Prepare For Winter
Winter is fast approaching and the cold weather will soon be upon us, we are getting much colder weather than we are used to in the UK, we had a few spells of -20 degrees C at the beginning of the year, make sure you are prepared for winter and ensure you don’t get any nasty surprises, check any exposed pipe work is insulated, check your loft, any pipework within the loft should be insulated and if you have water tanks in the loft ensure these are insulated as well.
Always make sure you know where you cold water main stopcock is, if you are unfortunate to get a burst pipe this is the valve to shut off first, it is often found under your kitchen sink, but can be anywhere, it should look like this
If you have a condensing boiler check the route of the condense pipe, this will be a usually white plastic pipe that leaves the boiler and should terminate to a waste pipe or a soil stack, if the entire route of the condense pipe is within the thermal envelope of your building, this will be ok, but if the pipe runs externally you need to check a few things, if the pipe is run externally in overflow pipe (this is a small diameter pipe, about the same size as your broom handle) this will need attention, the best solution is to get a plumber to re-route the pipe internally if possible, if it is not possible than have the pipe size increased 40 – 50mm in my opinion, and make sure the run of external pipe is as short as possible, if very exposed have this pipe insulated as well, if as we all are you are a bit short of cash at the moment and you have the small pipe externally, insulate it with whatever possible, do everything you can to try and prevent it from freezing, if this pipe freezes your boiler will not operate and with the cold weather we have been getting this will not be a pleasant experience, a little investment now can ensure you have a trouble free and warm winter