Frost Heave
Capillary action, needle ice, molar volumes, ice lenses, thermodynamic free energy, blah blah blah blah blah. When you hear about Frost Heave, a lot of bigwig wordage is tossed around to explain a pretty basic thing: When water is underground and it freezes, it expands just like when it is on top of the ground.
What Water Can Do
This expansion can damage the hell out of the stuff around your home, office, barnyard, or any other place where you have things sticking into the ground. A very common example of an item frequently damaged by frost heave are fence posts. If you don't sink them below your local frost line, over time they will be pushed up out of the ground, resulting in a fucked up fence.
Frost Line
The frost line, or frost depth, is a pretty simple concept. It is the depth at which the ground can freeze. Frost lines, in the United States, vary from state to state, owing mostly to the amount and severity of winter weather that state receives. In Ohio, the frost line is 32 inches, meaning that over the course of a winter, Ohioans can expect the ground to be frozen down to around 32 inches of depth. Meanwhile, states with a hotter climate like Florida have a 0 (zero) depth frost line because freezing temperatures have almost no time to penetrate the soil.
Areas To Expect Frost Heave
Any area where standing water is not allowed to flow and drain away, you can expect frost heave. The longer water is allowed to stand and saturate a specific area, the more water will accumulate in that area's soil. If sustained freezing temperatures happen, that area will probably have frost heave. Problem areas include: crawl spaces under homes, farm fields, roads with poor storm sewer drainage, sidewalks, improperly constructed home foundations, and that deck on that one guy's house who didn't put his deck posts deep enough into the ground.
Effects Of Long Term Frost Heave
Items placed in the ground that are subject to the effects of long term frost heave can be pushed completely out of the ground. Other forms of damage can be sink holes (see below), uneven placement, and in rare cases: death. When such things occur, repairs must be made to avoid further damages. Items that are ignored will continue to be damaged by yearly frost heave until they are no longer recognizable.
After Frost Heave
Once above freezing temperatures occur and are sustained, underground ice will thaw and the water will drain or evaporate away. This can leave voids in the soil that some people call sink holes. Items build on or in that soil will not be supported in the same way as they used to be. They usually sink. This means odd hunks of concrete sticking at funny angles out of the ground, light poles twisted out of shape, and home domiciles thrown impossibly out of whack.
Frost Heave Solutions
Since everything is pretty much built out of inflexible materials on or in the ground and we live on a planet that is 3/4ths water, there is no cure.
Prevention
Since there is no cure for frost heave, prevention (as they say) is the best medicine. Things you can do to prevent frost heave:
- Don't build your shit next to Lake Erie.
- Make sure any structure is built with excellent drainage.
- If drainage cannot be guaranteed, install sump pumps that move water far away from the structure.
- Don't put newspapers in storm sewer drains.
- Place items going into the ground well below that region's frost line.
- Move to an arid region such as Arizona.
- Spend a little extra cash when you are repairing roads.
- Don't pave over gutters and spillways.
IRL shit
Below are 2 pictures showing "in real life" damage done to a road by a garbage truck:
External Links
- Frost line map and other valuable tidbits of information.
- Concrete leveling so you don't trip and bust your head.
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