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Maximum season length with a 3 season cottage?
How late in the season can you safely go if a place is not insulated using lake water pump (outside) in an uninsulated pump house?
And how early can you safely open? |
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From Columbus Day to Patriot's Day, Oct 12 to April 19, is the official lakes region, rule for freez'n pipes.
A standard porcelain toilet is what freezes and cracks, first and fast. One way to beat that winter chill; go to www.ebay.com and purchase a heated mattress pad, made by Sunbeam, and fall in love with your Sunbeam heated mattress pad! Is better than going to Naples, Florida! |
Really can't judge by time.You have to keep a close watch on the weather.
Most systems won't freeze until there is a sustained temp in the low to mid 20's If you leave a faucet on at a slow trickle or a fast drip (outside faucet preferably) the pump will come on occasionally and the lake water will prevent the system from freezing. |
Live and Learn
Fifty-three years of island living has taught us to close during Columbus Day week. We have had cold snaps in late October down to 11 degrees. A few years ago, there was a fairly heavy snowstorm just before Halloween. Too old now to deal with cold weather! 🐻
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general rule of thumb is ours is shut down by 11/1. and a lot of time our plumber winterizes by mid November. All depends on your building, your pipes, sun exposure.
open mid April. |
We open May 15, close Oct 15 every year.
Could open slightly sooner but boat valet does not start for us until around May 15 so not worth it. ;) Once you get past mid-Oct you run the chance of a short freeze. Even if not enough to crack pipes, your begining to get to the point where it is no fun breaking out the compresser and antifreeze and getting wet. Or pulling the dock with cold water pouring in your boots. |
If you use the place after Columbus Day, winterize it each time before you go home.
You need to be thorough. I winterized a friend's place but their adult daughter took her boy-friend back after, for a romantic autumn get-away. They only drained the pipes and did not blow them out. The trapped water caused at least 4 leaks in the over-head pipes. Thank goodness they didn't know how to de-winterize the the heating system because the old-man did not want that anti-freeze stuff in it. If you have section/zone valves in the system, you may wish to provide a minimum supply of water, to the toilet and a spigot, or just a spigot. Lugging your water in a bucket will be 'rustic' and help you get in touch with your inner pioneer! Have fun, good luck! |
There really is now specific dates in my case, I monitor weather. I have the winterizing process down to about 3 hours..... (this includes things like draining hot water tank, blowing out pump and moving it into the boat shed etc.)
When the weather starts to show multiple nights in the 20s and teens in a row, I go up and winterize. As soon, as nights in the 20s and teens become rare occasions, and the lake is ice-out I go open things up.... |
We usually close 3rd week of October but have gone to Halloween with no issues. As far as turn on, as soon as they call ice out my water is turned on.
We always shut off the breakers when not there in case of a leak. We had a leak a few weeks ago from a failed fitting the plumber had just installed, had we not turned the breaker off it could have ran all week. We are single story and all plumbing is under the house so no risk inside. We just re-plumbed all with pex. |
Water system is in from ice out till the first week in October.
Far as use goes, I use mine in the winter all the time in a good season I get 6-7 weekends. No running water though. |
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What do you use for a heat source? I have no idea why, but this fascinates me—maybe the man vs. nature thing. Sent from my SM-G950U using Winnipesaukee Forum mobile app |
Winter Use
I use my camp occasionally in the winter. No running water inside but I do have a submersible pump with heated hose to draw water from the lake through a cut hole in the ice. The pump then fills up a 20 gallon water tank that I keep warm with a bucket heater. The Outdoor shower heats up nice Even when super cold out with a camping style on demand water Heater system.
Reliance toilet waste bags take care of bathroom issues or we take a trip to the mainland. No issues with heat,... electric baseboard as well as mini split and propane fireplace get it toasty pretty quick. Having Wi-Fi thermostats is a big plus for getting the camp warm ahead of time!! :) Oh yeah, the wife has never spent the night during the winter months and doubt she ever will. I mainly use it for ice fishing / snowmobiling, etc, etc. Yes my camp is fully insulated. Dan |
Thanks for all the feedback, very helpful.
I am a penny pincher when it comes to wasted fuel. So, on our old property I set it up so that I could remotely turn the power off to our oil furnace (which also did the hot water). There was no sense running it when we were not there for standby hot water and not that cold out. This saved a lot of fuel. So with no heat at all the house usually would not drop below 40F until mid December. But of course the house was well insulated and sitting on a ton of granite. I had an alarm that would message me when temp dropped below 40 F and I would turn Furnace on. Usually at 5AM. But we burned less than 200 gallons of oil a year and that included hot water. I had antifreeze in the heating system too, because those baseboard heating pipes are the most vulnerable to freezing. Like others said, it would take sustained low 20's before the house would drop below 40 F. Can depend on wind too. As mentioned by others, my guess is 11/1 to Ice Out would be fairly safe for most places as well based on my own (non 3 season in how it behaved). I know it varies with weather and exact situation at each site and there are many ways to extend usage. |
Winter island
Sanibel, maybe Captiv a if you want to rough it.
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Be wary of pex
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Pretty tight consensus
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But you can get mice even in a modern 4 season home, they can squeeze through the smallest crack. |
I also leave all my breakers on except the fridge and water heater (city water and sewer so no well pump). Just in case the mice decide they want to eat wire they will get zapped right away before they can cause any real damage to the wiring.
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On any given weekend I bring a couple gallons of water for drinking, melt snow for cooking and have a small camping chem potty. All in all it's not to bad at all. In fact during my years of renovation winter time was used to haul out big bulky and heavy stuff over the ice. Also my last weekend of winter occupancy I make sure all my propane tanks are topped off for the summer. Wrestling 100 pound propane tanks in the boat is a pain! Far as heat goes I use a blue flame vent less heater 20K BTU heating about 600SQFT for now, eventually I'll install either a vented gas or pellet stove. How well does it work? I do need to keep the ceiling fans running to mix the air and do crack a couple of windows for cross ventilation. Also have 2 CO detectors. Here is the coldest reading I took last winter. |
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Best way to insulate your floor is closed cell blown in foam. No Vapor barrier issues and it will fill every nook. |
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Not that mice don't find fiberglass insulation attractive either! |
It only takes a small crack and then you have mice in the house. I foamed around the pipes and haven't seen a mouse since (knock on wood). Creating a barrier under the house for the insulation to sit on that is mouse proof would be complicated. And that's if you have room to work. I absolutely hate working under the house.
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Floor Insulation
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What I did at my place for floor insulation... I used small cans of spray foam around all pipe and other small floor cutouts first. I then installed fiberglass insulation. Covered all insulation with 1/4" luan. I used urethane caulking over all luan seams then screwed strapping over all the seams and sealant to ensure nothing could get through. Its been under there for 12 years now and we get no mice. bugs or ants. Floor stays nice and warm in winter as well. Dan |
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I had a similar thought in mind, when I re-did the house I also re-did the mess of an excuse for plumbing which I consolidated to a single that travels under the floor joists east to west. My thought was to use fiberglass bats and cover it with zip board taping the seams. Same thing I did for the exterior wall and roof sheathing. Thing I love about that stuff is it has that coating on the outside that essentially is better than house wrap already integrated. The goal being that if I have to gain access I can with it being screwed into place. Since I have all my plumbing consolidated I can box around that and insulate that as well. My neighbor just had a new place built and they employed a similar method to insulate the floor as well which I was curious to see how they would do it. I'll figure it out and start to experiment with it. I do like what you did. Since the luan is so thin have you had any problems with it warping on you? I was thinking the 3/8" green zip board, although heavy would not suffer from this. I've had that stuff warp so bad it popped through screw heads! Guess using a pan washer would help with that under every screw head. |
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I have not had any warping issues with the luan sheeting. The zip board and tape sounds like a great idea also! Insulating and sealing the floor will make a huge difference in your home comfort not only with AC and heating but with any bug or mice issues. It basically becomes a non issue. Good luck! Dan |
So how practical is it to run a 3 Season year round?
It has lake water with a pump house probably 20 feet from waters edge and water line that probably goes 50 feet to the house and very shallow. There is no plumbing on the 2nd floor and 1 bath back to back with a kitchen. The hot water heater is like an 80 gallon electric. And it's literally in a trap door in the kitchen. And pretty deep down, surrounded by dirt. Partial foundation around maybe 3/4 way around. It has Electric heat and double pane windows. No insulation under the house. Not sure what's in the walls. Assuming nothing but it might have something since they bothered to put in double pane windows. Looks like modern sheet rock too in good shape. So it's not like boards you can see through to the outside type of thing. Would this cost a fortune to prevent from freezing? It's very small too. We can close off 2nd floor which will add a buffer of insulation. What would it need? Insulate just an area under the kitchen and hot water heater? Hardest part is the water from the lake. I heard you can put heaters in the pipe but it's expensive. I wanted to install a nice water filter system, then I thought of all the work to drain it. Then I thought about putting in tankless hot water on LP, but that might be more vulnerable than conventional hot water tank. I have a Well guy coming along with Septic site planner but that might not happen until next year. Also an LP tank is getting installed. Will switch electric appliances to LP and add a gas (simulated wood) stove. |
Do you know about Pyrotenax all season water lines which have something like a 125' x 1 1/4" black cpvc, water line with an internal heat wire, a thermostat and a control dial to dial in the on/off temp at 34(+-) degrees.
Unlike the standard cpvc 1 1/4" water line that cracks when the water inside freezes, the Pyrotenax uses a high pressure cpvc that will expand with the internal ice should the power go out, and then contract back to original shape after power returns and it thaws out. Cost: maybe one thousand dollars and can be a do-it-yourself project because it gets installed just a inches underground using hand tools like a shovel and a hoe for digging, as opposed to a John Deere back hoe. 125' x 1 1/4" uses 1888 watts of power, and runs on 220-volts ac with a foot valve at the bottom of the line, under the ice, down on the floor of the lake, tied to a cement block. Is made in Ontario, Canada, and can last for 25-years, plus. ............. The Rinnai direct vent heaters, made in Japan, powered with propane or natural gas, and controlled with 110-volt electricity are very reliable and make warm, hot air heat, very quick with nothing that can freeze up plus it feels and smells like clean, real heat. When the electricity comes back on, it will recycle and restart, making hot air heat in the middle of the night, or anytime, after an electric power outage. The Rinnai un-vented heaters make hot air heat that is tainted with the yucky smell of propane, and is definately best to stay far away from their un-vented heaters even though it is made by Rinnai. |
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In the event I do get a Well in and some proper winterizing, I'm trying to not waste to much $$$. But I might need that heated line any way for the well because there is potentially a lot of ledge between the pump and the house and the Well might go roughly where the pump house is any way. So can you cut that tubing any where? Would you have to "jumper it" around the pump? Can the pump itself be heated in a similar fashion? What is the feasibility of the pump being moved up into the house? House is probably 75 ft back and 20-30 ft above water level. Can pumps routinely handle that? I'm sure years ago they had good reason to build a pump house (5 ft above water level) and push up. The existing pump is very tired. If I can get really nice Lake water setup, I might pass on the Well. The only reason I'm considering the gas (wood stove emulated) thing is that is something we can easily reuse if we decide to rebuild. Not sure I want to commit to a new heating system for this house, just yet. Can that Rinnai also take on domestic hot water duties as well? |
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3-Season cottage
Following the statement of FlyingScot, I would add that if a house wasn't originally built to be a 4-season house that the cost of upgrading to a 4-season house is huge, Oh, yes, you will hear stories about people who wrapped their plumbing pipes in the Sunday New York Times, buried their water pipe 6" in sand, and kept the shades drawn upstairs and had a wonderful winter. Don't believe them, it just doesn't work that way. If you are unsure about the insulation in the walls you can always cut a hole and check. The interesting thing about frozen pipes is that if we have cold weather and a pipe freezes, it may be some time before it thaws and begins to leak, and, if the pipe is 'hidden', the damage will be very costly.
I guess I am a bit of a wet blanket on this topic, but your question needs experts to provide you answers - experts in each trade, plumbing upgrades, insulation installation, heating methods, electrical harness suitability, etc, etc, etc. Good luck. |
I think it'd be incredibly expensive and questionably comfortable. I stayed in an uninsulated cabin a few years ago with just a (steel) wood stove for heat, and it was not cool at all—3 sides were cool/cold and 1 was on fire.
If you had baseboard heaters and could insulated the floor somehow, it might not be quite as bad, but it sure will be expensive to battle, what, a 45° temp differential (22° - 67°)? Average temp in January in Wolfeboro is 32° high, 12° low. Sent from my SM-G950U using Winnipesaukee Forum mobile app |
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I don't know the status of the walls yet. Will know soon. There is no hidden plumbing, it's extremely simple layout. This would not be full time. So just heat/insulate/protect it enough to not freeze and pay the price to heat it with the electric and/or gas stove on weekends. Probably just a Saturday night. Mostly so I can do other work on it over winter. I really don't think it would cost much at all to get it truly winterized. Blown in closed cell foam on the floors and walls and solve the water issue as discussed or with a Well. I could move hot water up in the house with Tankless water (mainly to save space). |
As already mentioned in an earlier post, get a Sunbeam heated mattress pad from ebay and you can basically turn the house/cottage heat off or way down while you are asleep.
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I totally agree :) There are two things we have to find on our first day of unpacking, that mattress pad heater and the coffee pot. |
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