frozen water in conduit

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elecmen

Senior Member
Location
NH
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Electrician
Does anyone know how to thaw or remove ice in 2" PVC schd 40 conduit? I tried blowing air from greenlee blower and snaking it. Open to all ideas. Thanks in advance.
 
elecmen said:
Does anyone know how to thaw or remove ice in 2" PVC schd 40 conduit? I tried blowing air from greenlee blower and snaking it. Open to all ideas. Thanks in advance.
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Is it exposed? Heat gun or heat tape.
 
elecmen said:
Does anyone know how to thaw or remove ice in 2" PVC schd 40 conduit? I tried blowing air from greenlee blower and snaking it. Open to all ideas. Thanks in advance.
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Does any air come through at all? If it does, use a hair dryer and connect it to the conduit and wait. Make sure the temperature isn't high enough to damage the insulation.
 
GoldDigger said:
How long is the run?
I would consider running hot water into/through the pipe.
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i suspect that it'll freeze solid shortly....

they make food grade antifreeze for mobile homes...
if you took some straight from the bottle, and heated
it to scalding hot, and poured it into the pipe, it MIGHT
melt the water, and mix with it, and not refreeze.

in any event, it won't freeze further, no matter what
happens.

using scalding hot water to melt your way into something,
like a car, doesn't turn out well by the time you make your
way to the mall, in fort wayne, indiana.

don't ask how i know this.

:dunce:
 
Recreational-vehicle antifreeze (and windshield deicing fluid) often contains a lot of water. While it will prevent freezing, it won't be very effective at undoing it.
Automotive antifreeze and straight alcohol (not 70% rubbing alcohol) might be effective, but they're slow, expensive & toxic.

What's the situation? Flooded and froze over the weekend and you need to pull wire today?
You didn't say where you're located. Any chance of waiting for warmer weather?
 
How long of a run, how much of that run is frozen shut, and whether it is completely shut or partly open will be determining factors in what might work. If there is a open path through it you can run water through, even 40 degree water will thaw it out as long as you can keep it flowing - it will just take longer then 180 degree water would take. You may need to evacuate that water somehow before it freezes again once you do have it completely open.

Salts and many other impurities (including commercial antifreezes) will lower the freezing point, but if you have a long run that is completely frozen it might work but may take some time. Finding a way to agitate any liquid you do get thawed so the salt, antifreeze, etc. reaches newly exposed ice may help speed up the process - maybe somehow inserting a line with compressed air flowing through it? That probably does introduce some additional heat as well.
 
kwired said:
How long of a run, how much of that run is frozen shut, and whether it is completely shut or partly open will be determining factors in what might work. If there is a open path through it you can run water through, even 40 degree water will thaw it out as long as you can keep it flowing - it will just take longer then 180 degree water would take. You may need to evacuate that water somehow before it freezes again once you do have it completely open.

Salts and many other impurities (including commercial antifreezes) will lower the freezing point, but if you have a long run that is completely frozen it might work but may take some time. Finding a way to agitate any liquid you do get thawed so the salt, antifreeze, etc. reaches newly exposed ice may help speed up the process - maybe somehow inserting a line with compressed air flowing through it? That probably does introduce some additional heat as well.
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Good idea; wish I'd thought of it! Just make sure that the air flow is low enough that you don't lift all the water out of the conduit. That's going to depend on what the slope of the conduit is and whether you can keep fluid in it in the first place.
 
drcampbell said:
Recreational-vehicle antifreeze (and windshield deicing fluid) often contains a lot of water. While it will prevent freezing, it won't be very effective at undoing it.
Automotive antifreeze and straight alcohol (not 70% rubbing alcohol) might be effective, but they're slow, expensive & toxic.

What's the situation? Flooded and froze over the weekend and you need to pull wire today?
You didn't say where you're located. Any chance of waiting for warmer weather?
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We put windshield wiper fluid in a PVC pipe once that was frozen. It worked. Worth a try. Not sure if it would be detrimental to the insulation of the conductors?
 
chris1971 said:
We put windshield wiper fluid in a PVC pipe once that was frozen. It worked. Worth a try. Not sure if it would be detrimental to the insulation of the conductors?
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A cold weather variety of wiper fluid of course, there are warm weather types that probably will not work so well.
 
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