Anyone with a sea chest

[angus99]

. . . leave your boat in freezing waters over the winter? We have pulled ours every winter so it's never been an issue, but someone visiting our ER asked if a seachest could be damaged during a hard freeze. It's basically a column of water about 2.5 feet high with nothing to insulate it on five sides once temperatures drop in the ER . . . so the question got me thinking.

 

[Sealife]

When we winter in water(due to use), we make sure the ER never gets to freezing (so sea chest would be fine), We also don't "winterize" systems. If not using boat, we pull and winterize everything.

 

[GFC]

We leave our boat in the water all winter and have a BoatSafe heater in the engine room that keeps things about 40* down there, and several 1500W heaters throughout the interior of the boat.


I goofed up a couple of years ago and forgot about a sea strainer in the lazarette. It was an unheated area. The temps dropped, the plastic bowl in the strainer froze and broke and I ended up having to replace it.


Now I make sure I drain that strainer and also had a 110V plug installed so I can plug in a small 750W heater.

 

[BaltimoreLurker]

I've used a BoatSafe type heater when leaving my boat in over the winter. Was never a problem.

Never had a power failure either, so, there's that. But that is a consideration.

 

[BandB]

When we lived on the lake in NC, we kept our boat in the water year round and never winterized it. We kept all areas heated and also checked it daily or more frequently when especially cold.