Defense Against Old Man Winter

Now that we’ve all gotten our boats set for the winter, let’s reflect on why we do what we do, what was involved, how much work it was, what we can do over the winter, and might there be options we hadn’t considered to do it better next year.

We’ll start off painting the big picture, then in subsequent blog posts, dig in further.

What’s the problem?

So, why do we need to do anything differently in the winter than other in wonderful yachting seasons? In a word: freezing. We need to protect against water in our boat freezing, and to protect our boats from being exposed to external freezing water.

Other weathering is like that experienced by our boats during more temperate months, albeit maybe a bit more extreme, particularly from the damage caused by wind and ultraviolet. Hopefully we’re already defending against these bad actors.

 Call me Captain Obvious, but why do we need to protect against freezing water? Two primary reasons. The first is water expands as it freezes, which creates tremendous force. This leads to burst pipes and broken fittings. Not a happy situation. The second is that the surface ice on a body of water can do immense damage as it moves.

What can we do?

There are two major freezing defense regimes from which we can choose. Reduce or eliminate the possibility of freezing in our current cold location or move someplace where it’s unlikely to freeze.

Freezing in cold geographies

There are two freezing culprits in cold locations against which we need to defend. One is freezing damaging systems in our boat. The other is exterior environmental conditions wreaking havoc on our boat. It’s these possibilities which we need to reduce or eliminate.

Onboard systems freezing

There are several locations where freezing can damage systems aboard our boat. These include the obvious ones, like the engine cooling system, and the freshwater system. There are less obvious potential freezing victims, each requiring some sort of freeze mitigation defense. These include the head and holding tank, any cooling systems such as refrigeration or air conditioning, flooded batteries, any domestic liquids such as drinks or liquid soap, among others.

Environmental freezing

Water in contact with your boat, whether the water in which she floats, or precipitation, will freeze, and can cause serious, even catastrophic damage. Precipitation can fall as rain, collect, freeze and easily burst or break whatever traps it. Mast-out winter storage is a common culprit, with spreaders or mast tracks collecting rain, then Bad Things happen. Moving surface ice can slice a boat open at the waterline. It can pile up and push over dock pilings. It can grab anything at the surface around which it freezes and drag it to kingdom come.

Moving to non-freezing locations

There are two non-freezing locations to consider. One is inside storage in cold geographies, the other is taking your boat south and over-wintering someplace warm, where a deep freeze is unlikely.

Inside Storage

Hauling your boat and storing her indoors, in a heated space, reduces the possibility of being exposed to freezing conditions. There are still appropriate precautions: the heat can fail, and “heated” can in places be to temperatures only moderately above freezing. Relatively low height/air draft powerboats are more likely candidates for heated inside storage, as they can more easily be moved inside without having to remove superstructure or the mast.

Going South

There are very attractive destinations and options to take your boat south for the winter. You must be prepared to have your boat at a sometimes-inconvenient distance away, and probably not be planning any DIY work on her. You should also be prepared to deliver her south, either directly, for an offshore-capable boat, or taking advantage of sheltered passage routes where possible if not.

 Hurricane season must be taken into consideration, for a couple of reasons. First, you do not want to be delivering your boat south until hurricane season has ended, typically at the beginning of November. Deliveries after then can be brisk, to say the least. Second, the impact of any hurricanes that do come ashore can significantly impact southern marinas, and any arrangements you might have made for a southern slip with them. You might be forced to make new arrangements at the last minute, if your initial southern marina suffers any significant hurricane damage.

Summary

Freezing is bad for your boat. There are a couple of places you can store your boat for the winter, with options and considerations for each. We’ll explore each of these in upcoming posts