Antifreeze is slushy

[mets721]

So in NJ it’s pretty cold, like the rest of the east coast now. Temps in the single digits at night and only in the 20’s during the day. My buddy told me the antifreeze in his toilet bowl was semi-frozen. Sure enough I went and checked mine and it’s like a sno-cone, not solid, but a thick slush. Anyone else have this happen? I blew the lines and ran antifreeze so I didn’t think there was any water left.

[ctbruce]

Slushy is fine as its only partially frozen. Solid freeze is where the problems start.

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[Javi]

the -50°F antifreeze has a freeze point of +12°F while the -100°F antifreeze has a freeze point of -60°F

Was I to be living where you is... I'd be buying me some -100°F antifreeze for sure...

[JRTJH]

RV antifreeze differs from water in its "freezing characteristics"....

Water expands when it freezes and it's the expansion that causes the damage to water lines, fittings, tanks and valves. RV antifreeze does not expand (as much) as water and has a lower freeze point. Those two "characteristics" make RV antifreeze "less damaging" than water, when used in an RV.

Your RV antifreeze will become "slushy" and may even "lightly freeze" into a more solid mass. That won't cause problems as long as the temperature doesn't fall below the antifreeze rating (-50F or -100F). It was -20 Saturday night and had I gone to the pole barn to check our Cougar, the antifreeze in the toilet, above the flapper valve, would have been a thick gooey paste, sort of like peanut butter. That's normal for RV antifreeze.

As a side note, I would recommend leaving your faucet valves turned on during storage, that way even if the antifreeze does solidify, it won't cause any damage to the valves in the faucets. I also leave the holding tank valves pulled open and the 3" cap off the end terminal. That way, there's no possibility for any fluid to collect in the 3" plumbing run, freeze and cause damage. Others prefer to close the valves so mice, etc can't get into the tanks (they say if they die there, it will stink)... Well, my black tank stinks even with no dead mice, so, to me, that's not an issue...... YMMV......

ADDED: Remember that if you have water in your plumbing lines when you add the antifreeze (and don't completely flush all the water out, replacing it with antifreeze) then you will raise the freeze temperature of the solution. In other words, 100% antifreeze is rated at -50 or -100F, if mixed with water, it may not protect to those temperatures, but may solidify and start causing damage at -35 or -40F, depending on how much water was remaining in the lines that mixed with the antifreeze.

[Dave W]

To date have never had a problem with anti freeze. The slushy stuff doesn't expand the 9% that 100% water will. IIRC, the stuff I'm using is -70 so will probably never have a problem. Then there is blowing out the lines. I tried doing it with my Porter Cable pancake compressor a couple years ago but since it was running continuously for over 10 minutes, was concerned with overheating it to destruction. I then ran a bunch of hose to my shop compressor - and was amazed at the amount of additional water that was blown out with 45 psig (same setting as the P-C) but a continuous volume of 15 cfm or so instead of 2 or 3.

Will a pancake compressor do a good job - possibly if you don't have a fairly complicated system with a washer hookup. My experience says that on ours, it wont do the job well enough.

[mfifield01]

Did you see water coming out after 10 minutes with the pancake compressor? I've wondered if I could do it with a pancake compressor (don't own one). I use a 30 gallon (~6 cfm).

[PARAPTOR]

Yes using the -50 RV stuff have seen that slush, but so far have had no issues. Weather here has been in the single digits. Been so cold have not ventured out into the Raptor yet

[CWSWine]

Remember you looking at the ambient temperature. If the ambient temperature is 0 and the wind chill factor is -20 the liquid anti-freeze will be at 0 not the -21.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The effect of wind chill is to increase the rate of heat loss and reduce any warmer objects to the ambient temperature more quickly. Dry air cannot, however, reduce the temperature of these objects below the ambient temperature, no matter how great the wind velocity.

[notanlines]

CWS, no one should be looking at wind chill factor for rv anti-freeze. As you brought up, it has absolutely nothing to do with it.

[ctbruce]

Originally Posted by notanlines

CWS, no one should be looking at wind chill factor for rv anti-freeze. As you brought up, it has absolutely nothing to do with it.

Wind chill only affects living matter: humans, doggies, horses, etc.

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[CWSWine]

Originally Posted by notanlines

CWS, no one should be looking at wind chill factor for rv anti-freeze. As you brought up, it has absolutely nothing to do with it.

You will not believe how many people don't understand that. December we were in northern Texas and the temps were going to be a low of 35 degrees but wind chill was going to be in the mid twenties and they were going around tell use to disconnect our hose because they were going to freeze and burst.

[BigTexRex]

The RV anti-freeze I've used has a note on the bottle that states it may turn to slush which is normal

[CrazyCain]

So i had a little bit of AntiFreeze that dripped out of the open kitchen faucet while temp was -6 while we were not at TT, so a good thing i would guess??

[ctbruce]

The slush doesn't build hydrostatic pressure like water would do. This protects your pipes.

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[JRTJH]

Tom,

That little bit of red in the sink under the faucet may not have dripped out during the -6F temps. It may have dripped out when the temperature warmed up and you didn't notice it until you got back to the trailer. Typically, as the sun shines on the trailer sides, the interior temperature will rise. With your faucets open, as the temp near the trailer walls warms from sunshine, the antifreeze in the lines near the walls will also rise. Rising temps cause expanding liquids, so the antifreeze will slightly expand. That extremely small expansion will not damage anything and would be easily absorbed as a slight pressure increase in the plumbing (from 0PSI to maybe 3PSI). Not enough to cause any damage but just enough to push a drop or two of antifreeze up and out of the open faucet.

No need to be alarmed as long as you flushed all (or most) of the water out of the lines and replaced it with antifreeze.

There's more damage caused by turning faucets off/on when it's extremely cold than by just leaving them open. When the orings are cold, they "grind" against their seat more than "glide". That can roll an oring off the faucet stem or even break one. It's best to just open the faucets so nothing can freeze inside the stem assembly and leave them that way until ready to use them in the spring.