PREPARING YOUR HOME AGAINST WINTER RISKS
Freezing pipes, ice damming and more can be difficult and costly to correct
The winter season can hit your home hard. But by planning ahead, you can reduce the risk of taking on avoidable damage that could give you a major headache — and an expensive one.
ICE DAMMING
Ice damming can cause a lot of damage to your home. It can rip off the eavestroughs, loosen roof shingles or even back up into your home and cause internal damage.
Ice dams are created when your roof has improper ventilation. When the attic isn’t ventilated properly, heat will collect melting snow on the roof. The water will then run down the slope, where it will freeze on the eavestrough and form a dam.
This will cause the warm meltwater still flowing to back up along the roof, seep into the house and cause damage.
The best way to prevent ice damming is to stop it from the source: your attic. Make sure the space is properly sealed, ventilated and insulated.
Insulation levels are measured by their R-value. The R-value measures the ability for an insulating material to resist heat flow. Higher R-values indicate a larger insulating power. The recommended level for most attics is R-38, which is about 10 to 14 inches (25 to 35.5 cm) of insulation, depending on your insulation type.
Remember, your attic is a cold zone and it should be the same temperature as the outside. Without that proper insulation, heat will escape from the indoors, and the cold air will blow in from the outdoors.
FROZEN PIPES
When water freezes, it expands. This puts a large amount of pressure on the container holding it — and that includes your pipes. Frozen pipes can break, which can lead to flooding in your home.
But because the pipes are already frozen, you might not know there’s been a break until you come home one day after a thaw and find a flooded house.
What’s one sign you could have frozen pipes? Well, the first sign will probably be that you don’t have any flow from one faucet or fixture — such as a shower head — in your home, but the rest still work fine.
If you have one frozen pipe, others in the same area are vulnerable to freezing as well. Allow a little bit of water to drip from the faucet and flush the toilets every so often to keep water moving.
The best way to solve a frozen pipe issue is to prevent it from freezing in the first place. Wrapping inside pipes in insulation material — and depending on the material of the pipes, this insulation can take different forms — and ensuring that exterior plumbing lines have been drained.
Frozen pipes are never a do-ityourself job. Always, always call in a licensed plumber to fix the problem.
FIREPLACE AND CHIMNEY SAFETY
Did you have a specialized inspector take a look at your fireplace before you moved in? If you didn’t, you will want to hold off on lighting your first fire until you do. Have a licensed fireplace inspector come in and see if it’s usable and safe — this is especially true with wood-burning fireplaces. But even your gas fireplace should be checked yearly by a licensed gas technician. A gas fireplace working improperly can lead to carbon monoxide poisoning — or worse — death.
You will need to have your chimney cleaned and inspected yearly to ensure the flue is intact. Even a small fracture can expand into larger cracks, allowing toxic fumes to seep in. A damaged flue can also allow creosote to build up in wood-burning fireplaces.
Creosote, as well as soot, make your fireplace much more susceptible to a chimney fire. Chimney fires can spread to the rest of your home in minutes. Place a gate in front of a wood-burning fireplace to keep popping embers in and children out. And always ensure the fire is completely out before going to bed.
Before the season really hits, allow yourself plenty of time to take care of any last-minute projects to protect your home against the elements of the season.
What’s one sign you could have frozen pipes? Well, the first sign will probably be that you don’t have any flow from one faucet or fixture.