst proof but having had some just installed in an addition the connections etc (like Commander Zero pointed out) are not PEX and would be a weak spot.