A Guide To Winterizing Your PVB
Hi, Alfred Castillo here โ Sprinkler Warehouse Pro. Today Iโm going to share with you how to actually winterize a backflow preventer.
Keep Your Valves In Line
As itโs currently in its state, you can see that both of my valves are in the open position. We have supply going into the backflow preventer, out to the outlet, and into the valves. This is normally the way your sprinkler system will operate. For the winter is where we have to take a little bit of extra measures here to prevent any kind of failures of that in this backflow. As the supply runs up into the pressure vacuum breaker, we want to go ahead and turn this valve thatโs currently on. You know theyโre on, in the direction of the pipe. So, if itโs parallel to the pipeโthey are on. Weโre gonna end up turning this particular valve, off. We want to ensure that any water that might be in this particular PVB has the opportunity to expand without breaking the valve or the cap. So, what weโll do is weโre going to do is releaseโrelieve the pressure from what we call hereโthese bleed valves, or these cock stops.
Right now, they are in a closed position. As you can see here, theyโre perpendicular with the actual valve itself. We want to go ahead and release these bleed valves if you can turn them right now. Thatโs closed. These ball valves are not a screw. All these are just real simple ball valves that rotate. So, if I open, this is closed. Open. Closed. Itโs not a screw, so right now thatโs closed. Again, in the winterization of this particular backflow preventer, we always want to keep them open there so any expansion of water will actually flush out over here.
Prepare The Insulation For Harsh Weather
The next step to make this particular winterization more effective is to go ahead and utilize insulation. I have a couple of pieces here that Iโve pre-cut just for the sake of this video, but weโll actually go ahead, and you can pick this particular installation up at Sprinkler Warehouse. So, what weโre going to end up doing is weโre going to insulate the supply side first. Now one of the important things that we want to point out when weโre insulating the supply side. Many times, homeowners will only insulate up to the actual valve itself, or up to the brass part, and thatโs where a lot of homeowners make mistakes โ they do not want to insulate, or they donโt, or they fail to recognize that insulating this particular valve is just as critical.
Why is that? As you can see here on this particular valve, itโs actually the same one thatโs right in here. I have it open. This is actually in its open position where water flows. You can see here. If you can see right there, water flows right in through here. Well, when it closes you can see the stainless ball valve that it is. In here it opens and closes. When you close this, we actually have water that is still in that ball valve, and part of that water essentially is just resting now on the sides of the valve itself. If we donโt properly insulate this part, you can see what might happen in the event of a hard freezeโthat water will expand. And youโll get aโitโs not really a hairline crack. You can see itโs a pretty good-sized crack, and this is brass my friends.
This is just what a little water can do if we donโt properly insulate that. Thatโs going to be really key and important to know. When insulating and winterizing your PVB, your backflow preventer. Itโs important to go ahead and insulate all the way to the actual PVB itself. Youโll see here, Iโll make the measurements. You can make the cuts using the insulation. And weโre going to go ahead and insulate all the way up. To pretty much where the PVB starts. So, we have the valve insulated. You actually also have the PVC pipe insulated. Again, our knob is in its off position here. Sometimes these knobs will actually rust out and go bad. We also have a kit here where you can actually buy these particular valves right here at the Sprinkler Warehouse made out of stainless steel. So, you donโt really have to worry about rust or anything like that.
How To Insulate Your PVB
Once we have this pre-cut and trimmed, letโs insulate. You can go ahead and get some tape. Now you want to go ahead and try to insulate as much of this particular valve as possible.
So, as you can see here. Itโs closed pretty well. I can close that up. When I tighten it up. You want to see if you can cover up any exposed part. So, what weโll end up doing isโIโll go ahead, and you knowโif thereโs any excess insulation here. You can go ahead and tape. And just kind of measure out what you need to cut out. There itโs a little square there. Iโm just going to go ahead and try to fill that gap. With umโwith a particular little bit of insulation. I can close this, and then weโll have an effect. Actually, thereโs probably a little bit more here. Make it good, conform thereโthere we go. And then we can go ahead and have a very nice tight fit.
The important thing is you want to make sure that every part of this valve is insulated. With that, we have this particular insulation tape that you can also pick up here at Sprinkler Warehouse. And then weโll just go ahead and start insulating from the top. Itโs important to ensure that we have a good tight fit around there. You want to wrap it around a couple of times to ensure that you donโt have any kind of exposure and to make sure you do have a tight seal around it. And Iโm going to go ahead and wrap it around a couple of times. Iโm gonna do a little overlap here. Just to ensure that I do have it completely covered, Iโll go ahead and make a nice cut here.
Where it is, itโs got a little bit exposed there, but no problem. You just continue to wrap it around if need be โ itโs okay. And at least with this now, if any water is building up in this particular valve as a result of the closure, with it being properly insulated, you really donโt have to worry now about any type of rupture. The important thing is to insulate the supply side, but itโs also a good idea to insulate the side that actually will go to your valve. And so, by doing that again you can go ahead and measure. Measure some insulation. We want to do the same thing as well. We want to not only measure the actual PVC pipe. But we want to measure the insulation to cover over the actual valve itself. For very similar reasons as weโre covering the supply side valve. We want to cover the outlet valve as well.
So, what weโll do is, we will also go ahead and continue to wrap up this side here. Once you get the measurement, you want to go ahead and go all the way to the PBV. Weโre going to go ahead and get this covered. We also want to see if we can get a good little insulation to cover every part of that valve as possible. Slowly Iโll make my way thereโs probably another little exposure there that Iโll go ahead and address to make sure it is completely covered, then I can go ahead and insulate the rest of the pipe. While accommodating it, I might have to just snake it in a little bit here to make sure that I got a good wrap-around. Then Iโll just continue wrapping the rest of this particular pipe, this side as needed. You can go ahead and finish that off, properly insulating it.
So, there you have it, my friends. Now you have the proper winterization technique of a backflow preventer on how to make this winterize with the proper positions on your valves โ on your actual valves, which is supposed to be closed, and this is open โ and the proper way to insulate a backflow preventer.
Feel free to leave a comment. And let us know what other subjects you are interested in learning about. So, again Alfred Castillo here from Sprinkler Warehouse.