Frozen Water Pipes - advice in advance!

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domane

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Last winter I was on a livery yard with my one horse 2 miles away. I have a couple of jerry cans which hold 25 litres each I think and were just right for being able to fill his overnight bucket in his stable.

This winter I lease my own space and will have 4 horses and ponies to keep hydrated. You lot are ingenious and innovative so have you got any advice or tips for me for when the water taps inevitably freeze please?
 
Have you got mains electricity. If so consider putting a heat trace wire alongside the pipes under the insulation. You can get clever and have it on a thermostat, or just put it on a switch and turn it on when it goes below 4 degrees. We have done both, and it works brilliantly and uses very little power. Benefit is that taps and water troughs keep working, and you do not have to call out a plumber to mend broken pipes. If you have a hunt on the internet you can buy the heat trace wire on line or talk to your friendly electrician. It costs quite a bit but is well worth it.
 
I fill lots of extra plastic dustbins, so that I have enough spare water for a few days if there's a really bad freeze.
Also, if your tap is high enough, put a big empty dustbin under it and leave the tap trickling very lightly (or on a steady fast drip) so in the morning it won't have frozen (unless it gets to about -6, running water doesn't freeze at temps higher than that ime) and you'll have a bin full of fresh water for the neds in the morning. Lagging the pipes helps too, esp if the pipe and tap are somewhere exposed.
 
Last year we wrapped the tap and pipe in plastic feed bags and put a bin over it and never really had a problem, they froze a couple of times so i just used to take a flask with me just a drop of warm water on the tap worked great.
 
as long as you can keep the mains pipe running you can just drain the tap pipes every night to make sure there is nothing in there to freeze. We rented a field years ago and just drained the pipes after every time we used them (turn off at stopcock and open all taps to ensure pipes are empty), the mains was underground and the taps outside, we never had a problem. If you have mains pipes that go into a building then they need to be insulated (hay and straw do this brilliantly). I also used to tie bags of hay around our outdoor taps overnight when we had our own place to stop the actual taps freezing in case there was a little water left in, we had self filling troughs and with insulation we never had a problem.
 
We re-fill those 5l water bottles you can buy for under £1 in Asda, then bury them in the hay.

The hay seems to work really well as an insulator, they never freeze. Fill them at home & carry them down if the taps are frozen for days on end, bit of a pain but at 5l, they're easy to carry & use.

Not tips to stop taps freezing in the first place though, sorry! :)
 
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