How to Unfreeze Water Pipes in Marriottsville and Sykesville

Chances are that if a pipe freezes somewhere in your home, the first indication will be no water coming from a certain faucet, or cold water only.

You could, of course, come home from a day at the office, enter your home through the garage, and notice a frozen pipe before you even attempt turning on one or more of your faucets. But for purposes of this blog, let’s assume you discover the problem the old fashioned way as mentioned above.

The first step in correcting the problem is the easiest and probably the fastest too: locate the frozen pipe. And the place to start is anywhere you have unheated water pipes, like your garage, a crawl space, or even inside a closed cabinet where a water pipe resides on an outside facing wall.

Once you’ve discovered the source of the problem, now it’s time to get down to some serious damage control and repair work:

1. Turn on or leave the faucets open just a little. Here, we’re talking about faucets connected to the frozen pipe(s). The reason for turning or keeping the faucet on is that running water is less likely than standing water to freeze. Plus, should the running water bump into the spot where the pipe is frozen, it might even assist in thawing.

2. Plug in the hair dryer. Next, grab your hair dryer or heat gun and head to the frozen area of your pipe. Don’t place either directly on the pipe or keep it one space. Instead, move it back and forth across the frozen area so the pipe will thaw uniformly and safely.

3. Apply heat tape. If another adult is home while you’re thawing the pipe, send someone else out to your local home or hardware store to purchase heat tape. Once you’ve successfully thawed the pipe, wrap the tape in a single layer along the length of the pipe, then plug it in.

4. Heat the ambient air. Since cold air is what caused the pipe to freeze in the first place, it only makes sense at this point to add some heat to the air to help prevent a re-occurrence. Whether you use a space heater, bare incandescent bulb, or heat lamp, be sure to keep it a safe distance away from the pipe and, of course, any flammable objects.

Next, and for best results, we invite you to contact Your 1 Plumber, even if you’ve made it this far on your own. Among other things, we have the proper training and experience to check for pipe damage throughout any and all unheated areas in your home. If we locate cracked pipes, we’ll recommend either repairing or replacing the affected pipes, and give you a guaranteed upfront price before we go any further. We can also give you advice or do the necessary work to help prevent water pipes – hot and cold – from leaking in the future.