Winter Storage

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pat.jack

New member
Hi Folks,

Living in the Upstate NY area, we have pulled our boat out of the water and are preparing to winterize the boat. I'm wondering what recommendations some of you have based on your experience storing your boats? Unfortunately, we do not have space at our home to store the boat, so we plan to store the boat at a Marina that is a Honda Dealer and have them perform some service on the engine (we have a Honda 90hp). The standard practice in our area is to shrink wrap the boats and store outdoors.

Some of the questions we have are-preventing mold in the cabin. What do you recommend to minimize mold (the marina specifies a product called Kanberra)?

Do you normally take your cushions out of the boat before storing?

We have recently added CamperBack canvas for the cockpit-what have you done to properly store that for the winter?

Hearing about your experience would be appreciated.

Regards,
Jack Howell
 
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We purchased a heavy duty winter canvas that was done by Fisher Canvas in Burlington New Jersey. It is supported by one long wooden 2 x4 in the front and two 2 x 4 's in the rear. It has a zippered access door. We leave a small electric heater on all winter. The shrink wrap thing seemed to be money out the window over time. I know it can be used over but a decent winter cover cost around 1250 dollars and we have had it for 5 winters, you can do the math. We like being able to go aboard for winter projects and just to insure everything stays peachy in the cabin area. We run RV anti freeze thru any of our water systems which include raw water wash down and the fresh water system. I would remove any canvas or cushions and store them in a dry place. Because we sometimes have mice, I bought a Rubbermaid dock box at Home Depot for a little over $100 dollars. I roll my camper top sides up after making sure they are completely dry using big towels and those swim noodles. Then I put them in individual canvas bags that have sewn on canvas handles. We do this because we trailer our boat a lot and it makes them easy to handle plus it protects them while in transit. Then we put them in the dock box located in our garage along with herbal mouse repellant that contains spearmint leaves called Fresh Cab. www.earth-kind.com I also duct tape a heavy duty trash bag around the trailers winch and tuck the electrical connect for the trailer inside the bag before duct tapping. I would use some anti mildew stuff in your rear lazarettes compartments along with your anchor rode area. Some folks spray their electrical terminals and the power head of your outboard with a anti corrosion blocker. We use WD 40 although some might find fault with that and would recommend Boeshield T 9. I would make sure your fuel gets treated with Blue Stabil or the marine ethanol additive to prevent phase separation or the other after effects of ethanol laced gas in stored gasoline engines. The dealer might have already seen to that. I lube our sliding window channels with Mary Kate liquid Rollers so they slide open easy in the spring. I shoot a little Febreeze in the cabin for good measure.
D.D.
 
Don't get as much freeze/snow as you but we do get some. We store our boat at home, however.

What I do every winter:

-drain H2O tank
-flush H2O system w/ compressed air
-drain water heater
-put pink anti-freeze in H2O pump
-use small oil heater on low in cabin w/ West Marine air circulating "fan" like this: http://www.fisheriessupply.com/caframo-stor-dry-dehumidifier-9406ca
-leave head window open
-open all cabinets, doors etc
-stand cushions up (air circulation) as well as life vests etc
-launder then place bedding in "Space Bags" and vacuum air out
-battery charger "on"
-cover w/ Sunbrella cover....

As far as the camper-back, just make sure it's clean and DRY and roll it up. We just store ours in a bag in the V-berth.
I've also used commercial desiccants but now I don't see the value, as the heater works fine.

The Kanberra they are refering to is this:
http://www.fisheriessupply.com/kanberra-gel-kanberra-gel-tea-tree-oil-air-purifier
 
Our boat is stored in a boat valet, inside storage facility. Here is what I do:

1) Gasoline treated with storage level blue stabil
2) Main engine is fogged. Oil, oil and gas filters changed.
3) Full canvasback left up, but zippers are left half zipped to promote air circulation
4) Tarp placed over boat to protect from dust and dripping of liquids from boats above us in the facility
5) The cabin door screened window is in place to promote circulation within the cabin
6) Cabinets and drawers are left open
7) I don't worry about the birth cushion because we have Hypervent underneath it
7.5) All water was removed from the 15 gallon fresh water tank ( in the spring, we shock the tank with chlorine)
9) Water is removed from the windshield wiper fluid reservoir and water lines are blown out.
10) The battery switch is turned off, and all batteries are removed and put into storage
11) The 6 inch hull inspection port cover is removed to allow any moisture between the hull and floor pan to evaporate
12) I cleaned the boat interior and cockpit
13) My 22 pound Lewmar anchor, the anchor chain and rode was removed. I soaked the rode in liquid fabric softener as people have recommended on this site, and it really made the anchor rode more supple. Now, It will dry out over the winter.
14) Applied MarPro Salt Terminator to the exterior surface of the boat to include canvas andwindow channels, and flushed the main engine with it.
15) We have type IV inflatable life jackets. We removed from the boat, and in the spring will test inflate them (with the air tube) according to manufacturers recommendations.
16) In the spring, I will remove the old disel fuel and replace with fresh fuel. Lifespan of diesel, as I understand it, is two years.

Why did we remove everything from our boat? As most of you know, our type of boats have a lot of storage capacity. We find that at least 20 percent of the stuff we did not use, so next year, that stuff is not going back to clutter our boat.
 
Thanks to all of you who replied to my request on winter storage for our boats. I have a bit of work to complete before we put the boat in storage-sometime late next week.

Regards,
jack Howell
 
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