Beat the freeze, winterizing your home tips

With below-zero temperatures becoming more frequent overnight, and a few recent snowy days in London, the City is reminding Londoners to take important steps to winterize your home before the cold weather is here to stay. To help, follow these tips to prepare your home. 

Find your outdoor faucets

It is important to winterize your outdoor faucets to prevent them from freezing as freeze damage can destroy the faucet or lead to a burst pipe. Check to see if you have a frost-free faucet. Unsure if it’s frost free? Look at the knob. If the faucet has a knob that’s perpendicular (sticks straight out) to the house, it’s frost free. 

Don’t have a frost-free faucet? Take these steps: turn off your outdoor water, drain the tap, and then close the tap for the season. It is good practice to shut your outdoor water off during the winter regardless of tap type.

Haul away your hoses

Disconnect all garden hoses from any outdoor faucets, if you leave your garden hose attached to the faucet all winter, your faucet and hose can freeze causing damage and may even lead to a burst pipe.

Prepare your pumps

Pools often require pumps to operate, so it’s important to ensure you’ve closed all parts of your pool. Outdoor pumps should be winterized to prevent damage from freezing water. Be sure to drain outdoor pumps of water and store them in a dry place for the winter.

Shut off your sprinkler

To prevent frozen pipes or leaks it is important to winterize your irrigation system. Check your systems manual for specific details about your irrigation system or consult with your irrigation company for more information.

Evacuate your eaves

Clean your eaves troughs from any debris such as leaves, twigs, and bird nests which could cause water to collect, freeze, and eventually damage your eaves or roof. To clean your eaves, use a ladder safely to simply sweep the debris out of the trough with your hands or a small broom.

Batten down your barrels

If you have a rain barrel, it is important that you disconnect it from your eaves trough system in the winter to prevent freezing in your eaves trough and in your rain barrel. Rain barrel freezing can often lead to the barrel expanding too far and breaking. If you do not have an indoor or covered area to store your barrels for the winter, simply flip them upside down to ensure no water will be held inside of them. Once you disconnect your rain barrel don’t forget to reconnect your downspouts to ensure winter precipitation flows away from your foundation.

Test your smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors

This is critical. It’s always good practice to test smoke alarms monthly and replace old devices after 10 years.

When the snow flies, keep the vents clean to prevent carbon monoxide from building up inside your home.

Going away for vacation this winter? 

Set your water heater to vacation mode or lower the temperature a few degrees. Turning off the main water supply to your home is also the best defense against flooding caused by a burst pipe or other plumbing failure.

First, locate the main water supply valve in your home. The valve should have a wheel control or lever handle to open and close it. It is perfectly safe to turn it off by either turning the wheel clockwise or closing the lever. If you don’t know where to locate the valve, you may find it in the basement, in the crawl space, or outside your home.

These simple tips and tricks can help protect your pipes, faucets, sprinklers, and hoses this winter. 

Find the complete checklist on our webpage london.ca/ClimateAction.