Source
r/gardening•
PostingInPublic

Q: Protecting full rain water barrels against frost?

I'd like to catch the upcoming rainfall to help me through our "dry" season in early spring, but it's really too early and I fear frosts may freeze the water in the rainbarrel and destroy it.

Are there any tricks to keep it from freezing too easily or to direct the expansion of the ice?

I would wrap the barrel in leftover foil and fleece and would find a way to cover it with fleece or something more solid so that the cold air does not pool inside.

Any more ideas?

Limited power, no running water, I'm only there for an hour in the afternoon if the weather allows.

Posted Feb 19, 2015, 11:34 PM UTC

913
Paper_Street_Soap•

Just take the lid off?

3
nickolaiatnite•

Yeah, build a compost around it.

2
PostingInPublicOP5b equivalent•

My setup isn't even close to allowing for this setup, but kudos for suggesting a solution that would most likely work by providing heat and/or counterpressure if worst comes to worst!

2
nickolaiatnite•

For sure. I know some people who heat their showers with 1/2" hose that runs all through a compost pile. They switch piles every few weeks. It gets up to 160°f

1
abrachas•

It will be difficult to freeze whole barrel anyway, put a large plastic bottle half fulled with water, if top freezes and expand it will destroy bottle not barrel. (Like they use pool pillow to protect pools from freezing).

2
PostingInPublicOP5b equivalent•

Neat, exactly the kind of trick I was looking for!

2
Guygan•

I fear frosts may freeze the water in the rainbarrel and destroy it.

It would take a very long time of very cold temperatures to freeze the entire mass of water in a barrel. One night of frost might make some skim ice on the surface, but it certainly wouldn't damage the barrel.

1
PostingInPublicOP5b equivalent•

No, not a long time, a few nights of single-digit nighttime frost °C followed by even lower single digit °C daytime temperature days following fill suffice. It's scarily quick. A lot quicker than you'd expect for sure.

The ice in fact forms a reversed U form along the top and sides if you would cut the barrel in half, first the surface is frozen, then ice grows inwards from the sides.

At this point, the expanding force from the freezing water has nowhere to go except towards the bottom/center where the water is still liquid.

This pops out the bottom, hard plastics (plastic buckets) will be destroyed, sort-of-soft plastics (rainbarrel bottoms) expand and pop out and may or may not survive this. The power of expanding freezing ice carries a lot of force, it breaks steel piping and bottoms of water barrels for sure.

1
ddeckZone 6a•

In 5 b, there is going to be a lot of cold weather. It should be drained through the winter. Around April, (the rainy season), just let it fill up from there.

1
PostingInPublicOP5b equivalent•

Well,

I'm living in an oceanic mild rainy central european climate, but by now, I've lost two batches of spring greens like spinach to too dry conditions, not to frost. Our rainy late may and june are no fun, but certainly will fill up any empty rain barrels, but by that time the season for spring greens is over.

The question effectively was, what could I do to help my march-april spinach grow without having my rain barrels destroyed to freak frost conditions like last year?

1
phippy420•

This would be a great question for r/askscience as a engineering student and avid gardener my best suggestion would be a thermal coat of some sorts, paint it black and plug your tap. Edit: Maybe try shopping for HVAC insulation wrap?

1
AnhydrousEtOH•

if you have power they sell little heaters designed to keep ponds thawed that would work. You could even use an aquarium heater and a little insulation. Another option to try is an aquarium bubbler with an air stone at the bottom. It'll keep the water moving and temperature more uniform.

1
BuffyTheUmpireSlayer•

The water only expands so much. Just don't let it get too full, give it space to expand.

1