linnea orlando
Jan 16, 2009, 02:00 PM
Hi, I live in a two story house and we put the heat down at night on second floor for sleeping. The temp was about 57 upstairas but was below zeero outside last night. Now the heating zone on that floor is not working and there is no water coming out of the spout in the upstasirs bathroom. There is water coming out of the sink and the toilet flushes though. What should I do?
L. Orlando
antipode12
Jan 18, 2009, 03:06 AM
Sounds like a frozen pipe to me. Happened to us 2 nights ago also. (We're in NY. 5 degrees F.)
The real trick to consider is whether there is also a pipe break from the freeze.
Here's what we did: the area that froze was behind a wall and in a ceiling (below). I first shut off the main valve (in case the pipe was burst and leaked when the freeze thawed.) I then opened the faucet that froze. Then I held a blow dryer to the exposed pipes nearest the freeze (underneath the sink). This took a while. It finally melted and a little water came out of the faucet.
In the basement ceiling (under the frozen sink above), I could now hear water. A pipe HAD burst. (Thankfully, the water main was now off.) I found the leaking area, cut the drywall away, and replaced the offending section of pipe. (You could also use waterproof epoxy patch.)
Important next step: I insulated the heck out of everything -- fiberglass in the ceiling and wall under the sink, GreatStuff in the cracks, polyethelyne on the pipes. I'm not having this happen again.