Lee is a story in Spanish.
Plumbing is one of those things you don’t really think about until you’re forced to think about it. This week, as snow, ice and freezing days hit central Texas, many residents face frozen pipes and water leaks.
Jimmy Maas of KUT spoke with Brad Casebier, CEO of Radiant Plumbing and Air Conditioning in Austin, to find out why cold weather is so difficult for pipes in our homes and what to do when there is a leak.
KUT: Brad, you’ve been doing this for a long time. You started with your father when you were a teenager. Have you seen anything like this?
Brad Casebier: No, we’ve never seen anything close to that. So, having – I don’t know the exact amount of years – but more than 30 years of plumbing experience. No, nothing even close.
For all of us to have a basic platform from which to start, why is cold weather so difficult for the pipes in your home?
Oh yes, this is super simple. The water expands when it freezes. That’s why ice cubes float in your glass. They take up less area and reach the top. Therefore, your tube was not really designed to expand and contract. Some new and modern tubes like PEX handle frostbite better. They will stretch and then have a memory and return to their original size. But copper, CBVC and brass, galvanized tubes. It will freeze and stretch that tube.
Now, you may not burst the first time, but the next time you freeze, it is starting from a stretched point and will stretch again. And then, you know, the pipe can be frozen three or four times and burst the last time, or it can burst the first try.
At what temperature is it really difficult for houses, normal houses with modern plumbing, to be affected by the cold outside?
For me personally, if it’s going to freeze 32, 30 degrees at night, I don’t drop my stuff. Your house retains enough heat and will only freeze for a while and then heat up again. It’s a good practice to drip, but what I found on my business side, just by looking at the volume of calls, is when things really start to break is when you don’t freeze during the day and drop to almost 20 seconds at night . And this is where we begin to receive many interrupted calls.
Right. So, for those of us who may be, you know, thawing and stumbling over leaks, what is our first course of action besides calling you?
I think everyone in Austin who has a home should know how to turn off the tap on their home. Even if you don’t have an active leak, find out how your home will close now. And then, when that happens, you are prepared and you are not in complete panic trying to do that.
With our volume of calls, we are making a lot of video calls and guidance and helping people in these situations. But we can’t even answer the phones, there are so many. It is so difficult to get help now. So you’re kind of alone. So, you really want to know how to close the water.
This main is usually located in front of your house, on the sidewalk or on the street.
Yes, usually on the left or right side of your lot. And there is a large circular cast iron cover, which is the city’s meter. And your valve to turn it off must be 30 centimeters or more from that in a small box or round tube with a normally green lid or a small cast iron lid on top. And that must be the valve that closes your house.
How difficult or easy is it to say that we don’t have the right tool?
If it is in good condition, you will not need tools. You should be able to lift the lid, grab the valve, activate it and you will be closed. Over time … the lid disappears and then the dirt enters the box and eventually becomes covered with grass, and the owner of the house cannot find it in a panic.
The city always keeps the meter box open because it checks its water meter all the time. And then you will need a tool if you are going to use the shutdown, which in an emergency would be good. We should not use this valve to turn your home on and off. This is the property of the city. But pliers or a wrench. It’s a square head valve, and you can put pliers or a wrench on it and turn that thing. I think it’s a 90 degree cut that completely closes off the water in your home.
How are you coping? How are the family and employees? I mean, everyone is kind of in the same boat.
I will be honest. It is very stressful. I mean, we are sad. I mean, we see calls after calls, read the notes and talk to these customers. And their lives are essentially destroyed, you know, and we really can’t get to them. So, yes, it’s a lot to take on. And then the CSR team is hammered with calls. So it’s a lot. And we would love for it to thaw and for the roads to be safer and for us to be able to move faster to get a solution for people.