Winter Plumbing Maintenance

The winter season can be particularly hard on our home plumbing. Extreme temperatures and holiday parties with many guests can take a toll on the plumbing. With big holiday meals, grease and food can get in the kitchen drain and disposal and wreak havoc. Ice cold temperatures can cause pipes to freeze. There are some simple steps we can take each year to make sure our plumbing is well maintained through the winter months. First, we all enjoy hosting guests and having parties during the winter holidays. While these gatherings can be a lot of fun they can also cause big problems for our plumbing. There are some simple steps you can take to take care fo your plumbing if you are planning on hosting guests this holiday season. You should avoid pouring any liquid fats down the drain because they will solidify and create clogs. These clogs in our pipes can cause big headaches and it’s simple to collect any liquid fats in a container and throw them away in the trash. Also, you should run cold water down the drain before and after disposer use to clean out waste. When you use your disposer you think whatever you have put in there is chopped up and gone but you need to run the water before and after to ensure it’s not simply sitting in the disposer. Also, you should not put hard to grind foods into the disposer. It can be tempting to just dump everything in there and turn on the disposer but you should be careful to avoid putting hard to grind foods in that will make your disposer work hard or potentially break. If you are hosting overnight guests during the winter season it can be additional strain on your plumbing that your plumbing is not used to. You and your guests should consider spreading out showers over the course of the day instead of everyone trying to take showers all at once. To prepare shower heads for your guests and ensure they are having an enjoyable shower that doesn’t involve clogged shower heads, you should soak you shower heads in vinegar overnight. After soaking shower heads scrub any remaining residue off. Not only will this improve the overall appearance of your shower but it will also improve water flow which will help keep your plumbing functioning properly. When temperatures drop pipes can freeze and that can mean big problems. Use a foam insulation or padding sleeves to protect pipes from freezing. You can save yourself big headaches by simply protecting your pipes each year. You should also run water through all valves periodically throughout the winter, even if typically unused. This will also help prevent any freezing that could occur. These tips are simple lifestyle changes and cost you little to nothing but can save you big this winter. By maintaining your plumbing with each changing season you will add life to your plumbing and ensure that you don’t have to suffer big costly repairs at inconvenient times.]]>