Part of preparing for winter includes maintenance to prepare your plumbing, gutters, pipes, and other water systems. Performing these tasks before it starts freezing up outside is important! Waiting until the last minute is a frosty mess when it comes to winter preparation.
If you don’t do outdoor faucets maintenance before winter, your pipes could freeze and cause costly damage.
An often neglected part of winter preparation is outdoor faucets. Quickest to freeze, and exposed to the roughest elements, maintenance on them before the first snow is imperative. Let’s review how we can get your outdoor faucets ready for a chilly Baltimore winter.
How-To: Prepare Outdoor Faucets for Winter
Indoor pipes are shielded from outside weather, so they aren’t subject to freezing like outdoor faucets and pipes. This means you need to prepare them for winter to ensure they don’t freeze and cause problems. It only takes about 30 minutes to maintenance your outdoor faucets before winter comes.
Complete the following steps to prevent your outdoor faucets, hoses, and pipes from freezing this winter:
- Find the inside shutoff valves. For every outside faucet you have, there is a separate inside shutoff valve. They will also contain a cap used to drain excess water that may be sitting in the pipe to the outside faucet.
- Turn off water to the outside. You want to do this by turning the handles clockwise. This will shut off the water to the outside.
- Drain all excess water. First, you want to open the outside faucets to drain any excess water that may be sitting there. This is a very important step, because just turning off the water alone will NOT do the job! Any leftover water that can freeze will cause serious problems. To do this, open the drain cap with pliers, and make sure you have something to catch the excess water that drains out—such as a bucket.
- Repeat the process for all outdoor faucets. If you have more than one, the process needs to be done for each outdoor faucet you have.
- Consider insulated covers. This isn’t a necessary step, but it can provide added protection for your outdoor faucets. They are useful if you’d like a little extra protection.
ServiceMaster of Baltimore Deals with Water Damage
In the event of a burst pipe or some other form of water damage, ServiceMaster of Baltimore is ready to help with certified licensed restoration technicians available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.
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With over 57 years of experience in helping business owners and homeowners, like you, with water damage restoration, we are the best choice for the job. We maintain a high standard of morals, values, and customer service and handle every job with the utmost care, speed, and effectiveness.
If you have questions about outdoor faucets and winter maintenance, give us a call at (410) 498-8030 to speak with a knowledgeable professional.
