· Michael Blair
Nashville averages only a handful of hard freezes a year, and that is precisely the problem. Homes in genuinely cold climates are built assuming a freeze; homes here are not. The pipes that burst in Middle Tennessee are almost never the ones people think to protect.
Where local homes actually fail
Hose bibs are the single most common burst in Middle Tennessee, because the valve sits inside the wall but the water sits in the spout. Leave a hose attached and the water cannot drain back, so the spout freezes, splits, and does not announce itself until spring when you turn it on and water goes into the wall.
After that: pipes in an unconditioned crawl space, which is most of the older housing stock here, and any run in an exterior wall on the north face. Garage walls with plumbing behind them are third.
What to do before the first hard freeze
Disconnect every hose. It takes ten minutes and prevents the most common failure. If you have frost-free bibs, they only work with the hose off.
Close crawl space vents once the weather turns and open them again in spring. Insulate exposed runs in the crawl and the garage. Know where the main shut-off is and check that it actually turns, because finding out it is seized while water is coming through a ceiling is a bad time to learn.
- Disconnect and drain every garden hose
- Insulate exposed crawl space and garage runs
- Close crawl vents for the season
- Locate and test the main shut-off
- Leave cabinet doors open on exterior-wall sinks during a hard freeze
The dripping tap question
It works, within limits. Moving water is harder to freeze and an open tap gives expanding ice somewhere to go, which is what actually prevents the split. A pencil-thin stream from the tap furthest from the meter is enough.
It is worth doing on a hard freeze night and pointless as a season-long habit. If a run freezes reliably every winter, the answer is insulation or rerouting, not a tap left running from December to March.
If a pipe has already frozen
A tap that gives nothing on a cold morning while the others work means one run is frozen and it has not burst yet. Turn the water off at the main first, then open the affected tap so melting water has an exit, then warm the run gently with a hair dryer or a space heater working from the tap back toward the frozen section.
Never use a torch. Beyond the obvious fire risk in a crawl space, localised heat on a frozen section turns trapped ice to steam faster than it can escape, which splits the pipe you were trying to save.