Cold Water in Bathroom - May be frozen pipe

[Kaityf]

It is very cold here - was -10 this morning. Sometime this afternoon, we discovered that the cold water isn't flowing in the sink in our upstairs bathroom. The toilet, located next to the sink doesn't work either as the water tank won't fill. The cold water in the bathtub, however, is fine. The hot water in both the sink and the tub works just fine.

Someone told me that the problem might be due to a frozen water pipe. I looked up how to thaw a frozen pipe, but I have absolutely no idea where that frozen pipe might be. I'm very afraid of what will happen when the pipe thaws if I don't take care of this. How do I find which pipe is frozen?

We have three bathrooms. The one with the problem is on the second floor. There is another bathroom just below it on the main floor. It is smaller, with just a sink and a toilet. Like the bathroom above it, it is next to an outside wall. Both bathrooms have a window next to the toilet. The small mainfloor bathroom is not just smaller; it's also colder. The final bathroom is in the basement, below the other two. That one has a sink, toilet, and a shower. Being in the basement, it doesn't have a window. Water works just fine in that bathroom, too.

I can only imagine that the frozen pipe, if that's what it is, is buried in the walls somewhere, making it hard to reach. So I don't know what to do.

Incidentally, the bathtub in the upstairs bathroom had been a bit clogged. I cleaned it out yesterday and all was working fine in that bathroom. At first I thought the water problem could be related to that clog and cleaning, but I don't see how that's possible.

Any ideas on what I should do? I attached a jpeg showing where everything is in the problem bathroom. Next to the bathtub is a closet that has access to the bathtub pipes, but as the bathtub doesn't have any problem, I don't think that matters. Thanks.

 

[Plumber69]

If it's frozen it's probably already split. As soon as it thaws it's going make a mess. You need to get some heat in there. I'd be scared to leave the house with the water still on

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Terry]

If you have heat registers you can open, do so.
If you have a space heater, put it in the room.
Open the doors to the vanity to let air inside that wall too.

 

[Kaityf]

So you guys think the pipes are frozen? Why would the cold water be frozen but not the hot? Someone told me hot water pipes are likely to freeze before cold water pipes. We don't have any kind of vanity in that bathroon. It's a fairly small bathroom. There is a closet, but that's where the pipes to the bathtub are. The cold water pipes for the tub are fine. Got cold water there. I did just put a space heater in there. I'll see what that does.

 

[Reach4]

I would leave the hot dribbling a bit, and maybe open the cold valve a bit in case a little flow could work its way thru.

 

[Kaityf]

Ha! I already did just that!

 

[Plumber69]

Your toilet and sink probably share the same cold water line. Where you tub tees off before a freezing zone. The cold line could be closer or less insulated then the hot

 

[Kaityf]

Would those water lines be under the floor? In the ceiling?

 

[Kaityf]

Good news! The cold water works now in the bathroom! I tried it this morning and it works! And apparently no pipes burst. At least no water is pouting out anywhere or even leaking, that I can see. But there is something weird that happened last night. I did leave the door closed with the heat vent open, so it got warm in the room and I left the hot water dripping just a bit and turned the cold water faucet on just a wee bit. When I went to check, at first nothing looked different. There was no more water dripping than there had been last night. I turned the cold water faucet anyway and after a second, the water came pouring out! Yay!

Now for the weird thing. Just before going to bed last night, I went to the basement to check again for water leaking, something that might tell me if a pipe cracked and was now leaking. What I found was a lot of water on the floor that made part of the carpet quite wet. The downstairs bathroom is right next to the stairs and that's where the water was. Crap. I was sure there was a major leak in the bathroom pipes. But when I looked for leaking pipes, there was nothing in the bathroom. I traced the water and it was coming from the other side of the basement, by the furnace and hot water heater. I have a wet/dry vac and sucked up all the water and looked for exactly where the water was coming from. However, once I sucked up the water, the floors started drying. There was no more water.

I checked for a leak everywhere. This is the part of the basement with no ceiling. I checked for wet spots on the ceiling. Nothing. I looked for water on the walls. Nada. As of right now, there still isn't any more water. Now this area of the basement is the exact same spot where we had water leakage a few years back when our area got flooded. While our lot/house didn't get flooded, our neighbor's house did. The water reached our house, but there wasn't enough to flood our house. But apparently, there was enough water sinking into the ground that it must have exerted enough pressure to cause some water to seap into the basement. Where it seaped in is the exact same spot where the water was last night. But the snow isn't melting so that can be where the water is from. I checked the hot water heater for leaks. Nothing. The furnace has a humidifier, but from what I could see, no water came from there either.

If a plumber came to look at this stuff, would he be able to figure it out? As I said, nothing I could see was wet. And by the time a plumber would get here, anything I missed that might have been wet would certainly be dry by the time the plumber looked. Any ideas of what the heck is going on there?

 

[Reach4]

You could get water out of the temperature and pressure relief valve. If that is the case, there is something that can be done about that.

Of course it could have been ground water seepage, as you suspect.

How much water do you think you vacuumed up?

 

[Kaityf]

Hmmm. Maybe 4-6 gallons of water. It actually wasn't that much, but then some of the water stayed in the carpet. I mean you can't suck it completely dry. The area that got wet is something like 8' or 9' x 3'. What is the temperature and pressure relief valve? Where would it be located?

 

[Reach4]

The area that got wet is something like 8' or 9' x 3'. What is the temperature and pressure relief valve? Where would it be located?

On the water heater-- top or upper side. In an Indiana basement, I would think you would usually have a pipe going down to about 6 inches above the floor.

That is unlikely the source of that much water, but sometimes those can fail to close right away even tho the pressure has been relieved. If you are dribbling water from a faucet, pressure should not be able to rise high enough to release water from that valve.

Put a bucket or something that would catch water in case it happens again. The lack of water in the bucket would mean it was not related to the WH T+P valve. You can test by operating the lever, and releasing water. The valve should close, stopping the water, when you let go of the lever.


I am glad the water is working in the cold bathroom.

 

[Kaityf]

Thanks. I'll do that. Interestingly, there wasn't that much water around the heater itself. It is in the northwest corner of the basement. The water was in that area, but a little more to the east. Weird stuff. I'm keeping the water dripping in that sink now. Don't want any more problems with freezing.

 

[Terry]

How cold is it there? Here's a picture of the moisture from a gas appliance freezing at the chimney.

 

[Plumber69]

I seen frozen pipes pull apart the solder joints a millimeter or 2 and still hold pressure but drip once in awhile.

 

[Kaityf]

OMG...that picture is downright scary! So far everything is still good. I sure hope there aren't any cracked pipes or pull apart joints. If anything goes bad, I'll let you guys know. Thanks for the help and support!