It is not always possible to fill the radiator with antifreeze in a timely manner. Usually, in such cases, drivers wonder at what temperature the water in the engine freezes. After all, everyone knows that this is not very good. There are cases when drivers found a piece of the engine lying under the car in the morning. To avoid this, you should promptly fill the cooling system with antifreeze. But, just in case, it’s better to know up to what temperature you don’t have to worry about the motor, and also how to minimize the risk of damage.

What usually suffers?

At what temperature does water freeze in the engine? Before answering this question, let's look at the main consequences of this situation. Actually, there may be several problems. In very slight frost the radiator may freeze. An ice plug forms in the hoses. Because of this, the water only circulates in a small circle, and as a result, the engine overheats. Overheating leads to deformation of engine parts and failure.

More severe frost is fraught with mechanical damage to the engine and cooling system. If you are lucky, only one radiator will be damaged. Replacing it, of course, also costs money, but compared to the capital cost of the motor, it’s pennies. In a more severe case, the cylinder block will be damaged. Most often, after this, the engine is completely replaced.

When does water freeze?

From the physics course, even poor students who attended school every other day know that water freezes at 0°C. It would seem that this knowledge is enough to know exactly when the engine will defrost. But in practice everything looks a little different. Often, a car can easily withstand temperatures down to -3°. There are cases where even -7° was not fatal to the engine. Why is this happening?

The motor is quite a large mass of metal. It also contains lubricant and coolant, in our case water. When you park the car, the temperature of the power unit is around 90°. The engine cannot cool down instantly, and besides, the temperature is usually above zero in the evening. Cooling occurs gradually. With light frost, the engine simply does not have time to freeze completely.

The presence of additional factors also plays a role. IN cloudy weather cooling occurs faster. If the wind blows into the radiator, the chance of freezing the car increases significantly. In general, down to a temperature of -3° you don’t have to worry about the safety of the power unit. With frost down to -7°, the risk increases significantly. But still, with the right approach, you can survive this.

How to avoid defrosting?

  1. Many things happen unexpectedly in our lives. Among such “unchildish” surprises are sudden frosts. Often after repairs, water is flooded into the car. This often happens in the case of repairs divided into several parts. However, it is easier to drain the water before carrying out work. So, let's see how to protect your car from damage. There are several ways:
  2. Drain the water. This is the most reliable way. This way you are guaranteed not to freeze the engine. Although, there are some nuances. Some of the water will remain in the motor due to technical features it will not be possible to drain it completely. The residue can form a plug, complicating subsequent charging of the cooling system;
  3. Insulate your car. Drivers often tape off the hood for the winter with reverse side heat insulator. This will slightly reduce the risk of block damage. It's a good idea to put an apron on the radiator. You can wrap the engine. Cover it with an old blanket or jackets. This will minimize the possibility of the motor freezing at a slight minus. Such protection makes sense when parking the car overnight. By leaving it like that for a few days, you are guaranteed to go for a new engine;
  4. Park your car overnight in places protected from the wind. Availability air flow significantly enhances the cooling of engine parts. Even with a slight minus, there is a risk of ice formation in the cooling system. If quiet place If you can’t find it, then park the car so that the wind does not blow into the radiator;
  5. Add some antifreeze. It is enough to buy one liter to feel completely calm down to -7°;
  6. Starting the engine at certain intervals. This method will avoid freezing even at temperatures down to -10°. The inconvenience of this method is the need to go to the car every hour.

In addition to freezing, water in the radiator poses other dangers. It contains salts, which, deposited on the cooling jacket, gradually lead to complete blockage of the cooling channels. It is especially dangerous to pour mineral water into the radiator. There is a known case when a girl added mineral water to the expansion tank. After using such coolant, I had to throw out the block. Be sure to rinse the engine after adding water before adding antifreeze.

Conclusion. Everyone knows that it is not recommended to use water as a coolant, but often the car owner has no other choice. This is where the question arises, at what temperature does the water in the engine freeze? In fact, there is no clear answer to this question. It all depends on the combination large quantity various factors. The lower threshold is usually taken as -3°. There is definitely nothing to worry about at this temperature. Application additional funds protection may reduce the permissible temperature.

At what temperature does water freeze, everyone remembers from school that an ice crust appears on water at 0 degrees Celsius. But, even at such a relatively low temperature, the water in the glass can completely freeze, forming a solid piece of ice. It is worth noting that freezing of water is one of its natural forms. You must remember that water can be in solid, liquid and vapor form, and in all three states, it is water.

To spend clear example, just place a bottle of water in the freezer, and after two hours you can see pieces of ice inside, and after a day, all the liquid in the bottle will turn into solid ice. But, it must be remembered that when ice freezes, the ice expands and the jar may burst, especially if it is filled to the brim and closed with a lid. Have you ever wondered why all fence posts are made with a blank cover, and if not, then they are plugged or covered plastic cans. This is all to ensure that water does not get inside these columns. In Russia, as it happens, today it is pouring rain, and tomorrow the temperature drops below zero. Once the column is filled with water, temperatures below zero turn the water into ice, which in turn can damage the column, causing cracks and other defects to appear. Have you asked at what temperature does water freeze? The process of crystallization and the transition of water from a liquid state to a solid state begins already at 0 degrees Celsius.

At what temperature does water freeze in heating pipes in a residential building?

If the temperature in the house remains -10 for several days, and there is water in the pipes, it may freeze, which will lead to pipe rupture. Many people have probably seen modern heating radiators with a water drain function. Almost all modern batteries are equipped with the ability to drain water. This is done so that in the event of an emergency, when the temperature in the house is -10, the water does not freeze and burst the pipes. If the situation has reached this point, we really sympathize with you, most likely you will have to change the batteries, since in the process of freezing the water, microcracks probably occurred that make further exploitation These batteries are dangerous.

Why can water freeze in pipes? If during the heating season, just when the batteries are filled with water, a breakdown occurs and the water is supplied cold, and the outside temperature rapidly drops, this can lead to freezing of the pipes.

We have already answered the question at what temperature does water freeze; as an experiment, take a small glass, fill it halfway with water and put it in the freezer for several hours, two hours is enough for the water to partially turn into ice.

If you ask a person the question: “at what temperature does water freeze?”, then most often we will hear the answer that at 0 However, this is not always the case. For example, if you slowly cool distilled water, it will not turn into ice even at a temperature several degrees below zero. But if you put a small piece of ice in it, it will instantly begin to freeze, “sprouting” into long crystals. This process is associated primarily with the peculiarities of crystallization. To transform H2O into a solid, the presence of impurities and heterogeneous dust particles, air bubbles is necessary... The purest liquid is simply devoid of centers of support, therefore, determining at what temperature water (distilled) freezes,

the above factors should be taken into account. In laboratory conditions, the temperature of the liquid was reduced to 70 degrees.

Moreover, according to its chemical nature and position on the periodic table, H2O should solidify at one hundred degrees below zero. However, it does not obey most physicochemical laws that can be applied to other substances and compounds. The thing is that the interaction is unusually large, so a special, intense thermal molecular movement is required to overcome the attraction. This is evidenced by such a fact as a sharp increase and melting.

An interesting fact when answering the question of at what temperature water freezes is the fact that under some conditions, a hot liquid can freeze faster than a cold one. But a prerequisite for this is the fact that it is up to

must pass through certain temperature steps during the freezing process. This phenomenon was discovered by Aristotle, but it was only in 1963 that schoolboy E. Mpemba proved that a mixture of hot ice cream freezes faster than cold ice cream. The whole point turned out to be that what more difference between and cold air masses, the more intense the heat exchange occurs, and, accordingly, the more intense the cooling begins.

The scientific basis for the answer to the question “at what temperature does ocean water freeze” is also interesting. Typically this process starts at minus two degrees. However, the more salts in the water, the lower the temperature required for the liquid to freeze. However, there is no specific freezing point here. With an average salinity level of 35 percent, the temperature

freezing point - 1.9 degrees. At the moment when ice formation begins, a large percentage of salt remains in the water, which lowers the freezing point.

As we see, temperature regime converting H2O into ice is quite broad. This fact also applies to other liquids. For example, determining at what temperature you can get the answer that at -115 degrees. This is why it is used in deicing and antifreeze fluids.

Thus, answering the question “at what temperature does water freeze,” you can be sure that the answer depends on many factors. And at the moment, most paradoxes find a completely scientific explanation.

Pure water at 0 °C doesn't freeze- just like sea water.

In order for water to freeze, it needs something to which its molecules can attach. Ice crystals form around "nuclei" - such as dust particles. If there are none, you can cool the water to -42 ° C before it starts to freeze.

Cooling water without freezing is known as "supercooling". This should be done slowly. You can, for example, place a bottle very clean water into the freezer and refrigerate it. But as soon as you pull the bottle out and tap your finger on the glass, the water will instantly turn into ice.

Ultra-fast cooling of water has a completely different effect. Bypassing the ice stage (which has a uniform crystalline lattice structure), it transforms into a chaotic amorphous solid, known as " glassy water"(so named because of the random arrangement of molecules, similar to the structure of glass). To obtain “glassy water,” the temperature must be lowered to -137 °C in just a couple of milliseconds. “Glass-like water” on Earth can only be found within the walls of laboratories, but in the Universe this form of water is found most often - it is what comets are made of.

Due to the high salt content sea ​​water regularly cools below 0°C without freezing. The blood of fish, as a rule, freezes somewhere at -0.5 ° C, so marine biologists have long been puzzled by the question: how do fish manage to survive in polar seas? It turns out that species such as the Antarctic ice fish and herring, produce proteins in the pancreas that are absorbed by their blood. It is the proteins that prevent the formation of ice crystallization nuclei (almost like antifreeze in a car radiator).

Knowing the characteristics of water when low temperatures, you will not be surprised to learn that its boiling point (even at normal pressure) - not necessarily 100 °C. It may well be much higher. True, here too the liquid must be heated slowly, and in the vessel without a single scratch. It is in the scratches that the very air cavities are contained, near which the first bubbles form.

Boiling begins when bubbles of water vapor expand and break through the surface of the water. For this to happen, the temperature must be high enough that the pressure created by the vapor bubble exceeds atmospheric pressure. Under normal conditions this is 100°C, but if there are no places in the water where bubbles can form, more heat is required to overcome the surface tension of the bubbles making their way into life. (For the same reason, it is more difficult to inflate a balloon at the beginning than at the end.)

This, by the way, explains why a cup of boiling coffee can explode, splashing everything around, if you take it out of the microwave or stir it with a spoon. The movement will cause chain reaction, as a result of which all the water contained in the coffee will rapidly evaporate.

And finally, one last water oddity: hot water freezes faster than cold. Aristotle was the first to draw attention to this back in the 4th century BC. e., however scientific world recognized that he was right only in 1963 - thanks to the perseverance of a Tanzanian schoolboy named Era-sto Mpemba. The boy confirmed the words of the ancient Greek, clearly demonstrating that sweetened milk mixture will turn into ice cream faster if it is first heated. But we still don’t know what the secret is.