If you don't have indoor garage/shop storage, what do you do for the winter?

[92SupraComp]

holy crap! lucky for you and the warm weather! Here in NY, it has been 60's for a week. Low 80'd yesterday, high 80's today (hot!), still hot now, fan on high.... and tomorrow 80's again, only to have thrusday and on go right back down to mid and low 60's for the fly in weekend at the lake -.-

[Cusefan78]

How bad of a job is it to shrink wrap your boat. I'm thinking about buying the Gun and material and tryinging. Watched a few videos doesn't look too bad.

[92SupraComp]

buy the shrink wrap and a HF special weed burner. My dad bought our weed burner years ago. Its a great fire starter and we used to shrink wrap our Supra when moving from Texas back to NY.

[Cusefan78]

Does the weed burner do a good job? I found a good gun for around 300 with a self igniter

[Sirgonz]

Okay, let's hear some of your winter storage methods.

I'm a little nervous about how to make my boat weather the winter. I have a nice sunbrella cover that fits around the tower and has the cinch strap and the vent/pole. But it still seems to puddle water in 4 spots kind of around the cover's pole. Some of this is because of the railing around the rear trunk. I know that doesn't make the cover very happy as standing water on a cover is bound to seep through eventually. I did order another bottle of 303 Fabric Guard, so maybe that will help??? And obviously if I was closing it up for the winter, I'd find a way to tent up those 4 areas where the water's been puddling... But something more substantial over the boat would of course be best.

I looked at the Harbor Freight and they have a 20x10x8 portable carport tent thing. I have one of these that I've used for extra garage space and I know that the tarps on these things only last 2 seasons at best. It retails for $300 and I could easily get it for 20% off making it $240. But it's not very tall so I'd have to hope my tower fits in it folded down and know that I'll have to hassle with it in the future.

I'd LOVE to get a metal carport kit and have a full metal roof and 1/2 metal sides for $1300 to $1500. (20' x 10' wide by between 9' to 12' tall depending on what I could afford was the best "value" for the metal roof carport. The problem is that I really don't have that money to spare right now.

I have a gut feeling that if I try to just have the cover protect the boat that I'm going to regret it. I'm sure water will find its way in and then it'll be a moisture filled area. I'm sure they don't make enough Damp-Rid to combat the wet that we have all winter in the Pacific NW.

We really only get a few days of snow, so that's not a big concern. It would be nice to have something covering the boat that would allow me to actually work on it when the weather was lame. I know I have to repack my rudder's packing rope and that's not exactly something I could do if I didn't have some kind of tent or carport over the boat...

So what does everyone here do? Or are you all so spoiled that you have garage space for your boats?

Buy the cheaper car port and then as you can buy metal roofing panels from home depot... screw them to the poles of the cheaper cover thus making it sturdier and longer lasting? just an idea....Storage unit might also work though they want a lot around here... I kept mine at Oregon city marina last year un heated indoor space was $70 per month

[Sirgonz]

This is a mockup of the 21L x 12W x 11H with half walls at the top and the standard roof. Thoughts? I would think that with one of these it would dramatically decrease the dew/moisture that the boat would see...

The half sides seem like a legit upgrade, and that's in the above mockup. kicking out for full sides would be a lot more ($350 for a structure that had 11' walls, and $205 if I had gone with as low of roof height (10 foot) as I could justify. Would I be kicking myself for going with 1/2 sides vs. full sides? Will it make that much of a difference?

start where you can afford and add to it as you go...t he roof panels can be bought even at home depot so then as you get $ you can add to the walls.