THE END IS NEAR!!!! THE END IS NEAR!!!! THE END IS NEAR!!!!
Ok maybe it’s just the dawn of winter, but even so there are a few things that you as a homeowner should do before the deep freeze sets in or it may feel like Armageddon and as the Actor Sean Patrick Flanery said, Do something today your future self will thank you for.
Blaine here for Guardian Plumbing and Heating. Excited to bring you our another Episode of the Guardian Angle. These blogs are for you, our customers. They are not intended to be heavy, technical, install your own equipment tutorials, but alternatively, easy to understand tips about things that most people can do to protect their homes and increase the life of all their Plumbing and heating equipment.
We have all looked back and thought, I sure could have done that differently. Well at least I have. Often a little bit of foresight or if someone had just given us a little bit of information we could have saved ourselves a whole bunch of hurt. Like when Ethan trusted Hailey to give him a ride on the spinny chair at the park
No children were permanently harmed in the making of this video. My wife Elisa might kill ME for releasing it though!
After plumbing for over 30 years, one of the most common mistakes I’ve seen made by homeowners is forgetting to remove the hose from their outside tap. Many people assume incorrectly that because the valve is referred to as a Frost Free Hydrant, that they don’t need to worry about them. Let me explain how these handy devices work and why leaving a hose on can be so disastrous.
The Frost-free Hydrant was designed in such a way that when you close the handle it has a long shaft that closes the tap 12” back inside your house where it is warm. When installed correctly the water that could potentially freeze is able to quickly drain out and thereby protect the faucet from freezing. The issue that happens when you leave your hose on, is that when you turn off the tap, there is no where for the water to drain away, allowing the water to remain in the pipe, as the water freezes it begins to expand and eventually will blow out the side of the hydrant.
Most of the time when it does freeze and blow out the side, the water is turned off, so you won’t see the problem right away. But what ends up happening is, come springtime, you are outside and you hook up your hose to water your beautiful garden and unbeknownst to you the water is spraying out the hole in the side of the faucet and into your basement and since your outside enjoying the beautiful spring day, it floods and you don’t have a clue.
Some older homes may have an outside tap that looks like this. These do not drain out and need to be shut off on the inside of the home with the outside tap left open to let the water drain out. A lot less common, but we still see them out there.
Now the best thing that you can do is come September 1st, start removing the hoses from your outside faucets. Maybe even go into your phone’s calendar and make an alert right now “ Take hose off of tap” for Sept 1st. If you have a hose reel, put on a quick connect to make it easy to remove and less of a hassle.
This may seem so simple, but you wouldn’t believe how many Frost Free Hydrants we replace every spring that could have easily been avoided if the hose had just been removed earlier in the season. While we’re chatting here, don’t forget to blow out your underground sprinklers and remove the hose from your sump pump.
Here at Guardian Our top priority is building trust and integrity through lifetime partnerships that meet our customers needs. This is accomplished through a WOW experience for our customers consisting of honesty and fairness, exceptional technical knowledge, reliable, efficient products and a commitment to excellence. One of the key ways we fulfill this mission is through the Guardian Protection Plan our protection plan includes Annual Maintenance included, 20% Discount on repairs, 24 Hour Priority Service and and industry leading Lifetime Warranty on Recommended Repairs.
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And that’s how we saw things today from the Guardian Angle!