Off Topic Close Call...Water Stones Almost Frozen

W

Working Edge

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Dec 14, 2020
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Having a cold snap with record low temps, plus two days of snowfall here in Northwest Arkansas.
Figured I'd better check on things in my garage workshop, and found my drinking water reserves starting to freeze over, and my plastic pond for my water stones capped by a 1/4 inch layer of ice.
I moved my water bottles into the house, and extricated my water stones from their watery grave. Two hours later, the water stone pond was a solid block of ice, and I sure am glad I found that in time. I've had those new stones only a couple of weeks...!
Anyone else have a close call like this?
Would those stones have been destroyed by a freeze?
Mark
 
I don't see any good outcome if they froze. Water expands about 10% when freezing so no way that would be benign. Maybe someone had stones freeze and can report the results.
 
I think if they were saturated and sitting out they could be damaged but in the pond they may have survived.

Also I believe this is dependent on what type of stone, a coarse stone can hold much more water so probably would sustain more damage.
 
Probably would have cracked the stones...

Fyi, if you have soaking stones and pull them from water make sure to wrap them in a microfiber towel and let them dry over a few days. This will also prevent cracking, stones can crack from drying too fast too.
 
I've done some experiments with deliberately freezing stones and can report that while the bond type and formulation will also play a role, the coarseness is the largest determining factor of whether or not a stone will survive a freeze. Coarser stones inevitably have less binder (due to the rule of cubes) and are more likely to crack when frozen as a result. I've had stones in the ANSI 220 grit range and finer survive freezing when fully submerged/saturated, but that won't be the case for all stones.
 
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