How to Properly Store Your Vehicle for Long Periods of Time
There are many reasons why someone might want to store their vehicle. While they might enjoy driving their Ford Mustang through Costa Mesa during the majority of the year, they might prefer to store it during certain seasons or events. Or maybe they are going somewhere on an extended vacation and will not be home for a full month. Either way, knowing how to properly store your Ford Edge in Costa Mesa is essential for keeping it in tip-top shape. Here is everything that you need to know about storing your vehicle for any significant period of time.
Protect It From the Elements
Even though modern vehicles are designed to be pretty durable and weather resistant, that does not mean that you should just let your vehicle sit still out in the open for weeks at a time without protection. Your best option is to keep the vehicle in a garage since this provides a cover as well as a fairly constant room temperature. However, if you do not have a garage to keep your vehicle in, then you can always look at putting it into a storage facility.
If both of these options are out of the question for you, then at the very least, you need to make sure that your vehicle is protected by some kind of car cover. Weatherproof covers can usually be found at most auto stores or a Ford dealer in Costa Mesa and are a good way to keep rain, dust, and dirt off of your precious vehicle.
Perform a Deep Clean
Regularly cleaning your vehicle is always a good idea, but the amount of cleaning that you have to do before putting it into storage is even more intensive. For some people, cleaning their vehicle right before putting it in storage for the next month or two seems like a complete waste of time. However, this is an extremely important step in making sure that no damage occurs to your vehicle while it sits motionless for so long.
By leaving dirt, bird droppings, or water droplets on your vehicle, you allow these things time to eat at your vehicle’s exterior. Sure it might have just been a few little bits of dirt when you first stored the vehicle, but by the time that you come back, it might have caused of a section of your vehicle’s paint to be permanently discolored. So it is best to get the exterior thoroughly cleaned and even waxed in order to provide that extra level of protection.
You should also make sure to clean out in the interior of your vehicle. This is less for protection and more for the fact that no one likes coming back to a vehicle with a dirty interior. Give it a quick wipe down and do not forget to vacuum the floor and seats. This can prevent forgotten food, drinks, or crumbs from becoming awful, smelling messes in your vehicle.
Get an Oil Change
Replacing the oil in your vehicle is an extremely important step if you are planning to keep your vehicle stored for any longer than a month. Since most oil has contaminants within it, these could end up damaging your engine when left motionless for extended periods of time. Oil changes also give you the chance to get all of your other fluids, like the windshield washer fluid, replaced and completely filled up as well.
Disconnect the Battery
Even when your vehicle is not turned on, the battery is still being slightly used. This means that if you leave your vehicle alone for over a month, you could end up coming back to a completely dead battery. One of the easiest ways to prevent this is to completely unhook the battery from your vehicle and keep it stored in a safe and dry place. By doing this, you also prevent the battery from experiencing corrosion.
An even better solution is to find someone you trust to take your vehicle out for a short five-minute drive every couple of weeks. This helps to keep the vehicle’s components active and gives the fluids and lubricants a chance to flow through the vehicle.
Inflate the Tires
The tires on most vehicles are able to lose a few psi from their recommended amount of pressure before they become visibly affected or trigger a low-pressure warning in your vehicle’s information system. So without you even knowing it, your vehicle’s tires could actually be slightly below their ideal amount of pressure. Fixing this situation is a vital step in preventing flat tires from occurring.
As your vehicle sits for long periods of time, it is going to slowly let out some pressure from the tires. So even though your tires might look perfectly fine now, when you come back in six or eight weeks they might be looking much worse. That is why you should check the side of your tires to find the recommended psi level and then fill them up to match it.
Stay Away From the Emergency Brake
If there was ever a time to use the emergency brake, then you would think that it would be when your vehicle is being stored somewhere and is not supposed to move. However, you would be extremely wrong. The last thing that you should be doing when storing your vehicle for more than a couple of days is using the emergency brake.
When the emergency brake is activated, it presses the brake pads up against the rotors to prevent the tires from moving. However, when the brake pads are allowed to press up against the rotors for too long, it can result in them becoming damaged or even fused together. A better option for making sure that your vehicle does not go anywhere is to simply use some wheel chocks. They work just as well and there is no danger of accidentally damaging your vehicle.
