Winterization
 

Hi everyone!!! I'm sure like me, alot of you are sick of the high prices for winterization of your Mariah-I'd like to ask if any of you know of a basic manual you can buy to get the tools needed to do it yourself.Most of what you pay is labor and I'm sick of paying a doctors fees for something I'm sure I could do on my own-Any suggestions? Thanx-Larry J.

While there are plenty of writeups on the internet on what to do to winterize your boat, all the nitty gritty can be found in the Mercruiser engine manuals, which as a contributing member, you have full access to.

You don't need any special tools for basic winterization: changing the drive and engine oils, oil and water separating filters, fogging the motor, adding fuel stabilizer, draining the cooling system and greasing the joints. All of these require only basic hand tools.

Winterization DIY Video
 

Hi Guys, found this link while searching for winterization tips. The video was very helpful...

NAIT's techlife magazine brings you stories of people, technology and innovation from one of the country's leading institutes of technology.

http://www.nait.ca/31549.htm


Hope other DIY backyard boat mechanic find it helpful.

Very helpfull video, thanks !

:wink_thumbup: Thanks for that video, I was glad to see the use of RV anti-freeze instead of regular auto anti-freeze. I've always used the auto stuff and had to recycle every spring but now there's a cheaper and safer way to winterize !! Thanks, again, Bolo

I agree, excellent video! It confirms I did mine correctly.:wink_thumbup:

Winterization
 

Did you leave the stern drive up or down? Leaving it up would take pressure off the rubber boot. :confused:

It should be left down for winter. That way any rain that may accumulate in it, will drain out instead of freezing inside the outdrive.

If you want to go one step further, remove it entirely, and store it in a garage or shed. That way you can check the u-joints and gimble bearing at the same time, and confirm the bellows is nice and dry.;)

Thanks, this video was very helpfull as this is my first attempt at winterizing a motor

Oh crap. I never knew about the power steering cooler. Glad I watch that video :)

Re: Winterization
 

Getting close to this time of year again here :( Did anybody happen to save that video, the link is broken now.

Re: Winterization
 

Winterize in September? Shewt it's still summertime !:D

It's great to live where you can sometimes water ski on New Years Eve. :eek_animated:

All I do is drain the block and pull the water hoses and drain them, leave the trim all the way down to let water drain. Then I just reverse it when there is a warm day and I want to use it. Never gets fully winterized.

Re: Winterization
 

Well, I hope I'm a month away from actually doing it. Winter does seem to be coming on us early this year though. Figures it would the first year I own two street bikes and a boat! :)

Re: Winterization
 

Hey Dredd, I'm in the same situation. The trick is to space it out as much as possible for as much fun as we can get. Mine goes like: Boat goes to storage in four weeks and the windshield goes on the bike. Depending how cold it gets early, the bike gets winterized and stored around Thanksgiving. The Camaro goes to storage when the snow starts.Then the countdown starts, 3 1/2 months til the boat comes out of storage.
But, this was a great boating wekend, I hope for four more.

Re: Winterization
 

Hi Dredd, try this new link, click here and hit the play button. If you can't see it, you'll probably need to install "Flash Player" to play it on your browser.

WetWilly

Re: Winterization
 

Winterizing... Would it still be necessary to 'winterize' your boat if it's in a heated shop all winter? I'd think it would be the same as sitting at the dock/lift or trailer. Not that I'm Jewish and don't want to spend the big bucks, but if it doesn't need it, why do it? We just bought a 7 bay shop, so she might be sitting in the heated shop talking to to the plow trucks that just got back ;)

Re: Winterization
 

Depending on how long your off season is I would say about the only thing that the climate control gets you out of is draining the cooling system (which I would personally do anyway because it's not very hard). You're most likely still going to want to pull your battery, change your oils, probably fog your cylinders, etc...

Re: Winterization
 

Thanks. And yes, I would still do the 'obvious' things like change the oils, put the battery on a trickle charger, ect ect.

Re: Winterization
 

+1 on the above. You need to change the fluids anyway. A drain and flush for the motor will get rid of the crap you've picked up this season. I've flushed sand, pine needles etc from the engine. Fogging and Sta-Bil is also a good idea.
And the two best things, you'll have all winter to do a detail job for next years launch and #1--- it's free!!! :D

Re: Winterization
 

[QUOTE=WetWilly;10838][FONT="Comic Sans MS"][SIZE="2"]Great find VernB63!

:confused::confused:

Re: Winterization
 

i need to see the video how to do that:shakehead:

Re: Winterization
 

Hi JWoodliff,

Not quite sure what to make of this post since you're quoting me from 10/19/2008, but back then, I was complementing VernB63 as he was the one who originally posted the link to the video. Unfortunately as often happens on the "net", things get moved around and the old links stop working.

If you check out the second page of this thread, post #17, I posted the "new" link, click on the link and away you go (just so you know, the video is almost 25 minutes long).

If that doesn't work, here's the direct address - http://www.nait.ca/flash_videos/techlife/winterize.html , just copy this address and paste it into your browser.

As I said in my earlier post, if the video does not play on your browser, you will probably need to install the "Flash Player" plug-in for your browser. Click here for the Adobe Flash Player download (it's 1.83MB in size).

BTW, I re-watched the video just to make sure the link was still working as of today.... :wink_thumbup:

WetWilly

Re: Winterization
 

First year with my boat and worried about the making sure I drain all the water correctly. If anyone out there has a 1995 5.7L mercruiser can you confirm there are 4 areas total to remove a screw from to drain water (one on each side of engine block and 1 on each elbow of manifold)? Am I missing anything? Merc manual on this site has some other areas that I was unable to locate but I'm not sure if it refers to newer engines.:confused:

Re: Winterization
 

I think that's pretty standard and you also want to pull the hoses off the manifolds as well as the water pump and let them drain from there too, then turn the motor over a couple times and it will blow the rest out.