Is Winterizing For The Madisonville Area Needed

This year we plan on keeping LUNASEA on the north shore for the winter, is there anything special that needs to be done. Knowing that it sometimes gets much colder than in Houma how should I prepare. I am planning on leaving 3-4 heaters on, one in engine room, one in head, one in bilge storage and one in main cabin. What else do I need to do?

kartracer said:

This year we plan on keeping LUNASEA on the north shore for the winter, is there anything special that needs to be done. Knowing that it sometimes gets much colder than in Houma how should I prepare. I am planning on leaving 3-4 heaters on, one in engine room, one in head, one in bilge storage and one in main cabin. What else do I need to do?

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Keep your power bill paid up.

Do you get freezing weather?
Does it last for several days to a week or more?
Do you get to the boat regularily?


If not then maybe a proper winterizing should be done.
Your weather will be milder than mine.
Even so if the answers to my questions above are not great then protect yourself as a power outage could cost you far more than the savings in time, effort and materials if a hard freeze happens along with a power outage.

When we kept our boat on Galveston Bay, we didn't do anything in the winter. Madisonville probably has near the same climate.

David

Greetings,
Mr. k. I agree with Mr. Cl. If there is ANY, even remote, chance of a hard freeze, spent the time and little $$ to properly winterize.
We were in NC for a time and did NOT expect a prolonged freeze BUT one year, an improper blow out of the water lines, by me, generated a burst cold water line. Could have been a lot worse...Just sayin'

We never did anything in Seabrook, between Houston and Galveston. The temperature occasionally dipped below freezing for a few hours, but never long enough to be a risk. But, we did live close enough to the boat to be able to do something if we had bizarre weather.

I don't do anything here except for a hard freeze put on a space heater in the engine compartment, leaving the hatch up to the saloon open so some heat gets up there. Madisonville on the North shore gets colder I'd check with some of the local boaters over there. Space heaters are a big amp draw be sure your power cords and inlets are in good shape.

I had a boat in Municipal Harbor in New Orleans for 10 years and never did winterize. In fact it was my favorite sailing season and I often took the boat out. I don't remember anybody in the harbor ever doing anything special. Come to think of it, my boat spent all last winter with me living aboard in the Industrial Canal and this year am in Long Beach MS. As a live aboard there is enough warmth on the boat not to worry.
At this latitude I have never seen the harbor water come close to freezing. Usually in the high 30's or low 40's in dead of winter. When ambient water temp is well above freezing it keeps the air in the engine room about the same as water temp no matter the outside air temp.
I think the only thing at risk of freezing is the dock hose and even that would be very rare.

How far away from the boat will you be ?
There are devices that you can turn on and off with a cell phone, so you could have a heater ready to go if necessary, but not be paying for it 24/7 if you didn't need it.

Also...I wasn't sure from your post...will you be in the water or out ?

Thanks all !!!!!!

In short - nothing. The only concern I have is interior condensation. Countered by continuous air circulation same as the rest of the year. Even with what's laughingly called (down here) a "hard freeze", lake temp is in the 50s.

kartracer said:

This year we plan on keeping LUNASEA on the north shore for the winter, is there anything special that needs to be done. What else do I need to do?

Click to expand...

If the boat is to be kept in the water, unless the water can freeze hard, there's no need to winterize any systems or equipment below the waterline because boat hulls take their temperature off the water temperature and equipment and plumbing entirely below the waterline can't get any colder than the hull. However, unless you're planning to use the boat regularly all winter, there are systems that do need to be prepared for extended layup...starting with the sanitation system:

Pump out and THOROUGHLY rinse out the holding tank. You don't have to fill the tank to do this...put a few gallons of water into it via the deck pumpout fitting--'cuz that sends the water into the tank at the bottom to stir up any sludge and hold it suspension so it can be pumped out...pump that out. Repeat...repeat...repeat...until you're pumping out clean water.

Follow mfr's instructions for preparing any treatment device (Lectra/San, ElectroScan, PuraSan) for extended layup.

If the toilet is above waterline, it should be winterized. First flush enough to clear ALL the water out of it. If a sea water toilet, remove the flush water inlet hose from the thru-hull (close the seacock first!), stick it into a jug of non-toxic potable antifreeze and flush the toilet to pump it all through the system all the way into the tank. Even if the toilet is below waterline, if any of the bowl is above, it needs protection and just pouring antifreeze down the toilet won't provide any.

As for the fresh water systems, whether the water tank should be left full or empty has supporters in both camps. If plumbing is above waterline, there should be no water left in any of the lines. Draining the plumbing may require installing some quick connect fittings.

As for all other systems, follow mfr's instructions for preparing for extended layup. If you don't have 'em, you should be able to find owners manuals on the net...if a system is too old for it to still be available, contact the mfr directly.

Here in NC we get several nights where it gets into the 20F's. I turn off the fresh water pump and open all spigots. The engine room I do nothing. Ambient heat from the water below is enough to protect anything in there. Even get some ice in the creek, but water below is at least a few deg above. Never had a problem.

We normally winterize completely here in the Northeast but one year we had left the boat for 3 Winter months at an inland ICW marina in S. Carolina. We were advised it was not necessary to winterize but, since we were set up to do it routinely, we did a partial winterization anyway. All fresh water was drained down, including items like the washing machine, PH window washers, etc. We did not bother with seawater systems.We did leave a small electric fan heater with an on/off thermostat (set 40 degrees)running in the ER. We were glad we did. Turned out it was the coldest Winter they had experienced in quite a while. You can get an inexpensive compact fan heater with a thermostat for short money. Assuming power outages do not last too many days it will do the job below the water line.

Well it looks more like winter down around Madisonville that the PNW.. You just never know what Mother Nature will do