We go to Florida for the winter and wonder what the problems might be with turning off the electric and water for the winter. We have lots of furniture in the house but wouldn't have any liquids. At times it gets below zero outside for a month or more.
2007-07-22 06:59:02 · 4 answers · asked by Kathleen D 1 in Home & Garden ➔ Maintenance & Repairs
I wouldn't recommend turning off the heat completely. First, even if you turn off the water there will still be some in the pipes. If this freezes and the pipe burst you'll be paying a lot more to fix this that the winter's heating bill. Second, most thing are made for indoor use. Freezing some plastics for example will make them brittle and if they are holding any weight or are very heavy themselves, they may crack. Also, the furniture in your house has some degree of moisture in them. Lamps can be effected by the cold very easily.
I would recommend turning off the water. This can do no harm and will save you some money. When you get back it may take a little while to get all of the air out of the pipes, but nothing bad in the long term. I would keep the heat somewhere around 50 degrees. This should be warm enough for all your property and possessions.
2007-07-22 07:13:31 · answer #1 · answered by chriss_p_baconn 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The water needs to be completely drained. But even at this, I don't recommend it. Should you have a damp spring, then the plaster could get damp, as well as furniture. This could cause problems in a couple of years. I would recommend shutting off and draining the water, but keeping the heat low, maybe 40 degrees. This should combat the moisture problems. Don't forget the bathrooms and sinks. You would need to put anti-freeze of some kind (like that for RV's in the tank and trap to prevent freezing there , as draining the pipes won't take care of this.
2007-07-22 14:25:37 · answer #2 · answered by RB 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
My mom and I had a house in Talkeetna Alaska that we never visited in the winter. It gets cold in Alaska, so in order to not have our pipes freeze and explode and flood our house, we gave our neighbor across the street a key and he came over every day and ran the water.
When he couldn't, we would go underneath the house and actually turn off the water.
2007-07-22 14:07:51 · answer #3 · answered by Britty 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I had a House in the Colorado mountains and it gets pretty cold up there, what i did was board up the windows and back door, shut water off at the main then opened one of the facts up a Little to let the water expand in the pipes t, after draing and that keeps pipes from bursting in case they pipes fez
2007-07-22 15:23:22 · answer #4 · answered by ja1johna 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋