Never had a problem with mice and PEX. Been using it on projects for ten years . But I'm not surprised, I've seen mice eat a lot of strange things but mostly when following a draft to get somewhere. That's what mice do, they follow drafts, so make sure to draft stop all your holes. Mice will chew through Romex wire also.

Not a freeze but failed compression joint. Contractor installed new water heater(in attic) and saved me money by using a compression fitting. Fitting did not have a TEMPERATURE rating. We use a lot of hot water and turned the adjustment from A to C. Failed 4 days after install. He replaced and SOLDERED the new joint.

My dog's water bowl froze over last winter on our deck. Didn't cause major damage but she was thirsty until the afternoon sun came out.

I have a condo in Sun Valley Idaho and the insulation is horrible. The pipes froze recently but fortunately just caused a small leak. This was with the heat set at 50. Leaving your heat on doesn't really help because the pipes are on outside walls. They're saying I could rip out my walls and insulate the pipes. But it seems to me that wouldn't guarantee they are insulated the whole way (to floors above for example.) I think the condo association should remove all the condo siding and put foam insulation up before replacing the siding. If anybody else has had a similar experience dealing with a condo board on this, perhaps where they did go ahead and insulate the whole building, please let me know!

Wow, good thing they have triple-A !!

Christopher Boyd: lol. Just this morning she ditched the ice and refill dish with liquid water for the stray cats

Curt D'Onofrio, PEX is not that difficult to work with. You will faint at some of the connector and elbow prices though. I went to our plumbing shop and got some 'scraps' and wasted a few connectors learning to work with it before I got between the joists and got to it. It does 'bend' a bit and if you have plenty of space to do it in, you can very large radius your turns... some places it's best just to put an elbow in but you'll need very few. It comes in 'red' and 'blue' and you can color code your hot and cold which is nice. You will have to invest in some tools to work with it though.

Whoever did unto this place before me should have been keelhauled though. There were all these bends, pinches and weirdness; no wonder I had so many issues. What I do have installed and working is working wonderfully... I got rid of the *rock* in the plumbing and some weird stuff that was restricting things... Buy more than you need, at least my shop would take back goodly length pieces for credit... but I'm not returning any until I get through the kitchen re-set. I have two sinks, dishwasher, and ice maker to replumb yet. My washer and dryer no longer gurgle the kitchen and far bathroom sink and cause the far bathroom to stink of sewer gas...

At least I got to mess with this without having a burst one in the middle! My gospel is Insulate Insulate INSULATE!

I live in a mild climate (coastal Northern California), but I've had 35 y.o. copper pipes break due to highly acidic well water (5.5). We are changing all supply lines to Pex. The previous owner had already begun the conversion so I'm sure this breakage started quite a while ago. We also installed a pH neutralizer. Good news is that it is very easy to install Pex A. My son is doing all the plumbing and what we've done so far is working very well. Caution: rats will chew through Pex so you have to be sure there aren't any.

The first 3 years of our marriage my exhusband and I lived in a trailer. Cold Nebraska winters are very hard on water pipes in trailers. The pipes that lead from the ground to the hookup under the trailer needed electric tape and pipe insulation on them. Our home was an older one and the pipes from the back to the front of the trailer ran along the floor and were enclosed in a wooden box that ran the length of the trailer. The way our trailer was parked this was on the north. Every time the temperature dropped and the wind would blow our pipes would freeze. Despite what was said earlier leaving the faucets run does work but you also have to open up the doors under your sinks. You also have to have heat in the area. If you don't have any heat you can try opening your taps full blast. That may buy you some time.
I'm fortunate in all the times my pipes froze I've never had on break yet.
The worst I had to deal with was having the sewer line freeze while we were in the trailer. Now that was gross!

PEX isn't legal in our area...neither is Romex.

Copper supply lines and electric in conduit are required here.

I've never heard of the proper Romex not being legal (there are some special for 'moisture locations' and for burying but...)

I guess you go with whatever is legal. Here Romex and PEX are legal. Check first for local required code before starting.

Ah, Linda, I took a peek. I know where Elgin is, I had a college dorm friend from there. I don't think I will be moving that far north again but good thing to point out.

Linda & okdokegal: Thanks for the heads up about local code. Will have to check into ours about what's allowed material for water pipes.

That first pic has been floating around the 'net forever, they must have been away on vacation and came home to that party. I had a pipe burst in the garage, the neighbors discovered before me and started banging on the door at 6am. It was in the 20's, but that was normal in Jan. Had to get a plumber out and eventually I dry-walled the hole.

Vancouver, BC will have the occasional below freezing days and nights, and in 2009, while on holiday my next-door neighbour noticed that our basement windows had frost on them. Having a key for emergencies, she entered the house and found herself in 4 inches of water in the basement. She contacted us and since we were due home in 2 days, we contacted the insurance company and they sent out a restoration company for the day we returned. The restoration company did a great job and went through all of our boxes that had been sitting in the basement since we had moved in 10 years earlier. We had often talked about having a garage sale but never got around to it.

The restoration company went through all of the boxes and determined what was salvageable and what wasn't. We just stood by as they went through EVERY box.. After all the boxes were gone through, they removed the drywall and carpeting in the basement. Their plan was to replace the drywall as it had been, and replace the carpeting. I saw this as an opportunity to renovate a useless basement and asked if we could have the money instead of the new drywall and carpeting so we could renovate the basement. No problem! In the end, we got rid of a bunch of stuff that we should've done years earlier - at its replacement value rather than garage sale prices, and completely renovated the basement to have an income-generating suite.

This is one of those rare occasions where we benefited greatly from a potential disaster! We included an interior water shut-off valve in the renos so it won't happen again!

I am in Southern Calif. We have frozen water in small shapes in our freezer. That's about as close as we get to anything frozen.

I owned several mobile homes and had those rented out. A renter thought it would be fine to leave for the weekend and allow the fuel oil for the furnace to run out since he wouldn't be there. This in the dead of winter, in Northern Minnesota with below zero temps caused an entire freezing of the home. A complete re-plumbing was needed, and said tenant was sent packing.

Enjoying an evening cocktail in Baja when I get notified by tenant of our West Coast home in BC that pipe burst in crawl space over garage & water gushing into garage & down driveway!
Renter acted fast & rescued belongings, plumber called to cap off pipe, then I contacted insurance company to go in & see damage & what had to be done.

The insurance adjuster you get makes the world of difference. The one assigned to our claim kept me informed by email, advised me of how we may be able to avoid paying deductible by reducing work to be completed. We no longer needed wall dividing my husband's work shop from storage area, so hey.....good call!
A few days later, my tenant advises there is water leaking from 2nd floor into kitchen ceiling & onto floor!!! OMG! Now what?
Kitchen ceiling had to be removed.
Waiting for latest report!!!

We have a motor home that we park on my sons property in northern MI and the pipes froze up a couple of times. We invested in a heated hose and we don't have the problem any longer. If you are in a house, then you need to invest in the freeze protected outside faucets.

WOW! I had a pipe break and run for three days We were gone. It ran 110,000 in damage. Three floors on my home my brand new kitchen. I feel your pain. Not ice though.

I had to flush my toilets all weekend with thawed snow a few years ago when all my water froze (or, as it turned out, the meter or something external to the house). My husband went running around to check all the outside faucets and accidentally left one on. When the water finally got going again, it just poured out of that outside faucet, for hours, and ran into our basement. A river flowing into a lake.

Here in our place in MN, all outdoor spigots are now the "no freeze" type where the actual shut-off is about 18 inches back in the pipe. But we also have drain caps inside the house for each of the outdoor lines. And a shut-off valve before each drain cap.

Every fall we shut off the water with the inside shut-offs, open the outside spigot, then open the drain caps and drain any remaining water in that last section of pipe. Caps replaced and outdoor spigots remain open.

Any water line in a sparsely insulated area, or a cold space, can start to freeze when temps remain around 20f.

We'll routinely get -30f spells during the winter, and a week or two at a time with high temps below 0f. So we like to make sure we don't have water in the end of any lines going to the outside.

Recent kitchen remodel moved sink from an outside wall to an inside wall. No more water lines coming up outside walls to be exposed to cold. We think we're in pretty good shape for winters now.

Protecting Pipes from Winters Bone Chilling Freeze
cdrg+RedTeam
just now in Other
As a property restorer myself here are some good ways to prevent a pipe burst

As we head into the middle of the winter months it’s extremely important that you pay attention to your pipes. The world famous Farmers Almanac has forecast a very cold winter. With the extreme cold brings the possibility of frozen pipes in homes and businesses. The average cost for water claims is on the rise – that the average cost per claim – approx $15,000 – is up 33% from 2007 to 2008. While most insurance carriers cover damage done by broken pipes, avoidance is always the best option. So what can be done?

Here are some simple, but practical ideas that could help protect those pipes during this cold winter;

Run small amount of both HOT and Cold water. Keeping a small amount of both the hot and cold water running through the pipes will help keep them from freezing.
Open cabinet doors under sinks to allow warm air to circulate around piping.
Plan ahead and know where the water shut off valve is – not only around the fixtures, but the MAIN valve coming into the house. If a pipe burst in a wall, you can save major damage from occurring if you know where the main valve is and can get to it quickly.
This may be obvious – but proper insulation on the pipes is also very helpful.
For homes that have pipes in a open crawl space, be sure to close off the vents to the crawl space.
Install a whole house water leak detection system.
If you are going to be gone for extended periods of time, either have someone check the home frequently, or have the lines professionally drained prior to leaving.
Hopefully this gave you some ideas on how to protect yourself from Frozen pipes this winter.

Thanks, cdrg and Red Team, for re-affirming what some of us have already said has worked for us in the past. Though no one can foresee every possible thing that could happen to cause a problem, as the old saying goes "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."

Woow :)

The picture is not hers haha. It's on some blog other persons from November 20 th. Plus her profile says from California, don't think it gets that cold in California! Haha (:

We just thawed out a frozen hot water pipe to my tub in our newly renovated maser bath!! It took two days and a stadium heater/blower and hair dryer, but we did it! Our master bath faces north and is over our 3 car garage ( and don't get me started on the builder who designed this floor plan!!). During renovation my hubby took great pains in insulating behind and around the pipes to insure we would not have to deal with frozen pipes again. He sprayed insulation foam in the walls and joists, AND put the pipe insulated foam around the pipes leading to the bath fixtures. He even put a thermometer in the soffet before the sheetrock went up in the garage, with a receiver we keep in the bedroom to monitor the temps. Well, we hit -8 degrees this past Thursday (we live close to Cincy/Oxford, OH) and the soffet temps went down to 30 degrees. We had a frozen hot water pipe to the tub, but the cold worked fine - still don't get that one! We have two cut outs in the sheet rock in the garage for access to shut off valves and used those openings to heat the area. After the first day and no luck with an oil heater set below pipes in the garage and a hair dryer at the tub floor next to the pipe, he went to the barn and pulled his 'stadium heater' over to the garage and we started working with that the second day. We raised the soffet temp to 60 degrees and six hours later, the ice broke through and we have no leaks -yet! Today we are expecting 6-10 inches of snow, an artic blast to follow and the HIGH on Tuesday is -6 degrees!! Needless to say, the oil heater will be on in the garage, the pipes will be trickling and we hopefully be getting through this record breaking cold in better shape than the garage picture shown :) Lesson learned...the best laid plans may not be enough to fool mother nature!

Hi guys!! I am really upset and trying to figure out what the deal is.. Ok.. It is in the "teens" in Mississippi the last few days. A few nights ago, I believe my kitchen sink pipe must have frozen b/c it doesn't work. But get this.... ALLLL other sinks and drains work just fine. The showers work.. The sinks in bathroom works.. even my OUTSIDE water faucet is working beautifully.. I can't for the life of me understand what could be wrong. Has anyone else had a problem like this? If so, how did you resolve it? thanks so much!! Kristy

It's most likely frozen and I would turn off the main water valve asap before it burst. You will need to wait until it unfreezes and ensure that the line is not broken after re-opening

okay.. thank you so much for your time and help! It just seemed strange to me that the kitchen sink is the only problem. I will turn off the main valve. Thanks again!! :)

You may heating your house, but remember cold air falls to its lowest level. Keep your cabinet doors open so heat can flow in there, i.e. cabinet doors can be acting like insulators. Until provened otherwise, Yes! Turn off the main water valve

We go away for the winter so we turn our furnace low. What we have is a timer type thing that we plug into a lamp. If the temperature in the house goes to below 15 Celsius the light in the lamp comes on and when the neighbour's see the light on they check the furnace. We turn the water off when we go away even for a weekend.

The name of the Timer is Winter Watchman and it is a Honeywell product. The neighbour's also check our house regularly when we are away. We had friends that went away for five months and the neighbour didn't check it once. There was a drip in the upstairs bathroom. The house had to be taken down to the studs and they had to pay $18,000 to pay to remove the mold. The rest was covered by insurance. Word to the wise always turn the water off when you go away even for a short time.

Ok I took a shower Monday evening and by about,2:30 a.m.I had no water..i thoughtpipes were frozen until more than 24hrs had past with all the heat running non-stop and a space heater on my pipes and I still have no water not even drips or sweating pipes to indicate defrost...so what else could be my problem? Any solutions?

Chuck: could be that the water meter has frozen up. This happened once to me. It was below grade about 3 feet with a metal cover. I learned that i needed to keep snow off of this cover

I have a few question regarding frozen pipes. My rental house has been sitting empty for two months. The heat has been set tp 60 and the electricity has been on. The city of Raleigh lost my landlord paperwork and never transferred the account in my name; hence the water got turned off. I would imagine if I have to have burst pipes its best if no water is coming from the main correct ?
I had my friend go by and check ..everything looks good. No visible cracks etc. Is there anything I should be looking out for ?

Lastly how long can water stay off in the house? I have new renters moving in next friday. Is there anything they should be watching out for ?

Same ear-call a plumber to inspect the house ASAP.

Same ear...humm thats a new one. Well Car -Oil...I did call a plumber. And frankly he said the fact that I had the heat on and the water was not one..is probably a good thing. I was hoping to get a concrete answer. I am a novice home owner. What do people talk about when the speak of busted pipes. Flooding indoors or out doors etc,

Sameer : Water expands when it turns to ice. This expansion busts the pipe(s)

Sameer, probably the best thing to do is to try to arrange to have a plumber come soon after you turn the water back on. That way, if there is any damage to the pipes, it should be apparent as soon as water starts running through them. Then, the water could be turned back off-there should be a turn-off valve there to turn it off for your own use, not just the city's-and the plumber can assess the damage, if any. If you have any pipes that "busted," then there can be anything from a small leak, to water running down your driveway(worse case scenario there.) Hopefully, if the pipes were in good condition when the water was turned off, they will still be in the good condition. It definitely is a good thing that you had the water turned off during weather that is cold enough to freeze pipes.

Recently we had -8 degrees. My kitchen pipes froze. I found out when i got up for work. I shut off the main water valve till I got home. My first action was a space heater facing into the cupboard where the pipes were located. I then went into the basement and opened the release valves on the knob. I tried blow dyers and the heat gun along the pipes without much luck. I then put a load of towels in the dryer, took the outside vent and put it along the frozen pipes. In about 1 hour I had water pouring out those release valves. Fortunately they didn't split or burst. Come spring I plan to thoroughly insulate the crawl space these pipes are located in. It is 8" wide 12" tall, and 20 feet long any suggestions?

We are in a pickle. We have a shared house with an empty apartment downstairs. Our landlord went to Florida and the polar vortex froze the sewer pipes out to the street. This flooded the apartment beneath but no one was there to notice so it went on for some time. Now the water has been off for two days and we can't run anything down the pipes. Anyone know what the legal ramifications are for this problem?

Is the landlord aware of this? Is a plumber working on it? At the very least, you should not pay rent for the time you did not have working utilities. I'm no attorney, but I had plumbing issues 20+ years ago, research at that time indicated withholding at least a portion of the rent, and the landlord didn't protest it.

HELP, PLS? I am grateful I found this site. Just bought home in Wears Valley, TN (next to Smoky Mtns. Bought on top of a mountain to begin with: big mistake. Last nite it snowed 6" and it's 2 1/2 miles down. Stuck for a week, due to straight drops on both sides & no barriers. Just snow and ice. BIGGEST NEED FOR HELP. Last nite, it was approx. -10 degrees (we didn't know: just got here a couple days ago. Awakened this AM to absolutely no water.
It also turns out we share a fantastic water well with one other property owner right next to our property. Their property is higher than ours just a bit and runs down the drive and under our log home (large, also). Turns out that they had a pipe burst before and the owner of this home had to pay but did it right, we were told: had PVC pipe installed approx. 1ft to 14 inches down the drive, but when the pipe got to our home, he had 4 men digging approximately 10 feet deep, so the pipe is that far down, accessible through crawl space only, in order to warm, etc. We have had electric heater on down there all day, no water and no way to get down hill for at least a week. Vehicles can't get up either without taking huge risks, so plumbers aren't eager to make apts soon. Can someone please suggest what we can do. Husband is 78 and I've had 3 knee implants in left knee, 2 spine surgeries and 2 more to come. I know, Buyer beware, but the Broker continued to insure us we were easily accessible to hospitals, doctors, (EMS could be here in 4 minutes): we can't make it up mountain in 4 minutes in dry beautiful weather. That's another subject. Right now, any ideas about getting PVC and/or copper pipe flowing with water again. The pump of shared well is on neighbor's property. We've been in their home (this is their 2nd home & aren't here), all of the mechanics working fine and their water is on great. We've turned off their valve that pumps the water here, as we're lower and last thing we would want is our pipes to unfreeze or begin to and their pump to continue to pump, thereby blowing our pipes to pieces. If we get the water running, we can always turn their pump to this home back on.

Pls help.

Icwatson51, I am no expert, so here is some really crude advice. If you have snow, you have water. You can bring snow in and melt it to flush toilets. Don't put it in the tank, just dump a gallon straight into the bowl. If you have any water left in your toilet tanks take that out first. While the concept is kind of gross, it is actually uncontaminated and you can drink it (might want to boil first) or cook with it. I live in Asheville, NC, somewhat in your neck of the woods. The snow won't last a week, nor will this deep freeze. Those pipes should thaw soon.

Consider investing in a car, like a Suburu, that can get out of this kind of mess in the future.

I hope you're okay. Good luck!

Jeanstryker: lcwatson51 here and thank you so much. We actually brought some in to thaw last nite. It's miserable here. To think, plumbers can't even get up! We take running water for granted.

WOW! that would make a hell of a morning....

SoCal: So true: however, try all day yesterday, last nite, today and probably tomorrow! Need help! Thanks for expressing my feelings

A couple of years ago (2013) inherited a beautiful well kept 2 story home from my grandmother. Living between 5 and 6 hours away and very busy at the time I was unable to spend alot of time there. When winter rolled around I had the utilities turned off in the interest of saving the money that it would cost to keep the place heated so the pipes wouldn't freeze. Of course I was busy and did so over the phone. Well I didn't make it back until spring and time to mow the grass. What I found when I unlocked the door broke my heart. My grandmother's beautiful house had wet plaster from the ceiling and walls on the floor with water dripping from the ceiling The kitchen faucet had frozen and when it thawed was running wide open. Fortunately that water was going right down the drain and obviously where the majority of the water was going. The line going to the toilet upstairs had also bust and was what had caused the flooding in the downstairs bathroom an adjoining bedroom, hallway and about half the kitchen. As it turns out yes, the water co. turned the water off but they didn't turn it all the way off resulting in reduced water pressure but pressure none the less. There was only about three inches of water in the basement but it had been wet long enough that mold was growing rampant. It seems that the kitchen faucet running wide open allowed MOST of the water to go right down the drain otherwise I'm sure the basement would've filled up. I took off work for the next couple of weeks to clean up and neutralize the damage. What a mess! Of course insurance opted out because the house was unoccupied. I have since replaced all the faucets and a couple of pipes that split and am finishing the sheetrock work and replacing the carpet and hardwood floors that buckled. It's been a slow go but am preparing to move in soon. I just received my 1st water bill since having it turned back on and am having a hard time swallowing that pill after all the time and money I've been out repairing everything, when in my mind this all could've been avoided had the water been shut off like I had requested! I don't think I should have to pay it. The only advice I've gotten is that " you can't fight city hall"... Maybe not but that doesn't make it right! Needless to say I'm not happy with the water company... Thanks for reading. I just had to vent a lil.

That stinks, Chad. Some areas have a one time forgiveness policy for exceptionally high water bills. Check into that. Also see if they can confirm that they tried to turn your water off.

A friend of mine went on vaca for 6 days and came home to find her house w/3" of water everywhere. Burst pipe in the upstairs laundry. All very expensive furniture ruined by drips through the ceiling, structural integrity compromised, mold everywhere, the health department condemned the house. Contractors estimate 6 months to strip to the studs & rebuild. Insurance company fighting with the contractor about payment, no work starts until that is squared away. So, yes, even in summer all water should be turned off when no one is home.

I have a 90%EFFICIENT hvac with a drip pipe outside that froze this year. I just bought this house. one repairman said keep pipe short and other one said add more pipe to go down to ground into small pepples with salt and insulate more. no problems this year but very scared for next. what do I do. thank you