LeBlanc
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I have a frozen pipe between my well head at my northern Michigan house. We visit only a few times during the winter, and I always shut off power to the pump, open all faucets, and keep the heat on its lowest setting.
The feed line extends about 15 feet from the well casing to where it enters the house within a crawl space. No doubt it is buried too shallow, and I will insulate and install heat tape this spring.
Though it has frozen in the past, it has always thawed as the crawl space heated when we turned the heat up. Last night and today, that's not working. They've had down to minus -35 degrees over the past 2 weeks.
My neighbor leaves his pump on, turns the heat up, and waits until water flows (usually 12 hours or so). Is it ok to leave power to the pump on when the line is frozen?
I've been turning power on for a few moments every few hours with no luck. The neighbor says if I leave power to the the pump on, eventually it'll push the ice. While I don't believe that, I'm more concerned that leaving the pump power on that I might damage the pump.
Thoughts?
And as for wrapping the 2" feed line with heat tape and burying it underground, any advice? It will still be too shallow because of how the original owners had it configured, but hopefully the heat tape will assist.
Thank you.
The feed line extends about 15 feet from the well casing to where it enters the house within a crawl space. No doubt it is buried too shallow, and I will insulate and install heat tape this spring.
Though it has frozen in the past, it has always thawed as the crawl space heated when we turned the heat up. Last night and today, that's not working. They've had down to minus -35 degrees over the past 2 weeks.
My neighbor leaves his pump on, turns the heat up, and waits until water flows (usually 12 hours or so). Is it ok to leave power to the pump on when the line is frozen?
I've been turning power on for a few moments every few hours with no luck. The neighbor says if I leave power to the the pump on, eventually it'll push the ice. While I don't believe that, I'm more concerned that leaving the pump power on that I might damage the pump.
Thoughts?
And as for wrapping the 2" feed line with heat tape and burying it underground, any advice? It will still be too shallow because of how the original owners had it configured, but hopefully the heat tape will assist.
Thank you.