what a day

[greg_atlanta]

It's been at or below freezing for a day or two..... :shocked2 kinda unusual for Atlanta (go ahead and laugh).

Wake up this morning to make my coffee... no water. My hot water heater is in a closet on the back porch and evidently that's where all water enters my apartment. Brilliant design!!

Haven't been to the gym in a few days, so might as well go and take a shower there. Start my car, feels a little funky so I pop the hood to make sure the coolant resevoir isn't frozen. (Running about 60/40 water/AF, I think). It's fine. But notice a very small drip in short, fat coolant hose under the plenum (the hose is bulging a little bit)... Let the car warm up for about 10 minutes while I eat my cereal, then get in the car and the infamous gas smell is back. (Had been OK all last winter). Time for hoses!!

To top it off... get back from the gym and park outside my apartment, notice a big wet spot running all the way down my building -- from MY apartment on the 3rd floor. Go to leasing office and they say I missed the dancing fountains squirting out of my utility closet. Pipe in sprinkler system broke. Luckily not much drywall damage, though it did get my summer tires in the closet all wet.

This is why Atlanta freaks about cold weather!!! :rant

[diamondj30]

damn.

[911/Q45]

I remember a cold snap in Texas that had my neighbors out in their front yards with welding torches heating the ground to melt their frozen pipes!

[AZhitman]

85 today in Phoenix...

Nice day to do 120 down the newly opened Loop 101 freeway...

[Q451990]

I remember a cold snap in Texas that had my neighbors out in their front yards with welding torches heating the ground to melt their frozen pipes!

Man if you had pictures of that! That's hilarious!

Had a couple of pipes freeze Thursday night going to my kitchen sink... no breaks yet though... left everything dripping last night and that seemed to do the trick.

Heath

[VimyJ]

I remember a cold snap in Texas that had my neighbors out in their front yards with welding torches heating the ground to melt their frozen pipes!

Texans... what are you going to do... :rolleyes Sounds like a solution that only AZhitman could love.

[AZhitman]

Sounds like a solution that only AZhitman could love.

Nope - I'd douse the whole damn yard in kerosene and light 'er up! Bonfire time!

[90Q45blue]

Greg,

I also have that infamous gas smell. What hoses need to be replaced to fix that and does anything else contribute to it?

Thanks,

Nick

[texasoil]

Well, folks down here in 'tropical' Houston (where it gets hotter than the tropics and colder than Kansas City) learned from a couple of real bad freezes a decade ago.

Insurance companies won't cover broken pipes if they aren't to building codes--and the Uniform Building Code (covers entire U.S.) and Southern Building Code were ammended to say 'piping in external walls SHALL be protected from freezing.' Been that way for nearly 15 years now. Since the average useful life of wood frame dwellings down here in termite heaven and wood rot paradise is only slightly longer than the 30 year mortgage, a significan portion of housing has been constructed to the new codes (at least were supposed to be--but we all know what a little grease does to the visual acuity of 'inspectors').

Older homes have survived at least 2 major "single digits for 36 hours" freezes, and succeptible pipes burst and replaced with insulated or rerouted one, per new code at insurance Co insistence.

Ona these days we's gonna turn off the gas pipes and let y'all Yankees freeze in the dark!! We gonna form our own OPEC with Natural gas. Seems the fair price by our reckonin is about 3 times the current 'South subsidized' price you folks give us now.

The SOUTH SHALL RISE AGAIN!!

[greg_atlanta]

Since the average useful life of wood frame dwellings down here in termite heaven and wood rot paradise is only slightly longer than the 30 year mortgage.....

Sounds like a good place to RENT instead of OWN. :rolleyes

I'm glad I didn't have to lift a finger to fix the dancing fountains!! My apartment complex turned off the sprinkler system while it's being fixed and we've had a police cruiser parked outside our building watching for fires. Ahhh... the joys of renting!!

[90Q45blue]

Greg, can you or anyone else tell me what I should do to get rid of that infamous gas smell?

Nick

[911/Q45]

Most likely it's the rubber fuel line connectors under the plenum. When they are old and dried and it gets cold out, they shrink and leak. One is accessable from the front without removing the plenum, but you know that won't be the one leaking. Suck it up, pull the plenum and replace all those little rubber pieces under there. You won't have any skin left on your knuckles, but boy will you feel manly!

[greg_atlanta]

Get a variety of screwdrivers and try as best you can to tighten any clamps on the fuel hoses (coolant hoses too). Some you can get to, some you can't -- just follow the fuel lines from the passenger side of the engine. A lot depends on how the clamps are angled.

I had one clamp on a fuel line that kept getting loose and I found a screwdriver I could wiggle in there to tighten it from time to time.

But sooner or later you'll need to replace all the hoses.

Not as big a problem once it gets warm since heat makes rubber softer and less brittle! If you don't fix it now, it'll come back next winter.

[natsoundup]

How many hours do you think it would take to pull the plenum and change all those hoses?

I think I have read where the parts are about 100 dollars...but it could take up to two days to do the job as a DYI

I've had the gas smell for about three winters... last winter I tightened everything I could...and all but eliminated it... I need to do that again...

[DAEDALUS]

Check out Scottsdale's site; they have a hose kit, but I've read here that it may not contain all the hoses needed. That kit alone is over $200. Two full days is to allow for beginner mistakes. A good tech could do it in a single shift I think.

[911/Q45]

I replaced every piece of rubber under there and it was about $400.

[natsoundup]

Every piece of rubber in the engine compartment? or does that include suspension as well?

[911/Q45]

Engine compartment, no suspension parts.