Tips to Help Prepare for the Winter Months to Come in Dane County, Madison, WI
11/24/2021 (Permalink)
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With temperatures dropping daily here in the Dane County, Madison, WI area, here are some tips to help you prepare for the winter months to come.
- Keep cabinet doors open during cold spells. This allows warm air to circulate to prevent pipes from freezing and bursting.
- Consider shutting off outdoor faucets to prevent frozen pipes from bursting. Find the shut-off valve in the basement or crawl space and turn it off.
- If you follow the previous step, then open the outdoor faucet to help ensure it drains completely and the inner valve is shut off.
- Ensure gutters are clean and secure. Leaves and debris accumulate, causing a damming effect on gutters, leading to roof problems and water damage.
- Ice dams are a leading culprit for water leaks during the winter season. Ice dams form when heated indoor air melts roof snow. The melted snow collects on unheated eaves and starts freezing, creating ice dams. When heated air melts roof snow above and behind the dammed ice, trapped water cannot safely flow or run off the roof—the ice dam backflows under the roof's shingles and into the structure's interior areas.
- Proper maintenance of your furnace can help reduce the risk of furnace malfunctions like puff-backs that cause extensive fire damage.
- A puff-back is a messy furnace malfunction that occurs when an oil burner backfires, sending soot throughout your home or business. It can happen all at once, covering an interior in grimy soot, or a puff-back can leak soot particles more gradually.
- Puff-backs can also be caused by a partly clogged or cracked nozzle, improper nozzle angle, cracked electrodes, poor adjustment of the air-fuel mixture, a defective spark transformer, shorted ignition cables, or dirty or low-grade fuel.
- The aftermath is usually the main problem. Walls, ceilings, carpets, furniture, and curtains are coated with a fine film of soot and smoky streaks. As a rule, the damage worsens with a forced-air heating system or central air-conditioning because the ductwork provides a path through the house, even into closets.
If winter weather strikes your business or home with water damage or fire damage, let us help strike back! Equipped with the training, tools, and experience to quickly and efficiently mitigate water or fire damage and restore your home or business, SERVPRO of Dane County West will help make it "Like it never even happened.”®
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