Winterizing an ElecTrak

[bennelson]

Hey Folks,

It's getting cold around here, which means I now actually want my garage as a place to store vehicles.

I don't have a basement or other place to use as a workshop. That means that all my experiments/projects/storage go on in my uninsulated, detached, two-car garage.

Right now, I have enough room on the one side of the garage to park my Electric Geo Metro.

The other side of the garage is filled with tools, workbench, misc equipment, and my GE ElecTrak electric riding lawn mower.

My question is: What to do with my ElecTrak for the winter?

I need space in the garage, but I also don't want the mower to get getting snowed on, rusting out, and freezing the batteries.

The mower is currently running on 6 12V flooded deep cycle batteries. (two strings of 36V.) I have individual 12, 1.5 amp chargers, one on each battery.

In my area, it stays below freezing pretty much all winter.

So, what do I do? Keep the ElecTrak in the garage? Move it behind the garage and tarp it? Remove the batteries for the winter? If I do, where do I put the batteries? Leave it on charge the whole time?

Let me know your ideas.

PS - for the life of me, I can't remember what I did with it last winter!

[Daox]

I say find a way to bolt that blower attachment to it and use it!

I'll finally be using mine this winter and I'm very much looking forward to it (as much as one can be excited to blow snow at least).

[bikin' Ed]

Not quite an apples to apples situation but when I stored my miata outside, I tarped it, jacked it up to elongate the springs, and then put a charger on it the first weekend of each month.

This year, the miata won't get stored, but rather will get used when ever there is no threat of deep snow.

[bennelson]

Daox,

I didn't know you had a snowblower attachment for the EcoRider!
Maybe I knew and just forgot..


Hmmm. It would take some design work to rig up that snowblower attachment. At a bare minimum, I would need to connect an electric motor on the blower and do metalwork/welding for connections/quick release points on the mower.

And it would STILL be taking up (even more) space in my garage.
At least it would be useful though!

[Ryland]

I would get some rodent poison to go under the tarp and put it outside, insulate around it if you can so the ground helps keep it all a bit warmer then run the charger cord out from under the covering so you can charge it every month or two, if you remove the batteries do not set them directly on a concrete floor as the cold on the bottom of them can shorten their life if you charge them or do anything else to warm them.

[bennelson]

Just to throw some ideas out there, here's the snowblower attachment I have.

[Daox]

Yeah, I do!

EcoRider - riding lawn mower electric conversion - Page 9 - EcoRenovator

Mine is a bit different than yours, but generally the same. I'm planning on running it off the main motor as thats how its setup to work. It'll be less efficient, but less work.