Re: How - Why does it happen?
I changed up years ag, and started the following,
Winterizing consists of freeze protection basicaly. fog the cylinders, pull the carb fire arrestor and coat the carb with light oil, Then all electrical connections are sprayed lightly with WD-40 to remove moisture and coat with oil film. alternator & battery terminals included. battery cables are disconnected at this stage.
Spring starts with a shaker can electriical connection cleaner and recoating with corrosian protectant. during that process, connections are checked.
Then, its ignition components, battery check, etc.
oil change, filter change, waterseperator and inlines get replaced, cap and wires get cleaned and checked, . then a total visual inspection and cleaning of engine, bildge [looking for over winter leaks] , check belts, and attachments...
then we put muffs on and fire it.
ive found over many years of boating, batteries left hooked up over the winter can cause problems with extreme corrosian in even non used circuits. for the 2 minute disconnect, it cant hurt to unhook them. we also found that 90% of spring start up issues were electrical issues, where corrosian had shorted or blocked current flow, so the liberal oiling of these connections, an easy clean up in the spring, prevented most issues.
that visual inspection we do has found walnuts stored by squirrels up on the engine, [ go figure how they got in there], frayed wires, etc.
We beleive a fresh trune up in spring, beats installed parts in fall, that set in the boating envrioment all winter.
the other biggie is fuel. a full tank with stabilizer goes a long way in keeping condensation and fuel breakdown out of the equation.
we also jack the bow way up , and pull the transom drain plug, to assure that NO WATER can lay in the bildge. even on cold days, water evaporates, and with the proper conditions, it condenses on colder surfaces.
The electrical thing is in my opinion critical. Dont forget all the switches and guages, control cables and do-dads up there on the dash panel. We coat them also, as so often, they are where the rain and snow do the most harm on uncovered boats.
cleanup of the oil film is a breeze if you think computer cleaning or shaker can degresers that leave no resadue. Carb cleaners work great for this.
gremlins are the easy answer to why this happens, but reality says its just improper preperation, corrosian, and normal matterial breakdown.
our shake down this spring saw one of the twin engines that wouldnt start. the culpret, a broken hose clamp on the fuel line that allowed the fuel pump to suck air instead of fuel. past that, it was one wire off the dist, cap that kept the engine from idleing smooth.... hmmm, maybe there are gremlins after all.
