Chicken waterer and freezing

noway2

noway2

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As we're heading into winter, one of the daily chore challenges is keeping the chicken waterer from freezing. One of the tricks I have read about is to put a sealed* container of salt water in the water reservoir. The idea is that the salt water container will suppress the freeze point of the water surrounding it.

My question for the smart people here, perhaps some who work regularly in chemistry or similar fields is, how much salt to how much water would achieve the maximal freeze point suppression? According to this wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freezing-point_depression it's about 275 g per / kg but how does this translate into normal people quantities and things that can be measured with household tools like a pint of water?

* - the container needs to be sealed. You don't want the chickens drinking salt water
 
If the container of salt water is sealed, I see no way that its contents could have any effect on the water surrounding it. Maybe the water in the sealed container won't freeze, but the rest of the water will.

A kg of water is roughly 4.23 cups. And 275 grams of table salt is roughly 0.955 cups.
 
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Pack72 said:
If the container of salt water is sealed, I see no way that its contents could have any effect on the water surrounding it. Maybe the water in the sealed container won't freeze, but the rest of the water will.
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I was thinking the same thing, but as this link says, it will give off a small amount of heat, which the more I think about it, this makes sense. As a thought experiment, consider that the salt and chicken water are both at 32.0F. As the surrounding water cools, the salt water will still be at 32.0F and this will cause a little bit of heat to transfer to the cooler water due to the temperature delta. It's not much, but it may be enough to get the job done in our climate.

16 ways to keep chicken water from freezing
 
I believe the idea is the saltwater in the bottles wont freeze but they will bob around and agitate the freshwater and prevent an ice skin from forming on top.

I guess if thats true than any type of agitator would work? That one just happens to be low tech.

EDIT: Also the water / salt mixture is about 3:1
 
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I mix vodka with my drinks to keep them from freezing.

My uncle would put nearly empty water bottles, ping pong balls and the like in the waterer. The idea is that breaking the surface tension with a buoyant object impedes ice formation.
 
Unless you're adding salt to the drinking water, this will not work. It's BS.

When water gets to freezing temperature, it WILL freeze. It can actuality be supercooled before freezing, but that's under special conditions.

If you don't want the drinking water to freeze, then run an insulated line (possibly heated) to them with a trickle of water running all the time.

Or use a heated water dish of some kind.
 
The salt doesn't keep the salt water from getting cold, it just lowers its freezing point. It would get just as cold as the water or ice around it, even if it remains liquid. It would impart no heat to the drinking water.

We used to just have extra tanks and fill them inside, carry them out in the morning and replace the frozen ones. They do make electric heaters of some sort IIRC.
 
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Johnny said:
A regular 100w lightbulb in a cinder block with a metal waterer on top will do the trick for anything above extended sub zero temps.
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You can't buy 100w bulbs anymore. Our pump house has a bulb socket right where all the pipes come together just for that purpose and I just burned out my 2nd to last 100w bulb. Bought a 12ft heat tape and installed it a couple of days ago just before it hit 20° that night. Damn that stuff 's not cheap, but at least it won't burn out.
 
Flashpoint said:
You can't buy 100w bulbs anymore. Our pump house has a bulb socket right where all the pipes come together just for that purpose and I just burned out my 2nd to last 100w bulb. Bought a 12ft heat tape and installed it a couple of days ago just before it hit 20° that night. Damn that stuff 's not cheap, but at least it won't burn out.
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They aren't that difficult to find online but not likely in Lowes or HG. Halogen spot and flood bulbs work just fine, at least for the chicken waterer thing.
 
Flashpoint said:
You can't buy 100w bulbs anymore. Our pump house has a bulb socket right where all the pipes come together just for that purpose and I just burned out my 2nd to last 100w bulb. Bought a 12ft heat tape and installed it a couple of days ago just before it hit 20° that night. Damn that stuff 's not cheap, but at least it won't burn out.
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I buy them at Walmart monthly.
 
Johnny said:
They aren't that difficult to find online but not likely in Lowes or HG. Halogen spot and flood bulbs work just fine, at least for the chicken waterer thing.
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Oh wow, I thought they were verboten now or something. Good to know. Now that I spent > $35 on heat tape. :(
 
Flashpoint said:
Bought a 12ft heat tape and installed it a couple of days ago just before it hit 20° that night. Damn that stuff 's not cheap, but at least it won't burn out.
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Bad news it will it just takes a while so you might want to keep check on it since its not easy to spot like a bulb burning.
 
We used to put our galvanized fount inside a large heated dog dish with some water in it. Kind of like a double boiler. Worked much better than the heated bases, which always ended up crapping out halfway through the winter.

iu
 
Flashpoint said:
You can't buy 100w bulbs anymore. Our pump house has a bulb socket right where all the pipes come together just for that purpose and I just burned out my 2nd to last 100w bulb. Bought a 12ft heat tape and installed it a couple of days ago just before it hit 20° that night. Damn that stuff 's not cheap, but at least it won't burn out.
Click to expand...
Working on my wellhouse yesterday and noticed the bulb did not come on. They had them at Food Lion, $8.50 for 4. Lucky for me it is a wiring problem and I don't have to buy any:rolleyes::rolleyes:
 
Some folks in NewEngland put water circulators around their boats to protect the water from freezing.
I don’t think it is mostly due to moving water but pushing the warm water from the bottom to the top.
 
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