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I'm still on track to purchase a new C8... about a year away at this point.
Anyway, I wanted to ask about how all of you are storing your cars in the winter months. I'm considering building a one-car garage, but permitting may prove elusive in my community. Option 2 would be a carport and a cover.
If it ends up being option #2, what cover do you recommend?
(And of course for added UV protection I'll get the ceramic coating when offered.)
no such thing in SoCal. We drive all year around, mostly with the tops down.
It's very beautiful there, no doubt. Unfortunately Pennsylvania does not offer 12 months of suitable Corvette weather, and I don't think I can do a daily 3000 mile commute!
When I bought the car I had no garage for it so it just sat outside in Western Washington State rain. The maple "twirlies" and fir needles descended upon it. They got into all the cracks and crannies and I feared the needles would plug the drain holes --most especially the little slits at the rear of the hatch. I ran a wire thru to make sure they were clear. The next year I got I car cover. I put it on when the twirlies started falling and took it off sometime in January or February when the leaves were all off the trees. (I kept it on a battery tender while it was covered) The cover I got was the OEM outdoor cover with zippers for trunk and hatch. [Part # 85138417]. This Spring I had a carport built to park it under. When the twirlies started dropping I put on the car cover to keep the debris off and put it on a trickle charger .. When the trees are bare, I will start driving it again.. in the rain.
Get a 10x20 storage locker if you don't have a garage.
Things to do to prepare your car PROPERLY for winter storage so you can just turn the key in the spring...
1. Change the oil(last year's oil has been contaminated by the normal combustion process of the engine and this contamination can cause acidic erosion of seals and gaskets).
2.. Sta-Bil 360 (fuel stabilizer) or other brand of fuel stabilizer in the fuel tank, then fill up(having a full tank prevents rust and condensation inside the fuel tank), and drive for a few miles to ensure stabilizer circulates throughout the fuel system.
3. Detail car inside and out.
4. Pump the tires up to 35-40 psi to avoid flatspotting if you don't have "FlatSpotters" to prevent it.
5. DO NOT put your car on jack stands or blocks under the frame. This lets the suspension droop and puts the springs and bushings in an unnatural state.
6. In an unheated garage, cover garage floor with a waterproof tarp as moisture barrier. Heated garage, you're good.
7. Cardboard or carpeting under tires to add another layer of protection between floor and tires. Concrete draws moisture out of the rubber, shortening tire life and speeding up dry-rot.
8. Moth ***** by the tires and/or dryer sheets in the interior/trunk to keep critters away.
9. PLAIN/UNTREATED charcoal briquettes in the passenger cabin and trunk to absorb odors.
10. Steel wool in exhaust pipes to keep critters out(leave note on stearing wheel or pinned to the car cover as a reminder).
11. Then hook up battery tender and plug in or you can remove the battery or you can just disconnect the ground cable from the battery.
12. Cover car with a NOAH or similar breathable car cover.
13. Then walk away till spring.
14. DO NOT start until ready to drive it again in the spring. Letting car sit and idle for any amount of time DOES NOT get rid of the condensation that is created in the exhaust system and engine.
15. Check with your finance company to see if you can drop full coverage and just keep comprehensive since the car will be in storage. Some will allow it, some won't.
Originally Posted by Originally Posted by Don at DCCarCare.com
Long-term storage to my way of thinking is anything over a month. In 30 days, lots of things can start going wrong if you don't store a car right. Modern cars have their own problems since they can run a healthy battery down in less than a week sometimes with all the memory functions that have to keep going if you don't disconnect the battery. Without getting into boring detail, here are the basics of good long-term storage: Vehicles are always better off being driven on a regular basis. If you must store, store indoors where the wind can't get to your car. Car covers are ONLY for indoors use out of the wind, no matter what they advertise! It is better to let a car sit for months than to run it once a week for a few minutes. The reason is that you can't get the engine and other drivetrain parts warmed up enough to do any good and you will create condensation in the crankcase and exhaust that will help kill your car.Give your car a bath and good coat of wax including chrome trim before storage. Use a product like Wurth Rubber care on the seals/rubber trim, and Vinylex on tires. Clean the interior, use Lexol on the leather and Vinylex on the vinyl before storage. No need to go overboard and leave it dripping, just a normal treatment. A pan of charcoal bricks (not the type with fuel in them though!) in a pie tin on newspaper inside the car will help soak up odors. Leave windows cracked just a little to let some air circulate and let window seals relax so they seal better in the spring. Remove important papers from the car/glove box. Try to leave the HVAC system in OFF mode to help keep critters out. Give the car a good run and get it fully warmed up right before storage.Fresh fluids at this point are a good idea. Oil and filter, anti-freeze, power steering fluid, tranny fluid and brake fluid should all be changed right before storage. A week or two before storage is OK except the oil, make that as fresh as possible. Once the car is parked where it will sit, remove the battery, store in a cool dry place and trickle charge it once a month. Be sure to check the water level and fill if necessary. UPDATE: Reader Bill Wright reminded me that a modern trickle charger is a must have item for people that store vehicles for any period of time. In fact I have 6 Battery Tender Juniors on various old cars, and farm/lawn vehicles at my place. Since using them, dead batteries are a thing of the past and my batteries are lasting longer. Modern trickle chargers won't cause acid to boil away like a full fledged charger, but you should still check fluid every month just to be sure. We hope to carry a battery charger for this purpose in the near future. Fill the gas tank before storing with fresh quality fuel. If you drive your car so little that last years gas is still mostly in the tank, then siphon it off and use it in the lawn mower or dispose of properly! Fresh gas will last a full year if kept at a fairly stable temperature below 80 degrees. Filling the tank helps prevent condensation which helps rust tanks and fuel systems. Fuel additives for storage are not needed if storing for less than a year. With carburetor equipped cars, it sometimes helps to disconnect the fuel pump (plug the line so it doesn't drain) and run the car till the carb is dry. BUT, I have stored cars for many years without draining the carbs, and taken the carbs apart and found no deposits or "varnish" in the fuel bowls. Fuel will evaporate out of the carbs within a week anyway. On fuel injected cars, there is no bowl as such so don't worry about it. DO NOT put your car on jack stands or blocks under the frame. This lets the suspension droop and puts the springs and bushings in an unnatural state. If you want to prevent flat spots on tires (not a problem with modern radials anyway) support the car at the outermost points of the suspension so the springs and shocks/struts are in a natural state. Be sure to keep tires (remember the spare) at the correct air pressure and try to keep them away from electric motors or high heat. UPDATE: Bill Wright, a reader of these pages offers this from his experience: (NOTE: I have never had the dry rot that Bill mentions, when storing on a dry floor, but DRY is the key there. A good way to insulate a concrete or even dirt/gravel floor for better storage is to put down one or two layers of thick plastic sheeting under a layer of old carpet. The carpet won't blow around if the wind gets in when the door is open, and the plastic keeps moisture from coming up and rusting the underside of your vehicle, still, read what Bill has to say:... "Much as I get "ridiculed" by friends, I always park all our seldom used vehicles with 1x10s (or 1x8s or 1x12s - whatever fills the bill) under the tires. In my mind, it keeps the tire tread surface (and surrounding area of the sidewalls) away from the concrete - and the moisture-absorbing characteristics of the concrete. (I suppose this would be less of an issue if I had a sealed/epoxy-coated floor in our storage building). I've left old/scrap tires sitting over in a corner of the building in the past and, after a period of time, discovered the portion of the tires closest to the floor became dry-rotted/cracked. I know they weren't this way prior to "going to the corner". Anyways, I have yet to experience any dry-rotting of tires, even some that have sat for years, after storing tires with wood under them. Seems to work fine for me!! It's a good idea to put mouse bait/traps out in any garage. If you don't they will get under your car cover or sheets and make nests (usually near the base of the windshield), you will see their little pee spots on your hood! Left to run amok, mice can build nests in air intakes (seal them off with bags if you can get to them, and check airboxes/air cleaners before first starting), and even in the glove box or inside the seats. When starting the vehicle back up after storage, remove all your covers, bags over pipes, intakes, pans of charcoal, put the freshly charged battery back in and check all fluid levels. If possible disable the ignition (or just don't set the choke on carb equipped cars) and let the engine crank to build oil pressure. I like the idea of a few cranks at slow speed with no oil pressure rather than the first few cranks at 3000 rpm with no oil pressure! Try to get the engine to a slow idle as soon as possible till things warm up. Of course on modern computer cars, you have no control over this. Make the first mile or so at slow speed and keep the rev's low till things warm up. Test the brakes before you get on the highway. Drums and disks WILL rust some unless you store your car in one of those sealed bags (not a bad idea, but I have found it unnecessary if you have a good garage) but that will go away after the first few stops. That covers most of the major items, I may have missed something, if you have suggestions, or questions, please don't hesitate to e-mail me... Don@DCCarCare.com
Last edited by INTIMIDAT3R; Nov 13, 2023 at 01:23 PM.
If you are stuck with a carport, block the open sides to minimize blow through. I'm not a fan of covers. I've yet to see users who keep the cars underneath consistently clean enough. But, your call.
I'm still on track to purchase a new C8... about a year away at this point.
Anyway, I wanted to ask about how all of you are storing your cars in the winter months. I'm considering building a one-car garage, but permitting may prove elusive in my community. Option 2 would be a carport and a cover.
If it ends up being option #2, what cover do you recommend?
(And of course for added UV protection I'll get the ceramic coating when offered.)
If it was me, I would just follow what Chevrolet says to do.
Get a 10x20 storage locker if you don't have a garage.
Things to do to prepare your car PROPERLY for winter storage so you can just turn the key in the spring...
1. Change the oil(last year's oil has been contaminated by the normal combustion process of the engine and this contamination can cause acidic erosion of seals and gaskets).
2.. Sta-Bil 360 (fuel stabilizer) or other brand of fuel stabilizer in the fuel tank, then fill up(having a full tank prevents rust and condensation inside the fuel tank), and drive for a few miles to ensure stabilizer circulates throughout the fuel system.
3. Detail car inside and out.
4. Pump the tires up to 45 psi to avoid flatspotting if you don't have "FlatSpotters" to prevent it.
5. DO NOT put your car on jack stands or blocks under the frame. This lets the suspension droop and puts the springs and bushings in an unnatural state.
6. In an unheated garage, cover garage floor with a waterproof tarp as moisture barrier. Heated garage, you're good.
7. Cardboard or carpeting under tires to add another layer of protection between floor and tires. Concrete draws moisture out of the rubber, shortening tire life and speeding up dry-rot.
8. Moth ***** by the tires and/or dryer sheets in the interior/trunk to keep critters away.
9. PLAIN/UNTREATED charcoal briquettes in the passenger cabin and trunk to absorb odors.
10. Steel wool in exhaust pipes to keep critters out(leave note on stearing wheel or pinned to the car cover as a reminder).
11. Then hook up battery tender and plug in or you can remove the battery or you can just disconnect the ground cable from the battery.
12. Cover car with a NOAH or similar breathable car cover.
13. Then walk away till spring.
14. DO NOT start until ready to drive it again in the spring. Letting car sit and idle for any amount of time DOES NOT get rid of the condensation that is created in the exhaust system and engine.
15. Check with your finance company to see if you can drop full coverage and just keep comprehensive since the car will be in storage. Some will allow it, some won't.
As the oil degrades just sitting in the car, I'm not sure about step (1). Probably better to leave the old oil until spring, then change the oil immediately after taking out of storage. All the other steps are right on.
This is a car cover I just bought for my C8. Have one for the C6. It's an in-door/out-door cover. What I like is that the cover is made of several panels meaning that the cover fits snuggly around the body with no loose fabric to move when windy. https://coverking.com/products/2024-...autobody-armor
To each his own, but some of these steps listed for Storage look like they are from the 80's, and now unnecessary in the year 2023...
#2 - was true many years ago, but the Fuel systems are 'air tight' now and 0% chance of any condensation, and Gas tanks are plastic, so Rust is a non-issues as well
#4 - Flat spots are no longer an issue with today's tires, especially Run Flats
In Pa, you need to store the car out of the weather during the winter months.....if you don't have access to a garage, there are plenty of storage facilities to rent a space
I am thankful that My little garage is big enough for my new 2023 , I made room for it over the last several months just preparing for this car.
It is sitting on large area rugs and the garage is not heated but it is well protected and dry.
I do have the GM trickle charger on order and plan on using it but I am also going to be starting and even driving it here when I have clear weather that isn't too cold (Z-51 tires)
I did the NCM delivery on September 20th and I am just happy that I got the car when I did and "late summer" was a great time to get it.
I am going to try take care of My new car and Wa. state winters are more mellow than other states, I think I will be in good shape.
If you plan for a secure one bay storage garage, pack rats can be an issue. While I appreciate the home remedies suggested, i.e. moth *****. Folks swear by them. And so do rats. They don't work. And you'll be forever getting their acrid smell out of your car. Me? I'm in the lethal poison camp. This assumes the car will be isolated from children and pets. Buy some Gopher Mix from a farm store. It is typically small pellets laced with strychnine. Maybe arsenic. Put some in heavy bowls or pans around the enclosure. And under the car. You can buy cheap pots, pans or glass mixing bowls at a Goodwill then pitch them in the spring. I use it as a general prophylaxis in our garage. Again no kids no dog no cat. Find dead mice and rats on occasion. It is the no margin for error solution however.
And those home remedies don't work anyway. Nor do the Timmy Timid rat control products like DeCon. They are essentially salt intended to dehydrate the critters. With respect to pack rats, I'm in lethal mode.
Gopher Mix is hard to find in a suburban setting. Home Depot, Lowes, Ace won't have it. Liability issues with these kind of stores. I bought my last supply on eBay from a pest control company in Georgia. But any hard core farm and ranch store will have it. Ranchers put it down holes to control burrowing rodents.
I store mine in the winter here in New York in a garage- I dont use a tender or cover as I take it out and drive to work with it every day. Heavy snow might keep it in but only a few days
I also live in PA (Phila suburbs) and I bought my C8 in January bought a second set of wheels with the All seasons the non Z51 cars come with, and I since we had zero snow here last winter, I drove the C8 when I wanted to. I don't know where you live OP (we are hitting 80 on Saturday and breaking records tomorrow), but life is short (shorter for old guys like me) and you are paying a lot of money for that car so enjoy it as much as possible. I have a C4S with Alpine tires on it that loves the snow, yes, I do have cars that are stored in winter but that is either because they are one of a kind or just not that interesting to drive in the winter months. Some good advice on this thread but other than keeping the battery charged and a fitted cover (no cover unless it is one of those blow-up ones that the car goes inside), will keep all moisture out but they do help.
Storage Question
