Winterizing... Are These Steps Critical

[scarlet]

My husband and I winterized our boat a few weeks ago. Our boat is kept in Delaware, we live in Kansas so we don't have easy access to the boat. Prior to winterizing, he went through the manuals of every single system, and created checklists based on their recommendations and completed all steps as prescribed. Since then, my husband has been worried about the boat, and if we did enough. He went out and watched some videos on line, and is now worried that we missed several critical steps recommended by "professionals".

I made notes of their "recommendations", and I would like to know from people here if they believe these steps are critical. (Our boat will be kept in the water over the winter)

1. We drained the sea water from both engines and the generator, but did not FORCE the water out under pressure. We just allowed it to drain naturally. One of the professionals on line recommended blowing those lines out with a shop vac. Is that a critical step?
2. Same question but for the Generator. Is that a critical step?
3. We put antifreeze in the sea strainer of one of the engines but we could not get the cap off the sea strainer for the second engine so we did not put antifreeze in the second engine sea strainer. However, he did open the impellor cover and drained the water until no additional water flowed out. He did not run the engine after adding the antifreeze to the raw water system. Is this critical?
3. We drained the air conditioner lines allowing the water to drain naturally. We got about a pint of water out of each of the 3 air conditioning units, let drain for 20 minutes. However, we did not "blow out" the AC systems and we did not add antifreeze through the raw water system. Is that critical?
4, one of the "experts" stated that once you fully drain your waste water system and heads you need to run Antifreeze through the whole waste water system. Again, he recommends blowing it through under pressure. We would have never thought to do this.. we just drained it dry then closed sea cocks. Is this a necessary step?
5. We drained the water out of the fresh water system by turning on the pumps and running the system dry, including the hot water heater until all faucets ran dry. Another expert stated that we should have blown air through the system, which we did not do, as well as pumping nontoxic antifreeze through the whole fresh water system. I never even though to do that. Is this a problem?

thanks in advance.

[S/V Illusion]

Blowing the lines out often does not eliminate residual water in low spots so it’s a ‘feel good’ action rather than substantive. However, what residual water remains should have more than enough space to expand (if it freezes) to not cause damage.

The head traps water around the bowl which does not drain so you may be installing a new one in the Spring.

[billknny]

The answer is to all of the above is... it depends.

To be 100% safe and sure that you will not have a problem with freezing water damaging expensive equipment, the safest course is to flush antifreeze through everything that has water in it.

Just by way of example, some engines will drain completely, just removing hoses, others require special drain plugs to be removed, others should be flushed with antifreeze because they are difficult to completely drain.

If somebody tells you "sure, no problem" do they have the same physical arrangement as you do? Do they live in a climate as cold as yours? Do they know what they are doing?

Pretty much the same with everything else. If your systems drain completely, you don't need antifreeze. If you can drain of blow them out completely, you don't need antifreeze. If there is any place water can collect and freeze, it can cause problems.

Anybody doing winterizing as a business for other people's boats HAS to be very conservative in approach. Otherwise he can have a lot of very unhappy customers come spring, with a lot of expensive problems that they blame him for.

Following the advice of a random forum member, remember they have no skin in the game.

Personally, I am very conservative with my boat.

[Spot]

+1 to billknny
Get as much fresh water out as possible, and if there is any shadow of doubt, fortify with RV anti freeze. I want to say on the water heater on the RV it is just drained and not filled with AF. Campers often have a bypass valve for this purpose, to dose the plumbing without filling the water tanks or water heater.

Scarlet, is there a DE local that you would trust to go back through the boat?

By way of a cautionary tale...
I decided to 'treat' myself to having the local outboard guy winterize my I/O speedboat. Called him up, was told no problem, will flush the system with antifreeze, he even had a couple of his own I/O's in the yard.

-First warning sign was when a co-worker told me he hooked up his transmission backwards, causing a bad bump into the dock...
-Second warning sign is when he had to call me to find out how to start the boat. He could not figure out the standard 'pull out to start' knob on the controls. The manual was with the boat...
-Third warning sign was the fact that he had a bar/rec room in the shop...

I got the boat back and decided to audit the work. The cast iron exhaust riser was plumb full of fresh water. The manual was with the boat and told which three plugs needed to be pulled to drain the system completely, the exhaust riser being one of them. I ended up redoing the work myself. Had I not checked I would have lost the 140HP block and exhaust. I can't quite remember if I called him and shared my observations about his work.

My current boat has no plumbing and just an outboard so winterizing is more like looking out the window and wishing it was warmer outside...

Fair winds and non-frozen pipes!

[akexpress]

First post on forum for me not an expert but I have 35 years experience winterizing 3 different sailboats and an rv here in Alaska ( we do get cold) here. The sailboats stay in the water as the saltwater does not freeze in the port. We do get air temps well below zero at times.

Scarlet I would find someone to deal with the engines at least as you might be at risk and they are the most expensive to repair . The water systems and toilets are just a pain to fix if you have issues.

Engine
Fresh water cooled diesels Check engine system antifreeze temp rating with test tool available at any auto parts store. Adjust as necessary for your conditions. Close saltwater intake thru hull, open stainer have engine rated non toxic antifreeze (a second person helps) to start the engine and pour non toxic antifreeze into open strainer and run engine until it comes out the exhaust (may take more then 1 gallon depending on the boat) Shut off engine. That is about all you need to do to the engine. If getting to the top of the stainer is difficult I have put a T and valve into line from the stainer to engine with a hose to place in antifreeze container. This means you don't ever have to remove stainer top in future to winterize. Make sure to return valve to appropriate position so in the spring when you start engine you are drawing from the salt water intake thru hull.

Water system
I have added a shraeder valve after the expansion tank and pump into the water line. so after you have drained all the tanks you can use a simple floor bike pump to pump air thru the lines. You should have drained the water heater prior to adding any air. One by one open the faucets furthest away from the shraeder valve and pump air until no water comes out. Proceed to the next nearest and repeat. As a final step I add about 1 gallon of water system non toxic antifreeze to one tank and pump it thru the system to the closest faucet to the pump. This winterizes the pump and expansion tank. This set up minimizing the amount of anti freeze you need to clear out of the system in the spring.

Drain the holding tanks and pump RV antifreeze thru heads and leave some in bowl. Pour RV antifreeze in shower sumps and pump out. Antifreeze in each sink drain though most boats don't have p traps. Should take less then an hour to winterize from freezing problems. There are routine maintenance items that are part of the process like changing oil etc but the freezing part is very easy.

Mark
S/V CHAOS
Seward Alaska
Beneteau First 47.7

[CarlF]

Why not schedule a trip back in mid December to generally check on the boat? This will be before anything inside could get in trouble from freezing. And it's better than worrying all winter.

The engine and genset are the big concerns. Trapped water there could cause expensive damage. Every engine is different. As you probably saw in the videos, the best thing for the engine and genset is to take a hose off the seacock, stick it in a bucket of anti-freeze and run the engine until pink comes out the exhaust. It takes 10 minutes.

If you only got a little water out of the A/C, there's certainly water left inside. You can't really fix A/C's that burst from freezing - they're trash. Here again, it's really easy to just take the hose off the seacock and run antifreeze through.

The odds are good that a drained freshwater system will have enough expansion room be OK - and if not, the cost of repair will be minimal. I would pour some antifreeze in the head and flush. But once you've gone this far, it's pretty easy to also suck antifreeze through the fresh water system - but check the internet for how to bypass the hot water heater or you'll need a lot of antifreeze.

I'd try to get that strainer open. You're going to need to clean it someday. Better at the dock than at sea. If it's bronze, it's not corroded - just stuck. The Groco's have holes in the plastic top that fit a wide deck key wrench. That usually opens them easily.

Finally, Delaware isn't Maine. It won't take much heat to keep things above freezing. Cheap electric space heaters are a fire hazard but a few 100 watt light bulbs might be enough in Delaware. Or a couple of the heat lamp bulbs you can get at HD.

[redneckrob]

I take a completely different and far easier route. I simply close every seacock, remove the intake hose and put it into a bottle of RV antifreeze, and run the equipment until red comes out the discharge, about a gallon for every system. Even if there is some fresh water left the RV antifreeze will mix with it and the freeze protection is fine for anything short of Antarctica. The only exception to this on my boat is the hot water heater I have to drain before running antifreeze through the water system. If you have raw water cooling of the entire engine you will have to either run the engine till the thermostat opens before doing the antifreeze thing or remove the appropriate hoses to drain the post thermostat section and fill it with antifreeze. It seems foolish not to run antifreeze through even if you do drain or blow out the system because there may be trapped sections of water that you miss.

[GordMay]

Greetings and belated welcome aboard the CF, Mark.

[ranger58sb]

Originally Posted by scarlet

I made notes of their "recommendations", and I would like to know from people here if they believe these steps are critical. (Our boat will be kept in the water over the winter)

We often winter in the water, semi-nearby where your boat is.

We run antifreeze through the raw water systems on both engines and genset. I consider that critial, 'cause the cost of failure is huge. Actually, I have our yard do this one, because they have a little red wagon with pumps on it and tanks for boatloads of AF... so they can schlepp all that AF easier than I can, get it done faster/easier. In your case, with smaller engines, the schlepp issue might not be such a big deal...

We run antifreeze through the raw water system on our ACs. I consider critial because much of our hose run is above the waterline, potentially subject to freezing. AND because next year, if there's a winterizing failure in one of the AC hoses, the water pump will quickly bring a boatload of water into the boat! (Had a line pop off a fitting on Summer, water all over the place... inside the saloon, etc. Gak!) Accomplished via a 4-gallon (approx) "flush box" I made up, with a spigot attached. Hoses and fittings made up to attach flush box to AC raw water intake. Force feed AF using a transfer pump AND using the AC water pump. (Otherwise, antifreeze doesn't make it all the way through the longest of the two routes.) This is all easier than it sounds; and once the box and the various hose fittings are made up, they're useful for periodic in-season flushing, winterizing in subsequent years, etc. (It also helps that I installed Groco flush valves (SCC) on that intake, so I don't really have to yutz with pouring AF into the strainer BUT... this time... you could maybe just pour AF into your strainer fast enough so your AC pump will pull it all through.

For fresh water system, I drain our tanks, drain our water heater, and then blow out all the PEX lines with an air compressor. Then I disconnect the input and output to our strainer/pump/accumulator assembly, and pump a quick shot of AF through those to protect the pump and accumulator. There's never enough water left anywhere in the PEX to freeze. This one won't sink the boat if there's a boo-boo, but I don't want to have to repair stuff the following year.

Our holding tank and sanitation hose is all new this year, and we're not offshore.... so I haven't actually used the overboard macerator pump... nothing in that hose/pump needs winterizing.

For raw water washdown, I disconnect the hose at the inlet and then let the pump suck AF 'til it runs out all of our washdown spigots.

You probably don't have a fishbox, but I let our overboard macerator pump flush some AF out that thru-hull.

-Chris

[svspirited]

My $0.02 is you should get back there before the real deep freeze starts and do what everyone else here has mentioned. If you are having difficulty getting the top off of the strainer then invest in a can of Kroil, spray liberally and let it soak into the threads, with the right wrench and a little elbow grease it will open, then just put some Lanolin on the threads to make it all nice and easy to get off going forward, you should be checking and cleaning that strainer regularly anyway.


You want to drain all of the water then run antifreeze through everything that water runs through, no real need to blow it through with air just run enough through until the water comes out pink. For the holding tank so long as you have emptied it you should be fine though flushing antifreeze through the head is a good idea, you don't want water getting trapped in there and causing an issue.


Same goes for the engine and genset. Are they diesel? If yes then simply changing the oil, running some antifreeze through the raw water system, and putting a plastic bag over the air intakes and exhaust to keep moisture out is all you need. If they are gasoline you really should fog them with fogging oil.


The antifreeze is a whole lot less expensive than a new engine, AC, etc. I use about 18 gallons total for a 44 foot sail boat with a diesel main, genset, 120 gallons of fresh water, two heads, two showers, cockpit shower, etc. About $100 and it's about the cheapest insurance you can buy.

[Svsumurun]

Agreed with everything above - and I'll add one more thing - open every seacock and the hot water heater relief valve ... ( heater should be bypassed and just drained - the antifreeze amount is crazy to fill it)
Even with everything blown out etc , I've seen big icicles growing out of the seacocks in January! You have to give the water somewhere to expand to when it freezes.

If you get water in your bilge , then I would dump some antifreeze down there too ( especially if the boat isn't shrinkwrapped- the thaw/freeze cycles will make water come in where it normally doesn't ).

[ranger58sb]

Originally Posted by svspirited

You want to drain all of the water then run antifreeze through everything that water runs through, no real need to blow it through with air just run enough through until the water comes out pink.

Just a comment on this part...

Our tank situation is that it takes us about 15 gallons of AF to begin running pink from the tank through the freshwater system hoses. Just happens to need that much to get anything -- that's not too much diluted -- out of our tanks. And then it takes forever to flush freshwater tanks and water heater in the Spring.

Another approach is to inject AF immediately before the freshwater pump, assuming that will also treat the dockside water connection. Much less AF required, probably 3 gallons in our case, assuming the water heater is bypassed first.

Our preferred solution is compressed air, though. I wouldn't call this a "need" to do, it's just easier. That runs while I'm puttering around doing other stuff, with me occasionally closing one spigot and opening another. Takes about a pint of AF to finish that off with a quick shot of AF through the (disconnected at each end) strainer/pump/accumulator assembly. The quick QEST connectors at each end make that about a 2 minute job.

-Chris

[S/V Illusion]

If anyone actually fills their heater with antifreeze, you are wasting antifreeze. The antifreeze manufacturer may thank you but you just wasted your money.

The residual water won’t harm anything given it has lots of space in which to expand.

More important, propylene glycol based antifreeze losses it’s efficacy if diluted even a small amount so don’t use it to ‘displace’ water which serves only to mix it.

[Dockhead]

The average low temperature in Wilmington in the coldest month, January, is only -4.1C, with average high +4C. Is there really much risk of anything freezing inside a boat in the water in such a climate?


Remember the water will always be plus (or else it won't be water anymore ).


I am pondering this question myself, with my boat in the water in Denmark with average low temperature in January of -1, with average high of +1. Average sea temperature in January is +2. I would like to keep sailing during the winter and don't want to have to re-winterize after every trip.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by S/V Illusion

. . . More important, propylene glycol based antifreeze losses it’s efficacy if diluted even a small amount . . .

Where did you get that idea?


Propylene glycol is not quite as strong as ethelyne glycol (car antifreeze), but its antifreeze properties are most certainly not suddenly lost by "even a small amount of dilution".





https://www.clenair.com/sites/clenai...col_Values.pdf


If you use 100% propylene glycol, you can be diluted by even 60% water to 40% glycol, and you still have freeze protection down to -8F (-22C), a temperature which just about cannot possibly exist inside a boat, even in short spells of -30C and the boat on the hard.