Mid Summer Start During Storage?

[4StrokeAddict]

One more thought. Coming from the helicopter world, I can tell you most machines don't like to sit idle. We always had issues if we didn't exercise our helicopter fleet weekly. They tended to break more frequently when sitting then when being exercised. Getting all the fluids moving, lubing the seals, getting the moisture out of the oil and exhaust by getting it up to temp is good preventative maintenance. Besides, it allows you to dream of the season to come...

 

[stevewithOCD]

I've had 2 cars that i let sit for a year for different reasons. They were both good running dependable vehicles. When i put them back on the road, i blew bearing seals, leaky water pump, slipping trans & a list of small issues all due to lack of use. Not saying anybody is doing anything wrong, but EFBM is the minimum to be done

Ethanol Free gas
Battery tender
Mice. KEEP THEM OUT

BTW: by running sleds once a week will help keep those little wire eating buggers out.
BTW 2: I let my friends sled sit by mistake for a month or so because i forgot about it. Cost me over $1000 in mice repair!

P.S. I now have so many mouse traps around my sled that if someone tries to steal it, he better be wearing steel toe boots

 

[SAB1]

I put them to bed in the ring and don't touch them again until late fall. Never had a problem.

 

[Sasquatch]

I've had 2 cars that i let sit for a year for different reasons. They were both good running dependable vehicles. When i put them back on the road, i blew bearing seals, leaky water pump, slipping trans & a list of small issues all due to lack of use. Not saying anybody is doing anything wrong, but EFBM is the minimum to be done

Ethanol Free gas
Battery tender
Mice. KEEP THEM OUT

BTW: by running sleds once a week will help keep those little wire eating buggers out.
BTW 2: I let my friends sled sit by mistake for a month or so because i forgot about it. Cost me over $1000 in mice repair!

P.S. I now have so many mouse traps around my sled that if someone tries to steal it, he better be wearing steel toe boots

I have a ton of squeelers around my Car, Sleds and bikes. The mice don't seem to like them much! I have a ton of traps around the Garage and I now have a few pine martins living in the woodpile! I used to catch a couple dozen a year but last couple years only a few.

 

[terez]

If you are able to start/run anything with a powertrain during storage....its better to do so.

Circulating the rotating parts, bathing seals in oil, moving parts around that sit stationary...is all good.

The only reason NOT to is if you cannot run the machine up to operating temp.....you are begging for fouled plugs as well as not letting it run up to temp just creates a bunch of moisture that will remain trapped in the powertrain and exhaust which is bad.
The other poss negative is mice and other rodents...make sure there aren't any in the airbox....which is where they like to set up a luxury condo...you end up sucking nesting material and dead corpses into the intake tract and have probs all fawkin year.
If you used bounce sheets/moth balls or other preventative measures you should be good tho.

Besides circulating oil and displacing moisture in the motor....spinning up the clutches/chaincase and skidframe wheels is also good for them to prevent probs with stationary parts setting in place....a lil oil or WD on the skidframe wheels before doing this is good too.

Worst thing for any powertrain machines is to sit for extended periods....I start and run up to hot everything with a motor in the off season....whippersnippers/lawn equipment/chainsaws/sleds/bikes....

If you can't access your stuff off season then its important to be thorough with storage regimens.....

 

[pdiddy]

Squatch, what do you mean by "squeelers"? Ultrasonic devices?

 

[Sasquatch]

Squatch, what do you mean by "squeelers"? Ultrasonic devices?

Yep! Mice don't seem to like them much. I put them on the hood (plugged into an extension cord) in the front of my old car on heater air intake because I found found mouse poop in the air vents and a nest. Old car vents down by your feet both sides fed from the vent in front of the windshield. Cleaned it all out washed and fumigated vents with mothballs. Set up traps so as to catch them before they built more nests. After initially catching a few around the car and in the garage I was not catching anymore! Happy Camper I added the Squealers!

Out driving the car one day and the dog is sniffing under the seats so I try to figure out why! Found a bag of sunflower seats left in the car under the seat (wifes side and it was put there after the mouse thing) and its chewed open! Shells everywhere. I then I found they had made it into the car through a hose that connects the heater box to air vent system (chewed a hole in it!)! Bastards! So open the heater box and check for mice and nests all clear with a bit of nesting material! I set traps up front and the squealers on the hood and could could not trap any mice up front so I thought I had got them out but when I found a nest in the trunk corner behind the wooden box that fits so perfect in that spot to carry spare things one might need in an old car (I saw a shell form a seed). I set two in the trunk and caught three mice in less then two days. So it seems the squealers drove them from the front as they never touched those traps that where set up same time as squealers ( and they stayed there even while and after the ones I set up in the back) but the ones set in the trunk caught them.

So I concluded that I cleaned the vents and washed everything then dropped mothballs in the vents but I think I inadvertently drove them into the heater box. The mothballs or smell from the seeds drove/lured them out into the car itself. Then when I added the Squealers I drove them into the truck where they where building a nest! The squealers sit on the hood when the car is parked always and the traps are still set in the car with no takers! I have caught mice in the garage but none near the four squealers I have set up! I'm adding more! But like Bounce sheets I don't know if they are fool proof! Who was it that said the mice just used bounce sheets to line their nest! Mothballs though seem to work as well, and best is Warfrin. But both of those can kill your pets if they eat them or if they eat something that ate the Warfrin!

 

[stevewithOCD]

They LOVE to eat electrical wires too! I was soooo mad at the damage they did one time, i shot one with the shotgun. A little bit of an over-kill, but boy that sure felt good!

 

[yamadoo]

They LOVE to eat electrical wires too! I was soooo mad at the damage they did one time, i shot one with the shotgun. A little bit of an over-kill, but boy that sure felt good!

Reminds me of a friends story of trying to shoot a squirrel in the wall of their home with a 22 short rounds in a pistol. He is a fantastic story teller and explains how he knew how to spackle and was supposed to repaint the room anyway. The funny part was the size of the exit holes through the house siding as well as the car & truck repairs and the tire replacement bills for the two vehicles parked in the driveway along the side of house.

 

[Sasquatch]

They LOVE to eat electrical wires too! I was soooo mad at the damage they did one time, i shot one with the shotgun. A little bit of an over-kill, but boy that sure felt good!

Squirrels like to chew up sleds so one summer my buddy was laid off and spending his time living at my place. We where working on a project in the garage and left the big door open for light and a breeze as most do. Damn squirrels had chewed up my airbox (and seat) on my sled and built a nest inside it packing in seeds and nuts for the winter so I had a hate on for them about that! I shot one with the 12 gauge and it was laying dead in the crook of a branch. Now whenever a squirrel came and saw the other it challenged it by chattering away at it. So then that on got blasted by me or my buddy whoever was closest to the gun at the time! Every so often you had to hang a new dead squirrel in the tree to replace the corpses of those before who fell to the ground and or critters hauled them off. Now comes the part that has an irony to it. Squirrels are territorial so they are always challenging other squirrels. As you kill the squirrels others move in to replace the dead one. Basically you can't run out of or eliminate squirrels. 50 12 gauge shells fired off and you just dont miss with a 12 gauge, never ran out of squirrels but I think we thinned them out a bit! By the fall my mad had subsided so I called a truce.

A little story about an old car with a 318 A engine that someone wanted to buy the engine from me. It had low miles had only been off the road for a little over a year so he was interested and wanted to hear it run. I tried to start it but it was seized and would not turn over. I was puzzled cause it had oil poured in the cylinders and it was in the vehicle, water or even condensation should not have gotten in in that short of time. I started pulling plugs and looking in the cylinders with a pen light. One had funny looking light brown stuff inside it. Damn mice had crawled all the way up the exhaust into the head and filled a cylinder with the exhaust valve open full of seeds. Bastards! I pulled the motor and when I took off the exhaust manifold thousands of seeds fell out. Long story short took off top end clean out the seeds, showed the guy the cylinders with no wear and put it all together with new gaskets. He bought it and ran it for many years and thousands of miles.

 

[stevewithOCD]

Maybe those squirrels thought you had a 2-stroke that would break down & they were just storing some snacks for you to help you survive. Unfortunately i towed 3 2-smokes last year so unfortunately humans are just as naive as a squirrel...

 

[stevewithOCD]

How many people can take an "oil thread" & turn it into an analytical comparison from humans to squirrels....at 6 am....it better snow soon!

 

[yamadoo]

Yes we're a weird bunch...in all the best ways of weird....Have a great day guys

 

[Sasquatch]

As the run or don't run has been beat to death, I guess the thread got hijacked! One side says proper storage, no need to run in the summer and has no issues, other side says run every month or you will have issues! Both sides do what works for them! I have done both and have had no issues with either other them fouled plugs on my Warrior!

Two months till first snows and 4.5 months till trails open. Still riding my Bike looking at a 600 mile ride coming up next week! Winter is a long ways off yet!

 

[Sasquatch]

I'll add I run premium fuel last tank with sea foam! I siphon out the tank till there is a inch or so left. Burn in garden tractor in summer. I fill with fresh fuel first ride. Sled is stored in garage so no condensation issues!