Winterizing Your Hydro Jetter
Winterizing Overview
Sewer jetting must happen year round to keep pipes flowing. During the winter, new challenges can present with keeping the hydro jetter safe and fully functional despite freezing temperatures. In this blog post, we’ll go through the basic steps required to prepare your jetter for the colder weather.
Antifreezing Jetters
All standard US Jetting units come with an antifreezing system. This allows all of the main hoses of the jetter and the pump to be antifreezed to prevent bursts or damge. The suggested proportions of AF concentrate vs water are 50/50. Counterintuitively, pure AF concentrate doesn’t combat colder temperatures better than a 50/50 mixture, so it’s important to keep those 50/50 levels consistent. Each time you antifreeze your jetter, there is additional dilution that occurs, so we recommend increasing your AF concentrate every 3-4 times you antifreeze your hydro jetter. For a full tutorial on how to antifreeze your sewer jetter, visit our Youtube Channel.
Recirculating Jetters
When relocating between jet jobs, some operators will opt to recirculate their hydro jetters rather than antifreeze their units. A full video on how to recirculate your sewer jetter can also be found on our Youtube Channel, but the main concept behind it is to keep the jetter pump and engine running which allows water to circulate and not freeze. If recirculating with a Tier 4 engine, you must rev up to preset 2 or 3 which allows the engine to get hot enough to burn off the DOC. For a Tier 3 engine, you can simply keep the machine running at idle. This is not a foolproof method though, and caution must be taken in extremely cold conditions.
What To Do If Your Jetter Freezes
If, despite your best efforts, your jetter freezes, the main thing to do is NOT TURN ON YOUR JETTER. Take the hydro jetter into a garage or somewhere inside where it can thaw fully. Only after it has entirely thawed out can you run the jetter to see if any damage has occurred.
Replacement parts to have on standby:
Ideal replacement parts would be the 911 kit which includes an o-ring kit, clear bowl assembly (gasket, mesh element, and bowl), pressure disc and disc holder, and water selector rebuild kit. This covers many items that are vulnerable in freezing temperatures.
For RPD pumps (Harben pumps), it’s best to keep diaphragms, delivery valves, and inlet valves on hand, as these are the most commonly damaged RPD parts in the winter.
