Advice on winterizing vintage outboards

[dave-bernard]

watch for water cavities that don’t drain. can freeze .

[crosbyman]

quote amuller:

My biggest concern is rodent damage, and how to prevent it.

get a cat that loves old motors and feed him nothing …. any rodents that show up will be eliminated 😆

Joining AOMCI has priviledges 🙂

[RICHARD A. WHITE]

I decided to install heat and A/C in my garage/shop, so my girls don’t get chilly or too hot….but I understand not everyone can do that

http://www.richardsoutboardtools.com
classicomctools@gmail.com

[fisherman6]

It goes a little better when I get it done before my test tank freezes up. I just broke the ice out of mine and dumped it out tonight. Now, I’m back to not being able to keep it full for extended periods of time. I’ll be filling it every time I want to use it now unless.we get a warmer stretch of weather. Temps in the mid teens at night do nothing for my progress of winterizing. By now if I don’t have the water drained out of leaky gearcases, I could be in trouble. I may need to try a drum heater this year.

Anyway, I run mine in the tank on 8:1 mix, fog the carb as it runs out of fuel and choke it out with fogging oil. Then pull the plugs and spray fogging oil into the cylinders and roll it over a few times slowly. Put the plugs back in, make sure the pistons are innthe middle of stroke, and call the top end done. It is always a good idea to pull the choke closed to keep the bugs and other stuff out.

Then it’s on to the gearcase. I pull the drain plug to check for water. If there is water, I drain it and refill with fresh oil and note the motor as needing a reseal. If I have run the motor more than a handful of hours, I change the oil
If I barely ran it and it doesn’t show water intrusion I put the plug back in and call it done. Hang it vertically so it drains and put a dryer sheet or two under the cowl. So far they have worked for me to keep the rodents out. I use the obnoxiously scented ones. I don’t know if that matters or not, but so far so good.

-Ben

OldJohnnyRude on YouTube

[bill-mcnamara]

All good winterizing procedures including the use of "dryer sheets" with which I’ve had great success with too.
Got caught a little short of time this year, and had to warm up my fresh gear oil today, first really cold day below freezing.
Also use about 1/2 doz. sheets inside my tarped boats which seems to discourage critters entering.
Not sure why the little animals object to the scent, but glad they do!

[vixbit]

Moth balls seem to keep mice away.

[PugetSoundBoater]

As for getting all the water out of the lower unit water pump area, how about dipping the lower unit into a narrow barrel with RV anti freeze in it?
Plan B-How about making an adapter to fit around the water inlet, and pumping some RV anti freeze up in the lower unit and then drain it out? That would reduce the amount of anti freeze needed.
But first ..need to know if the anti freeze would damage the impeller or seals?

"Some people want to know how a watch works, others just want to know what time it is"
Robbie Robertson

[chris-p]

FIsherman6 has a great write up on what to do, especially those of us up north. Please, do not take the advice of those trying to tell you that fogging is not necessary. I get a little upset over that. Geesh, we are trying to preserve these things right, sort of the motto of the club and all.

Something I may add to that, is I mist my motors in WD40 to prevent corrosion. You ever find a motor that has been sitting a long time and the powerhead and etc… is all corroded? We want to avoid that.

Second, ensure that your gearcase drains are Working. You should see that ooze running out of the holes, if not, they are clogged and need to be cleared out.

[jerry-ahrens]

I respectfully disagree with NOT fogging motors. I fog all of them for winter, or if I know I’m not planning on using them for awhile. I’m one of those guys that gets motors serviced, up and running, then hangs them up on the rack. Fogging allows them to be stored for along time without worries… At least spray some in the cylinder if nothing else. I run em all dry while fogging at the same time.
The original question had to do with lower units freezing up, I believe. I’ve never really thought about that issue.. there are several -100 and even -200 RV antifreezes available. maybe you could dunk the lower units in this solution? Just a thought.
As a pretty fair test of fogging, I have two identical 12 hp Sea King’s hanging under my deck outside. The old wedge head motors.
Both cranked over well when stored out there and under cover. One had been fogged well and hung there for a a couple years or so,
then I found another one and hung it there also. I never did get around to fogging or oiling up the cylinders… on the last one. After a year or so, I was out there one day and uncovered them. One still cranked over fine. The other one, was stuck tight! I have it soaking,
but haven’t got back to it yet. I should have took the time to do it right..

[chris-p]

There is a mechanic up north that runs the motors in a test tank full of antifreeze while going through the winterizing process. Just in case a drain is clogged. He uses the same tank for the inboards though. Its essentially a trough that he backs the boat down into while on the trailer. Neat.

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