Vehicle Storage: What You Need To Do To Prepare To Store Your Vehicle

When it comes to your car, you probably keep quite good care of it. Perhaps there might be a time coming up in the future when you have to store your car for an extended, or perhaps even short, amount of time. It should be noted that there are certain things that you should do to ensure that your car's stay in storage will be entirely copacetic and uneventful. What are those things, however? Luckily, you have this handy dandy guide at your hand to tell you what to do. Throughout the course of this article, you will learn what you need to do in order to properly prepare your vehicle for storage.

Indoor vs. Outdoor

This debate is definitely the easiest to solve. If you have access to an indoor storage area, you should definitely store your vehicle there. Indoor storage facilities are obviously safer, as they keep your vehicles away from would-be burglars and arsonists and make sure that the vehicle is properly shielded from the elements.

It is important to find an indoor storage unit that is dry and has a moderate temperature; too much heat, or a lack thereof, can damage your car's paint job, cracking away at its once pristine exterior. A professional grade garage is most likely your best bet for storage, although the more amenities the garage has to offer, the more expense your car's stay will be.

Don't go overboard and don't choose a garage that you cannot afford. If, for some reason, storing the vehicle in an indoor area is not an option, you will still want to protect your vehicle. It is recommended that you invest in a thick tarp or car cover that will envelope the entirety of your vehicle.

Fill Up The Fluids

Before putting your car into storage, it's highly recommended that you fill up all of the fluids of your car. That's right, all of them. Why? A lack of fluids in the supply tanks that contain them can lead to rust. However, there are some important steps you will have to take after filling your fluids up, since they are going to be in storage for a while.

You should purchase fluid stabilizer. This does two things that are important for the fluids of any car that is going into storage: for one, it ensures that the chance of leakage is slim to none. Secondly, it will help pressurize the fluids in the car, making sure that none of the supply tanks expand, contract and eventually crack or break down.

A Few Extra Precautions

If you are going to be away from your vehicle from an extended period of time, between 1 and 2 years, there are some extra precautions you might want to take. You will want to take out the battery and make sure all of the battery connections have been properly cleaned. This will help to prevent acid damage and rust.

Next, you should also consider jacking up the car off of the floor of the garage and inflating the tires as much as safely possible, which is usually 36 p.s.i., of extra air into the tires. This will help to ensure that there are no flat or bald spots on your tires. When you return, it is still recommended that you check your tires' air pressure and check, rotate and balance your tires. Just because you've been off the road doesn't mean that no wear and tear has taken place on your tires.

When you go away on a trip, whether it's for a small period of time or for a few years, it's important that your car is in safe storage. Hopefully, this article has shed some light on the situation. For more information about keeping a car in a storage unit, contact a company like National Self Storage - Denver.