Why do Pipes Burst in Cold Weather?

When the weather gets cold, pipes burst… but why? If you’ve ever had a pipe burst you know just how much of an inconvenience it is. Your house can flood, your electronics can get ruined, but did all of this happen just because it got a little too cold? Well, sort of.

Media:

[FrankBoston]

Copper pipes start to squeeze the 32° water as the temperature drops below freezing, it continues this, trying to keep that water from freezing, until it can't. Eventually it freezes, the pipe now breaks even easier.

[unvergebeneid]

Especially after you said "most people would say because water expands when it freezes" I somehow expected there to be a twist or at least a "but actually it's a bit more complicated than that." Turns out, most people would be right then. Huh.

[spooksmysteries]

Thank you CR for your enlightening advice 🙂 I'd also add to your advice, that take care to know where the main valve is and how to operate it. In case of a burst-mains-disaster you then can just go and close the damn thing and open up the taps to let the pressured water to go to the sink, not the bed.

[Gainsforlife]

So if I workout in cold weather will I get a better pump?

[amologusmogusmogumogu]

Man I subbed this channel BEFORE this got millions of subscribers

[Psi]

There's a bit more physics involved. Most pipes for water have relatively high rigidity and a circular cross-section. You can suppress the freezing of water into the less dense phase of ice via pressure, which is the counter force that the pipes exert back onto its aqueous contents. When you drop the temperature of water in the pipes well below its freezing point, you get a stronger and stronger undercooling effect, which eventually overcomes what the pipe can hold back, resulting in a rupture somewhere in the pipe.

[BibleExposition]

Insulation is not enough, must tell people to flush their toilets every 45 mins to an hours beside opening the faucets for strong drip 💧. I stay up 4 nights or more to flush the toilets and open faucets to drip in last week severe weather in Texas Feb 12-20. Beat bursted 💥 pipes any day.

[hernanramirez]

So we not gonna check what the cc (closed captions) says right😅???

[Mannievh]

Man, almost like someone designed water to become less dense than the liquid water so that the ponds, lakes, ocean could be life sustaining…

[philyrakwan]

Seriously, the carpark of my apartment had a burst pipe and the fire alarm went off so the fire brigade had to come and sort it out.