Plumbed appliances and a cold empty house

01

Where the line freezes

Small-bore appliance tube has very little thermal mass, so it freezes long before a household pipe does. The vulnerable stretches are the ones that were run for convenience rather than for warmth: along the back of a cabinet on an outside wall, through a crawl space, or across an unheated garage bay to reach the far side of a kitchen.

What splits is rarely the appliance inlet. It is a fitting or a length of tube out of sight, and it makes itself known when the house warms up and the water finds the break.

02

Shutting a kitchen down for a cold spell

If a house is going to stand cold — a long absence, a heating fault, a property between occupants — the plumbed appliances want isolating and draining rather than simply switching off. It takes very little time and it is the difference between coming home to a cold kitchen and coming home to a wet one.

Before a house stands empty in winter

• Close the isolating valve for the kitchen water line at the wall
• Drain the run and the appliance reservoirs, not just the appliances
• Decide whether the refrigeration runs or stops, and do it properly
• If it stops, empty and clean it and leave the door propped open
• If it runs, confirm the drain is clear and defrost is terminating first