Advice for storing cars for a long period of time

[Joey]

I’m going to put my 27 year old Volkswagen to rest for awhile, until I have enough dough to restore it. It just isn’t fit to be my daily driver anymore, too many problems. I have a detached garage that has next to nothing for insulation and there’s no heat either. I’m going to put the Van in there.

What do you recommend I do to help protect it?

Here’s what I gathered from another website:
-Keep It Covered
-Clean It Up (Inside and out)
-Change the Oil
-Top off the Tank
-Keep It Charged
-Don’t Use the Parking Brake
-Keep critters out by stuffing steel wool in openings (exhaust pipe and air intake)

From: http://www.edmunds.com/car-care/how-to-prep-your-car-for-long-term-storage.html

Thanks,

Joey

Topic

[Nick Warner]

I’d pull the battery and bring it into someplace warm. Put a battery maintainer on it. Never seen steel wool stop a mouse. Keep some traps and poison around the car. Topping off the tank could come back to haunt you as the gasoline has ethanol in it. Ethanol has maybe 1/3 the storage life of gasoline and breaks down into a brown sludge that is hell to deal with. If you can get ethanol free premium, fill the tank with it and add Seafoam or Sta-Bil to it according to its directions. Run the engine a few minutes to circulate it through the fuel system. Take the spark plugs out and spray some fogging oil into each cylinder, then reinstall plugs.

When you go to get this running again make sure you look inside the airbox and heater fan areas in case a mouse or two did get in to build a nest. Pull out the fuel pump relay and crank the engine over until either the oil pressure gauge registers pressure or the idiot light on the dash goes out, whichever one you have. Then reinstall the relay and fire it up. Remember that your brakes will have a small coating of rust on them and will feel and sound strange for the first 50 miles or so. Test that they have good stopping power in an area with nobody around before you hit the road.

[skim3544]

What I like to do is place the car on 4 jack stand to stop the tires from developing flat spot. Then spray Wd40 on rotors to prevent rust. WD40 dries and burns so is safe to use on rotors, but don’t use other heavy grade oil – place battery in trickle charger

[Chris]

I’d say to put some moth balls in the vehicle, and put a tarp over it incase the roof leaks or there’s birds in the shed.

[Steffen Nyegaard]

I have had good results with putting in a dehumidifier box (those blue ones with granulate in them) in the vehicle to soak up excess moisture. On older vehicles I would top of the tank to avoid rust on the inside and add ethanol before starting it the first time.
Remember to run over all seals with silicone paste so they dont go brittle or crack while sitting still.

I would also change oil and coolant before and take off the battery. A little low viscosity oil could be added to each cylinder on older vehicles.

I keep anything oil away from rotors and pads. If it is not super humid where it is stored you would only see some surface rust that would where off after the first couple of brakes.

[Author]

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