Lowest outside temperature without heating

George_Bray

Ebe_Scrooge wrote: »

leave the house with no heating for a month, it'll end up being exactly the same temperature as outside, so zero degrees would be enough to freeze the pipes.

Not for my (detached) house, which I haven't heated for several years. The internal temperature tends to be at least 5 degrees C higher than outside. The coldest it's been inside this winter has been 5C, like right now, as I write. The coldest I've ever seen on the thermometer was 3C but that was about 4 or 5 years ago.

It often goes below zero in the loft space, though, so I removed all the water pipes, tank and everything. That's the only part of a house which I would see as at risk of freezing, at least in Southern England where I live.

I assume the rooms are warmer than outside due to the effect of some heating by sunlight during the day.

matelodave

I suppose it's like a lot of things, you take a chance or hear from other's experiences and try it yourself. 99 time out of 100 you'll be ok but it's the odd one that causes all the problems.

I've seen the mess and problems that a burst pipe can cause and some insurance companies can have a very jaundiced view if they assume that the place has been unheated or unoccupied and you may have problems getting them to pay out. _ you do have the place insured don't you?

George_Bray

matelodave wrote: »

some insurance companies can have a very jaundiced view if they assume that the place has been unheated or unoccupied and you may have problems getting them to pay out. _ you do have the place insured don't you?

Good points - I was responsible for looking after a deceased relative's house in the North of England a couple of years ago. It had to be declared as unoccupied, even though I stayed there quite a lot. As a result, the property insurance premium nearly doubled. I didn't see any mention of keeping the house warmed to some level, like perhaps 12C but it may have been in the small print. Regardless, I wasn't going to heat that house, while my own dwelling remains cold. So I added stop-cocks to stop fresh water going up to the loft, and drained the tanks in the loft. My only remaining concern was whether the central heating pipes could freeze so, like others have suggested here, I added a frost thermostat which came on if the internal room temperature went below 5C. Everything went smoothly.

My main suggestion is that you need a thorough understanding of the risks and specifics for any individual property before not using any heat at all, like I do at my main house.

I don't know whether mains water coming into the home could ever freeze, either the water authority's side of the boundary, or the shallow underground pipe from the boundary up to the main stop-valve in my house.

Swipe

George_Bray wrote: »

I don't know whether mains water coming into the home could ever freeze, either the water authority's side of the boundary, or the shallow underground pipe from the boundary up to the main stop-valve in my house.

Not a chance. it would have to be a 1947/1963 type winter for that to happen