Ok...we did what you suggested....we took our hair dryer and heated up the pipe coming directly out of the water heater, and it worked like a champ....so we went under the house to do the same, but found out that the hot water pipes are actually above a layer of insulation....is there anything we can do now, without tearing the insulation down to get to the pipes?
COMMUNITY FORUM
Nope!
Which is just as well. since they froze in your crawlspace now, they will again. This is an indication that they were never well insulated, or, nasty varmits made holes in the comfy insulation.
Pull down all of the insulation, defrost your pipes and begin insulating all of the pipes carefully. Begin by placing pipe insulation on the pipes and wrap the insulation with duct (not duck) tape to close up the opening. Then pack insulation around the pipes and tape this up thoroughly. You need to prevent all air from getting to the pipes. I would even go to the end run of these two floor joists and silicone all the seams of the wood. Then replace all of the regular insulation back in this raceway. You may even consider covering this raceway with plywood or polyurethane to help matters even more.
If this was my house I would say to hell with all of that and I would relocate the pipes up into the heated rooms. You can run them along a wall and then close up that wall with more drywall. I have done this on more than one occasion.
Do all of this to the hot and cold water pipes. Hot water pipes always freeze first due to physics. BEST OF LUCK!!!!!
Which is just as well. since they froze in your crawlspace now, they will again. This is an indication that they were never well insulated, or, nasty varmits made holes in the comfy insulation.
Pull down all of the insulation, defrost your pipes and begin insulating all of the pipes carefully. Begin by placing pipe insulation on the pipes and wrap the insulation with duct (not duck) tape to close up the opening. Then pack insulation around the pipes and tape this up thoroughly. You need to prevent all air from getting to the pipes. I would even go to the end run of these two floor joists and silicone all the seams of the wood. Then replace all of the regular insulation back in this raceway. You may even consider covering this raceway with plywood or polyurethane to help matters even more.
If this was my house I would say to hell with all of that and I would relocate the pipes up into the heated rooms. You can run them along a wall and then close up that wall with more drywall. I have done this on more than one occasion.
Do all of this to the hot and cold water pipes. Hot water pipes always freeze first due to physics. BEST OF LUCK!!!!!
