Turning your heat off at home while in Florida
I would like to know if its a good idea to turn your heat off and drain the water pipes while in Florida.Will this hurt the foundation and cause problems. Thanks
Forum Discussion
DFord wrote:
Any structure with water pipes in the outside walls is just asking for problems. That's a NO-NO! Keep your water pipes on interior walls or wrap them with permanent self regulating heat tape like this offering from Amazon:
EasyHeat 2102 Freeze Free Heating Cable
Way back in 1995, we bought our cottage, not knowing there was a heating cable wrapped around an overhead water pipe. I arrived at the cottage one Friday to find the ceiling on the floor and everything soaked/ruined.
As we did a teardown, we discovered that the heat tape had started a fire, which melted a soldered joint in the pipe which then separated, which flooded the ceiling and presumably the house until it somehow tripped the breaker to the well pump.....
Personally, I will NEVER trust a heat tape.
