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2020-21 Winter weather; bring it on

Parliament

By Parliament
in Daily Texan

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SubliminalHorn
SubliminalHorn

Power back on. 109 hours. I almost want to cry a little 

Machinator
Machinator
BradInATX
BradInATX

I've actually been turning my heat up a degree every time a new Surly member loses power on this thread. It's a nice balmy 94 in here.

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hookemATL

hookemATL 12228

Posted
Posted
Just now, NorthLoop said:

All you people running your outside faucets, where is the water going? Just making a giant ice sheet in the yard?

My porch faucet directs to the middle of the yard. We will see how much in the morning and go from there. My side/garage attached faucet empties to a stone/gravel pad where I keep my trash cans. Again, worry about the ice flow in the morning. 

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J-Mart

J-Mart 60

Posted
Posted
7 minutes ago, Paper_jam said:

The temperature in my unheated but attached garage is right about 39 degrees now, I've never seen it this low. I have a hose spigot on the outside wall of the garage and the warmth of the garage interior is the only thing keeping it from freezing (it's wrapped and covered, but still).  If the garage gets much colder I'm thinking of propping the house-->garage door open and blowing some warm house air in there. It would be an energy efficiency holocaust, though, to try to treat the garage as conditioned/heated space...

 

 

I have the exact setup and had the same thoughts. Wish I had a space heater I could put in the garage near the area of the outdoor spigot. 

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washparkhorn

washparkhorn 9967

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

I knew my drip had failed last night and I spent the whole time just tossing and turning.  Horrible night's sleep, even though I knew it wasn't yet cold enough to be a big problem.  Ran a power cord this morning and took a hair dryer to both spigots, and voila (wallah!) flow ensued.

Now I'm obsessed with making sure it doesn't freeze again.  I'll be trudging around my yard every 2-3 hours for sure.  If anyone hears tomorrow about a dude who slipped and cracked his skull open, subsequently freezing to death, that will be me.

Team Flow.

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jimmyjazz

jimmyjazz 46969

Posted
Posted
9 minutes ago, Paper_jam said:

The temperature in my unheated but attached garage is right about 39 degrees now, I've never seen it this low. I have a hose spigot on the outside wall of the garage and the warmth of the garage interior is the only thing keeping it from freezing (it's wrapped and covered, but still).  If the garage gets much colder I'm thinking of propping the house-->garage door open and blowing some warm house air in there. It would be an energy efficiency holocaust, though, to try to treat the garage as conditioned/heated space...

Same here.  Garage is currently at 42 F.  I would have zero qualms opening the door to the house to heat the garage, and I may do it later on, but my propane supply is dropping.  It's one big balancing act.

I don't think I'll run out of propane until Thursday or so, at which point I start burning shit in the fireplace if I have to (starting with my somewhat meager supply of firewood).  I am not at all interested in having burst pipes.

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Guest Lobo

Guest Lobo

Posted
Posted

All my mirrors are tied up in overseas deals, but I like that idea.  the ext. faucet in our SW corner of the lot could cause serious trouble.  I'm having to run the space heater on the inside of the garage every few horus.

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HOOKEM4

HOOKEM4 5151

Posted
Posted
10 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

If we lose power for more than two hours, I'm hopping on Team TEAR THE COVERING OFF OF THE OUTDOOR FAUCETS AND RUN THEM PRETTY HARD really fucking fast.

This is the team I am rolling with. I have a comical level of insulation on the faucets so it will be a shitshow trying to take it all off at midnight in a blizzard while 15 fingers deep in whiskey. 

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washparkhorn

washparkhorn 9967

Posted
Posted
Just now, jimmyjazz said:

Same here.  Garage is currently at 42 F.  I would have zero qualms opening the door to the house to heat the garage, and I may do it later on, but my propane supply is dropping.  It's one big balancing act.

I don't think I'll run out of propane until Thursday or so, at which point I start burning shit in the fireplace if I have to (starting with my somewhat meager supply of firewood).  I am not at all interested in having burst pipes.

It's your cave. You know it better than anyone.

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ztejas

ztejas 44114

Posted
Posted
6 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

I knew my drip had failed last night and I spent the whole time just tossing and turning.  Horrible night's sleep, even though I knew it wasn't yet cold enough to be a big problem.  Ran a power cord this morning and took a hair dryer to both spigots, and voila (wallah!) flow ensued.

Now I'm obsessed with making sure it doesn't freeze again.  I'll be trudging around my yard every 2-3 hours for sure.  If anyone hears tomorrow about a dude who slipped and cracked his skull open, subsequently freezing to death, that will be me.

Put on your bicycle helmet and a life preserver. If no life preserver available - some wet wings or a waist-wraparound inflatable will do in a pinch. 

Rape whistle of course optional as well depending on your confidence level for said middle of the night outdoor treks.

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1978horn

1978horn 904

Posted
Posted
Did anyone else just turn off their water entirely? I purged all of our lines, but now I'm not sure where the family is gonna take a shit. LOL.


I just turned mine off on the provider side. I went to check the outdoor bibs and both were frozen. I thawed with hair dryer and got them running.

Said fuck it and filled the biggest tub for flush water and filled up a bunch of bottles, pitchers and growlers for drinking water.

Just turned off the water and and drained it all. Now wondering if the process for turning it back on is any different from normal?

Also, I’m in a neighborhood that is on community propane tank farms. There are a couple throughout the development and a company is supposed to keep them full. They sent an email asking everyone to conserve because they can’t get trucks in to fill.

The reason that some neighborhoods do this is there is no infrastructure and the gas companies don’t want to pay all the infrastructure costs to bills out. The propane company comes in builds it out and signs a decades long service contract that is usually pretty hard to break.
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jimmyjazz

jimmyjazz 46969

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, ztejas said:

Put on your bicycle helmet and a life preserver. If no life preserver available - some wet wings or a waist-wraparound inflatable will do in a pinch. 

Rape whistle of course optional as well depending on your confidence level for said middle of the night outdoor treks.

I like the way you think, cap'n.  I do have some pool noodles.

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atomheartbevo

atomheartbevo 90544

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, HOOKEM4 said:

This is the team I am rolling with. I have a comical level of insulation on the faucets so it will be a shitshow trying to take it all off at midnight in a blizzard while 15 fingers deep in whiskey. 

If you fall and knock yourself unconscious, hopefully it's before you get the faucet going, because you'll make one helluva human popsicle as it is, and if the water is flowing,  finding somebody completely covered in ice is not a pretty sight.

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Gardner Barnes

Gardner Barnes 1569

Posted
Posted
I knew my drip had failed last night and I spent the whole time just tossing and turning.  Horrible night's sleep, even though I knew it wasn't yet cold enough to be a big problem.  Ran a power cord this morning and took a hair dryer to both spigots, and voila (wallah!) flow ensued.
Now I'm obsessed with making sure it doesn't freeze again.  I'll be trudging around my yard every 2-3 hours for sure.  If anyone hears tomorrow about a dude who slipped and cracked his skull open, subsequently freezing to death, that will be me.

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atomheartbevo

atomheartbevo 90544

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, ChickenSandwich said:

All of this pipe fear, say pipes freeze and burst. What kind of damage we looking at here?  Plumbing?  Assume no water damage due to said freeze etc. huge pain in the ass?

Well, anecdotal from friends (two different families) having it happen to them a few major winter storms ago in Austin, but their pipes burst inside the walls of the house.  It wasn't some "knock the faucet off and a fountain of water majestically freezes in mid-flow from the wall", it was "burst inside of the wall and the water redirected to the interior of the house".  And one family was out of town when it happened, so it was coming out of the doors by the time it was discovered.

Of course, their situations were not the same as ours - they both had the heat down, and in one case, the pipe ran a few feet along the interior of an outside wall - one of those cheap suburban quickies that was probably not insulated well.  The other was not dripping very fast, and had not wrapped the pipe, and it was in a location that was not easily reached by regular air circulation.

If you can get to the water cutoff quickly, you'll be mopping/wet vaccing shit up, have to probably replace some drywall or whatever, dry everything out.

Basically, ask the Houston crew what happens when they get an inch or two of water inside from a storm or hurricane.

But if you can get to the water cutoff quickly, you'll probably be wondering why you didn't just cut the water in the first place. 

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Biff Tannen

Biff Tannen 46060

Posted
Posted
2 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Well, anecdotal from friends (two different families) having it happen to them a few major winter storms ago in Austin, but their pipes burst inside the walls of the house.  It wasn't some "knock the faucet off and a fountain of water majestically freezes in mid-flow from the wall", it was "burst inside of the wall and the water redirected to the interior of the house".  And one family was out of town when it happened, so it was coming out of the doors by the time it was discovered.

Of course, their situations were not the same as ours - they both had the heat down, and in one case, the pipe ran a few feet along the interior of an outside wall - one of those cheap suburban quickies that was probably not insulated well.  The other was not dripping very fast, and had not wrapped the pipe, and it was in a location that was not easily reached by regular air circulation.

If you can get to the water cutoff quickly, you'll be mopping/wet vaccing shit up, have to probably replace some drywall or whatever, dry everything out.

Basically, ask the Houston crew what happens when they get an inch or two of water inside from a storm or hurricane.

But if you can get to the water cutoff quickly, you'll probably be wondering why you didn't just cut the water in the first place. 

Don’t tell me these things. Not now man. 

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jimmyjazz

jimmyjazz 46969

Posted
Posted
2 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

If you can get to the water cutoff quickly, you'll be mopping/wet vaccing shit up, have to probably replace some drywall or whatever, dry everything out.

Basically, ask the Houston crew what happens when they get an inch or two of water inside from a storm or hurricane.

My last house was below the peak of Cat Mountain (78731).  One of those giant Gulf rainbombs led to water building up in the back yard -- overnight -- and seeping in at the top of the slab.  Completely destroyed over 2,000 sf of hardwood flooring.  Total bill (flooring, drywall, remediation) was $18K.  It.  Fucking.  Sucked.

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MNLonghornFUKM

MNLonghornFUKM 8963

Posted
Posted
All of this pipe fear, say pipes freeze and burst. What kind of damage we looking at here?  Plumbing?  Assume no water damage due to said freeze etc. huge pain in the ass?

the waters gonna thaw eventually. Sheetrock damage, remove and dry out the studs so mold doesn’t form. Water damage is about the absolute worst thing ever
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texhorn

texhorn 356

Posted
Posted

Went out to check my hose bibs around dark and 3 out of 4 were frozen. Quick hit with the blow dryer and 2/3 were operational again in no time. Wrapped the fuck out of them and built shelters around them. Been dropping my faucets inside like a mother since Friday night.

The one that wouldn’t unfreeze is supplied by a line that runs in the attic above the garage (which is uninsulated) into my spray foam sealed attic above the rest of the house. Hit it with the laser thermometer in the attic above the garage and the pipe wrap was showing 16. I guess I’m just hoping the pex can handle it at this point. Fuck.

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jimmyjazz

jimmyjazz 46969

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, texhorn said:

Went out to check my hose bibs around dark and 3 out of 4 were frozen. Quick hit with the blow dryer and 2/3 were operational again in no time. Wrapped the fuck out of them and built shelters around them. Been dropping my faucets inside like a mother since Friday night.

The one that wouldn’t unfreeze is supplied by a line that runs in the attic above the garage (which is uninsulated) into my spray foam sealed attic above the rest of the house. Hit it with the laser thermometer in the attic above the garage and the pipe wrap was showing 16. I guess I’m just hoping the pex can handle it at this point. Fuck.

PEX is really flexible.  I think it can handle the mild volume increase from water -> ice.

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Orange&White

Orange&White 5563

Posted
Posted
18 minutes ago, ztejas said:

Put on your bicycle helmet and a life preserver. If no life preserver available - some wet wings or a waist-wraparound inflatable will do in a pinch. 

Rape whistle of course optional as well depending on your confidence level for said middle of the night outdoor treks.

Don’t forget to change your password also.

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Guest Lobo

Guest Lobo

Posted
Posted
4 minutes ago, vicerous said:

Worth replacing towels inside spigot covers with warm ones from the dryer? Not sure if that's worth the trouble or if I just need to not worry so fucking much. 

We did it awhile ago just for shits 'n grins.  Doesn't make a huge difference but you feel productive.  We're not gonna run the W/D from now until Wednesday to keep pressure off the grid.  Real reason I did it was just to check on all the 4 faucets and see the snow fall.  It's not great for snowmen yet, but I think it'll get there by morning.  I hope so because one of the only reasons I'm staying up to heat parts of the attic and ext. walls 'n shit is to give the kids a fun morning in the snow.  

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