Winterize Ballast on 242x (Central VA)

[meegwell]

I am reading all the winterization threads and comfortable I will not do much to winterize the engines. By "Blow out does this mean run them momentarily w/o the hose on (boat on trailer)? Makes sense if so.

As far as my ballast system...all the bags are virtually empty ( I assume some water in them). Anything I should do with them and how? Im in central VA we will have freezing nights and days, maybe a snow or two...nothing terrible.

 

[Dave burke]

You’re right about what blow out the engines means. That’s what I do and no problems so far.

in terms of the ballast, I make sure the bags are empty, then pour about a gallon of antifreeze in the three bags and then run the pumps for a few seconds. That might excessive for you (I’m near Lake Placid) but I’d rather be safe than sorry

 

[biffdotorg]

I would worry about the pumps more than the bags. For obvious reasons, the bags have room for expansion, but the pumps do not. I could see either running them dry, or running some rv antifreeze through them to be sure no water is in them.

My bags I worried more about growth of organic material, but then remembered, they are sitting in a pole building that will drop as low as -40f, so anything organic will die. HA!

Good luck, great question.

 

[meegwell]

I would worry about the pumps more than the bags. For obvious reasons, the bags have room for expansion, but the pumps do not. I could see either running them dry, or running some rv antifreeze through them to be sure no water is in them.

My bags I worried more about growth of organic material, but then remembered, they are sitting in a pole building that will drop as low as -40f, so anything organic will die. HA!

Good luck, great question.

Thanks for the input. Curious..how would I run anything into the pumps? I assume there is an input tube running into the water/through hull?

 

[Dave burke]

There are definitely input/output pipes on my boat. When I run my pumps for a few seconds after putting antifreeze in the bags, you can see the antifreeze on the ground.

While I guess in theory you could suck antifreeze into the bags through the input/output pipes, I found much easier just to pour the antifreeze into the bags and then drain for a few seconds.