Vacation car wants to be reliable
July 11, 2010 7:49 AM   Subscribe

Please help arranging things for a car to be used for a couple months at a stretch, three times a year.

My partner and I are about to pull the trigger on a Renault Clio. We have it on a lease right now and got it new. It will have 2000 km on it when she closes the house up. The car will be un-driven for no more than 6 months at a shot and will go about 5000 km per year. The car will stay in the garage when we are not here. The temperature in the garage rarely gets below freezing and the construction is massive so the variation in temperature is slow.

Difficulties: 1) She is here more than I and can't manage to jack the car up to keep the load off the tires. If there's an easy way to un-load the tires I would like to hear about it; 2) disconnecting the battery is not so easy for her either. For six months at a shot is it reasonable to open the hood, attach a trickle-charger to the battery and disable the alarm? It's vanishingly unlikely that anyone will be able to get into the garage to mess around with the car.

Fuel stabilizer is available here (France) and if anyone has a brand preference please let me know. We'll use stabilizer in the last tank run off before house shut-down.

Other advice welcome as well.
posted by jet_silver to Travel & Transportation (3 answers total)
 
Buy a bigger jack. Seriously. And some jack stands.

Or buy a set of used tires and rims that are road worthy, but only barely. When ever you're about to shut the place down, go to the nearest mechanic and have him swap to the "storage" tires. Obviously getting the place opened back up will require another trip to the mechanic to get back to the "driving tires".
posted by notsnot at 8:03 AM on July 11, 2010


As far as the tires go, brand new cars are shipped and stored with the tires overinflated. Part of any new car prep procedure includes letting the excess air out of the tires and resetting the pressure to normal. So, you can prevent tire dry rot, to a degree, by over-inflating the tires while the car is in storage. Just don't exceed the maximum safe pressure noted on the sidewall of the tire and remember to let the excess air out before driving again.

Many cars are stored for long periods of time with a trickle charger attached. Just make sure that you buy one that has some safety devices (breakers, fuses, electronic management, etc) built in.
posted by Jon-o at 8:04 AM on July 11, 2010


I haven't needed to use any of these products, but I'm reasonably confident that the Herrington catalog I found them in has some expertise in these matters. Flatstoppers cradle the tires to keep them from developing flat spots while parked for months at a time. The Swedish Smart Charger or Battery Tender Plus, maintain the battery while the car is in storage.

I have no basis for an opinion if Herrington ships to France or if these products are available from French sources.
posted by ob1quixote at 2:03 PM on July 11, 2010


« Older truck tire   |   I wanna be an ostrich. Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.