Preparing for a three month get away what do you do with things like electric

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Did you end up with any cracking of the sheetrock seams or corner joints because of the cold. That's another issue I'm concerned about. My parents use to shut their house down like you and because the sheetrock contracted so much from the cold, they had issues.  Not major issues just some minor cracking. I only used 1 tank of fuel oil last winter the 4 months we were in FL to keep the house about 50 to 55 so I feel that wasn't too bad considering the winter we had here in New England.
 
No cracked sheetrock or joints.  We did leave the heat on at 55, but drained the water system as a lack of electricity for a few days or more would be fatal to the water system.
 
buchanan said:
For gods sake relax man as your making a mountain out of a molehill. No one said you were a liar,Your putting words out there that just aint so.What I said was  your system should function fine without city water pressure.If it needs city water pressure for your home heat to work so be It? What I said was I doubt your system has to have City water to function if it does I really don't care.Like I said 3 times is the ones iam familiar with is the self contained pressurized system.(no city water required)Anyhow We were  just discussing pros and cons of what one should do when leaving house for  winter to go snow birding.
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There is a "make up water"connection to the city water system on my current system and the one at my last house.
The company that installed the boiler replacement in my current system said not to turn the city water off when we left for the winter. I don't recall the reason they gave now but it made sense at the time. 
 
Rene T said:
Clay, Do you shut the water off or leave it on. I also have forced hot water for heat so I don't shut the water off. What I did do was make a little piping modification which allows me to keep the water on ONLY to the furnace regulating valve. This is needed in case you developed a small leak in the baseboard  the valve would open and replenish the system. You wouldn't want the furnace to run dry. That wouldn't be good. The rest of the house has no pressure at all.

The other thing I do is open all my cabinet doors to allow heat to get to any water pipes inside the cabinets like under the sinks etc.. 

Also any rooms which do not have any pipes, I shut the doors to keep heat out. I also close the flapper door on top of the baseboard so most of the heat goes straight through the baseboard. No sense heating those rooms.
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I also open the cabinet doors when we leave.
In my case the necessary change to the plumbing to isolate the water make up connection from the city water supply would be a major job because of the way it is routed and wasn't worth the cost to me.
 
elliott-maine said:
We did leave the heat on at 55, but drained the water system as a lack of electricity for a few days or more would be fatal to the water system.
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Elliott, do you have electric heat?
 
Clay L said:
There is a "make up water"connection to the city water system on my current system and the one at my last house.
The company that installed the boiler replacement in my current system said not to turn the city water off when we left for the winter. I don't recall the reason they gave now but it made sense at the time.
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It may have a one way pressure sensitive flow valve  that allows for  say if the heating systems develops a small leak it may auto fill the hot water heating system?
Just a guess(assumption) on my part. Obviously the heating system does not need city water pressure to function so that would be my guess?
I did say guess in case someone did not notice
 
buchanan, you are exactly right. I grew up with hydronic (hot water baseboard/radiator) heating systems. While some very old systems might have a manual makeup valve, most modern systems would be automated through a pressure differential valve. As some earlier posters have pointed out, if anything happens to reduce the water level in the heating loop, the pressure drop would cause the valve to open and replenish the loss. If the heat loop were to be allowed to drop below a given level, the system would not function and the boiler could be damaged.
 
eaglestar said:
buchanan, you are exactly right. I grew up with hydronic (hot water baseboard/radiator) heating systems. While some very old systems might have a manual makeup valve, most modern systems would be automated through a pressure differential valve. As some earlier posters have pointed out, if anything happens to reduce the water level in the heating loop, the pressure drop would cause the valve to open and replenish the loss. If the heat loop were to be allowed to drop below a given level, the system would not function and the boiler could be damaged.
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most  have a overheat shut down limit switch system.I looked at my moms today which was installed in 1988. its a closed system and no city water feed to unit
If its leaks you have to manually add water and purge air from the system
thanks for the reply
 
That system is 25 years old. Take a look at a newer system and you'll probably find a pressure regulating valve which will replenish the system automatically. :)  :D  ;D
 
I have electric heat and a Monitor K1 heater.  If I had forced hot water heat, I would have had that drained and just left the Monitor on.
 
Greetings,

In regards to turning off the water, I just had some plumbing work done to the stick house. I was told that people who shut off their water for extended periods tend to have problems with minerals colasping in the pipe system so when it is turn on, it plugs up various appliances, and faucets screens have to be removed and clean. I was told that it causes problems 3/4 of the time. Now on the other hand, If you have a burst water line, seems like that could cause tons of damage more so than fixing the junk build up in the pipes so what to do.

We live in the country with hard water but wondering if it is the same with city water. Best!
 
The monitor will keep the house above freezing, and the electric heat helps.

A burst pipe can be very expensive if you don't catch it right away.  Some one down the street from my mothers house had to have the house gutted as a pipe on the second floor burst and water flowed everywhere.  Removing and cleaning filters and screens is a small price to pay versus damage to your house.  We always clean these once a year anyway.
 
We also had a neighbor in Happy Trails have a water filter housing on the second floor burst last year while gone. After several days someone driving by noticed water running into the street. It took several months to entirely rebuild the inside of the house.
 
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