Winter is coming and quicker than you know it too! Soon these long sunlight hours will get shorter and shorter as the months go on. Long days on the boat, basking in the sun will be the memories you replay in a few months. If you’re not thinking about winter yet, you should be for your boat! Because if you’re not, you can be wasting money and compromising your boats safety!
Reason #1: Safety
The first and most important reason is safety. When you choose an engine compartment heater with Xtreme Heaters, you’re choosing a safe and reliable boating experience. With a proper engine compartment heater (not a household heater or a lightbulb!), you can prevent critical damage from freezing temperatures. Our Xtreme engine compartment heaters were specifically designed to be safe on your boat and to prevent freeze damage.
Not only do our engine compartment heaters provide safety for your boat during the colder temperatures, but they are also safe themselves! Our engine compartment heaters have been independently tested and meet or exceed Coast Guard and American Boat and Yacht Council standards.
We even went a step further and tested our heaters against Military Specification (MILSPEC) ratings for heat, cold, moisture, and vibrations. We passed with flying colors! Our engine compartment heaters are actually so great that our military uses our heaters in special operations vessels. They're also used across our nation by homeland security vessels too. If it’s good enough for the military, it’s good for your boat too!
Reason #2: Engine Compartment Heaters Save You Money
Using an engine compartment heater prevents freeze damage which can cost thousands of dollars in repairs. If there’s any water or coolant in your engine when winter comes, the water can freeze. When water freezes, it expands and can cause split rubber hoses, crack iron, and rupture aluminum.
To prevent this expensive disaster, the options are to winterize your boat engine which can be time-consuming. Winterizing your boat means blowing all the water from your engine, which is tricky and not the best option since you won’t know if all the water is out. The second winterization option is flushing out existing systems with antifreeze to prevent the liquid in the engine from freezing. Using antifreeze can be expensive if you choose an undiluted solution. And if you’re diluting it yourself, you have to dilute it to the right level. It’s a science that can easily go wrong quickly.
The last option and less time-consuming one is keeping your boat engine compartment warm. Our fixed thermostat on our engine compartment heaters will turn on at 40 degrees Fahrenheit and off at 50 degrees. This keeps your engine compartment safely in the high 30s and mid-40s temperatures to prevent freezing.
Engine compartment heaters also save you money! If you’re not using a boat heater, then what are you using? A light bulb? A portable heater? If those last two are your solutions to winter, you’re asking for fire damage!
Did you know that every year there are an estimated 4,000 pleasure vessels that fall victim to either fire or explosion? And out of that number, about 400 of them are a total loss. Boatus marine insurance claim files have confirmed that the leading cause of winter vessel fires is due to unattended portable heaters.
When left unattended, portable heaters can easily tip over from waves or other movements. And once one boat is on fire, it can easily spread around the marina to other boats. Our Boating Horror Stories are proof that this isn’t the way to go!
If you’re looking for an engine compartment heater to keep your engine safe and warm this winter, look no further than Xtreme Heaters. Shop our small, medium, and large engine compartment heaters!
