My 911 is out in the cold

[gwl123]

I have no garage and was wondering what to do other than to cover it up. The winter has been very warm but now its freezing. The car starts up so far.....

[cnavarro]

Switch to a lighter oil, say m1 0w40? That's what I did here. She starts up fine even at 14F.

[cygtoad]

Avoid covering the car.   You should only cover a car if it is indoors.  The reason for this is that the wind will blow and the covering will buff away your paint!   Then you will get rust!   It is better to leave it out in the weather and in a shaded area.

You might consider renting a 10 x 15 storage cubicle.   The 911 just fits with a couple of inchs to spare front and back.

Good Luck.

[Formerly Steve Wilkinson]

There have been endless discussions of this, and you can do searches, but here's what I'd do if I drove my 911 in cold weather (which I don't) and didn't have a garage (and yes, I don't have a garage; I put the car in the barn for the winter).

For years, I flew airplanes in the winter, and light airplanes have flat, air-cooled, four- and six-cylinder engines in many ways very similar to those in 911s. And at least as expensive.

Those of us who did this had a variety of ways to preheat the engines before we started them--everything from lightbulbs under the cowling to magnificently heated hangars. But the most effective way proved to be a six-inch-square rubberized heating element that we epoxied to the flat base of our Lycoming's or Continental's sump, and put on a timer so that it started heating at, say, three in the morning if we had an 0900 takeoff scheduled.

By the time we got to the airplane, the entire engine--oil, sump, crankcase, crankshaft, cylinder barrels, pistons--would be warm to the touch. Okay, tepid in some places farthest from the heating element, but at least equivalent to an engine being started on a 70-degree day in the summer.

These heating elements cost $150-$200 at aircraft supply houses such as Aircraft Spruce and Wicks, and you could simply plug one into an extension cord in your driveway. They're absolutely safe because they have to be FAA-certified and are thermostatically controlled: they heat to about 170 degrees and then cycle off and come back on when the temp drops to 160.

Buy one, attach it to your sump.

Do NOT attach it to your oil tank, even though that's a much flatter and easily accessible surface. You don't want to heat the oil--which will chill right back down to zero the minute it's pumped into the bitter-cold engine--you want to heat the block. Don't let anybody tell you different, because trust me, if they do they have never dealt with an airplane engine.

[tdatk]

I'll echo Stephans answer. My F350 diesel has an electric block heater that I use when it get's below 20F. Works like a charm.

[Formerly Steve Wilkinson]

What on earth are you talking about? EZ ups? Is that like UPS? OSH is the airport identifier for Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Do I need to go there? Get a grip, man... left coast I know. Not goin' there.

[Joe Bob]

Orchard Supply Hardware=OSH
EZ up....steel A Frame 20 feet long, ten feet wide, eight feet high....weighted and or anchored to keep it from becoming a sail in high winds....vinyl covered on all four sides with a peaked roof.

Same dimensions as a single car garage. The trailer trash that can't afford a garage use them all the time.....

[Joe Bob]

http://www.bettershelters.com/?gclid=CMr7xdHJ8IkCFSNmYwodohQJBA

Oh and Steve? izzat a better retort for the "right coast"?

[Formerly Steve Wilkinson]

Just asking you to make sense. Insults not required. "300 bucks ar OSH" is in fact a group of words and letters that I am unable to interpret.

[Joe Bob]

"Bite me" got edited?

Who's moderating now? Mother freaking Theresa?