Winter storage of a Vantage (2010)

[Mushroom12]

Gosh, now I have a pickle...
I used to have a Rapide, which was an all round year car (yes I drove it in winter, in the snow, and had a good set of tyres and a second set of wheels for it).
Now I have a Vantage, and the nature of the car (mostly the tranny) makes it not something I want to do winter driving with, so soon we will hit the 'winter tyre season' (i.e. legally have to have winter tyres), and I'm going to have to leave her standing, and unused.
The question I have is how to keep her ok over winter with regards to the battery? There is no power point in the carpark so I'm limited in terms of fitting a trickle charger, and I don't want a dead battery and all the drama that goes with that. I can't be the only person in this situation so what does the collective wisdom of PH advise?

Thx

[bennno]

Mushroom12 said:

Gosh, now I have a pickle...
I used to have a Rapide, which was an all round year car (yes I drove it in winter, in the snow, and had a good set of tyres and a second set of wheels for it).
Now I have a Vantage, and the nature of the car (mostly the tranny) makes it not something I want to do winter driving with, so soon we will hit the 'winter tyre season' (i.e. legally have to have winter tyres), and I'm going to have to leave her standing, and unused.
The question I have is how to keep her ok over winter with regards to the battery? There is no power point in the carpark so I'm limited in terms of fitting a trickle charger, and I don't want a dead battery and all the drama that goes with that. I can't be the only person in this situation so what does the collective wisdom of PH advise?

Thx

Are you in the uk? Is your car park covered?

[Mushroom12]

bennno said:

Are you in the uk? Is your car park covered?

No, and yes.

[DickyC]

Pay to store it. £30 a week or so for secure storage with their trickle charger looking after the battery around here.

The place I used let me have the car during the storage term if I gave them a few days' notice.

[Calinours]

Mushroom12 said:

bennno said:

Are you in the uk? Is your car park covered?

No, and yes.

If a window of the car gets a few hours of daylight a day wherever the car is undercover - then a solar charger might do it.

If it's a completely covered car park and you have absolutely no way to connect to a power source, then you can visit once a month and just charge the battery for an hour using jump leads from another car with engine running. Don't forget to select 'reduced guard' to reduce parasitic alarm drain if yours has this function. If the car park is really secure you can disable the alarm altogether, locking the car mechanically. The car should be OK for the whole winter with a decent and fully charged battery.

[Dewi 2]

Another recent topic about this, will give you further guidance.
Pity about the absence of power. That certainly complicates storage.

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

[Go60 Jay]

I’m not an expert in these things, and what I’m about to say is so simple, that it’s probably too simple! Could you simply disconnect the battery and lock the doors manually? When the weather changes, reconnect and off you go.

Cheers,
John

[skyebear]

Pay to store it indoors where you can hook a battery conditioner to it.

Man maths means you can offset the storage costs vs reduced tyre wear and mileage depreciation.

Out of curiosity, what wheels and tyres did you put on your Rapide for winter?

[bogie]

You can get cordless rechargeable battery maintainer like the CTEK CS free, leave it in the boot connected up to the charge port. It has a big enough batter to start the car quite a few times, I would have thought it should last for months just maintaining the battery. They also offer a solar panel kit for it.

[Jon39]

Go60 Jay said:

I’m not an expert in these things, and what I’m about to say is so simple, that it’s probably too simple! Could you simply disconnect the battery and lock the doors manually? When the weather changes, reconnect and off you go.

Cheers,
John

You could with an (about) pre-2000 car, but judging soley by many posts on here over the years, problems are likely at the, 'reconnect and off you go' stage.

I think it has something to do with modern electrical wiring systems called CANBUS.
The dashboard might take on the appearance of a Christmas tree, decorated with error lights.
Various electronic modules might refuse to operate.