Winterizing time

Well, here in these parts of the UK, the central heating has not been used for many months and tend to sieze up over the summer. Need to check mine and probably have to manually "give it a kick" to get it going.

Hi, It's all done. Snowing this morning up here. Not that cold tho.

Turn off the AC, pack up shorts and tees, get out the sweat pants and sweat shirts :(

Snow! Please keep it on that side of the Pond. Just leave us a little bit for scenary on Christmas Eve.

Hey, It used to come in early September years ago. Now it is early October! I haven't started snow blower in years. Shovel and broom is enough.

Hmmm, I need parka and snow boots, LOL! My AC is all cleaned and covered up. Furnace is tuned, humidifier is cleaned and turned on, air cleaner element is cleaned and checked, Stored and covered outdoor furnitures, blew out the sprinkler, turned off all out door taps, time to wash our dog and bring him inside during night time........ Time to set up 'mas deco. B4 it gets too cold. Of course checked car cooling and charging system and battery. Swap out summer tires with winter tires.(easy, we have two sets of mounted tires)

The car is three years old so I may do the antifreeze, but then again, I may not. I've often gone five+ years with the newer stuff, unlike the 50's and

The heat has already been on this year so I know it is working, put new batteries in one of the thermostats.

Soon though, I'll be washing windows and putting the screens up and storm window down, kitchen and bathroom are last for that.

The snowblower gets pulled to the front of the garage, the lawnmower to the back.

On Sat 03 Oct 2009 09:06:12a, cshenk told us...

almost nothing. We water the plants less as the cooler temperatures come.

This is something I struggle with too...whether or not it is even necessary to change antifreeze every year!

My GM manual says 5 yrs or 150k miles.

My son's Audi says *don't* change it.

Jim

"cshenk" wrote in news:rEKxm.124299$ snipped-for-privacy@newsfe21.iad:

Had to turn on the furnace, already. 62 inside is too cold.

My Hyundai manual says 60k miles, but I've done that in less than 3 years. For most people it is 5 or so. My LeSabre has the original at 9 years and

What the heck, guys? It's at least another two months before I even think about turning the furnace on.

nate

(oh, right, I live in hell, I forgot...)

I've got 3 more windows to replace , boiler to get cleaned , leaves to take care of(just started to drop) , planters and other garden stuff to put away and I'll be pretty much ready except for putting the plow in the garage and putting the studded snowtires on my wife's '06 Elantra which I won't do till after Thanksgiving....They are mounted on different rims so the switch is easy....That's near the end of Nov. for those across the pond and north of the border...LOL..My 4X4 truck is ready......Oops , got a little more caulking to do as well...Burned my massive brush pile from trimming my trees and clearing brush out back today...A nice wet day for it...Boy did it still burn FAST...Glad I waited for a wet day.....

I'm not normally the kind of guy that makes blanket statements telling people to disregard the manual... but when a manual tells you that a fluid never needs to be changed, it's wrong.

That said, 5 years on a closed system with modern OAT antifreeze is probably OK.

nate

Jim Elbrecht wrote: ...

Ever???!!!

Then again, guess they're interest is in selling more Audis, not in keeping existing ones going... ( :) sorta'... )

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Hi, Our Honda and Subaru, every 3 years. For Honda I use Honda anti-freeze.

Heh. The water pump on my previous company car - an '05 Impala - failed before I ever even thought it might be time to have the antifreeze changed. I guess that was the antifreeze maintenance reminder. Kinda sucked; it started spewing coolant while dropping the girl off at the airport, had to stop and buy some bottled water just to make it home.

Hopefully the water pumps on the new 3.5 engines are more reliable than the ones on the old POS 3.4... I actually kinda like the new one, was thinking of buying it out when the lease is up if it's still in good shape.

nate

I don't have an original article. But a DAGS link.

Check for electrolysis

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Try this:

Take a digital volt meter and connect the negative lead to battery ground and place the positive lead in the coolant in the radiator (do not touch any metal), you should not show voltage over 0.01V, if you do then change the coolant and try again.

Now run the motor with no accessories on and the engine runnign at

Here is a bit from an industry newsletter about coolant: