Indoor Boat Storage Questions
 

Question for all you boat owners who store their boat at an indoor boat storage facility. How do you manage the equipment issues, meaning do you keep all you gear in your boat or does it travel with you?

Also, what about putting yopur boat away wet... meaning the area in the rear storage trunks etc...mine get REALLY wet and closing off and keeping them in a dark place equals mold in my book. My boats all the dark spaces opened up for a few days after riding when it is in my garage.

What about boat covers? I would imagine indoor storage places are very dusty and a cover would be cool, but then again, if the boat carpet is wet, I can't see a cover being a good idea either.

Thanks.

-Uj

I take my board/jacket with me, but leave everything else. I'm failry confident in the security where I keep mine stored ( this woudl play a huge factor on what gets left in the boat for me).

I leave the cover off to dry. I'd rather deal with some dust than mold.

I open all hatches, open all cushions for circulation.

Need to dry it out. If wet, I leave it uncovered for a few days then go back and cover it. I leave my equipment. If it gets stolen, I get new and improved stuff.

Yeah I am in agreement. I store mine in a barn in town, no security since it is my wife's grandparents. I store it right out of the lake. I do cover it right away, bird poop is a mess. Anyway, never worry about getting it stolen as I am an Insurance Agent, so I invite people to steal it so I can get new stuff. =) Find a person in town with a barn, better than paying arm and leg to store a boat.

I store mine in a boat locker which is a multi-unit metal building, concrete slab, and no heat (or A/C). I have to put the tower down to store. And, my boat has snap out carpet.

I do not cover, in fact I do about everything that is the very opposite. I pull out all the carpet pieces except one and hang from the tower (but outside the boat). I pull out all the removable seat pieces and set somewhere on the tower. I hang the ropes from the tower. I hang all the life vests and wet suits from an electrical conduit on the ceiling. I open all the seat and rear hatches that do not remove and leave them open (same with ski locker hatch). Prop open the glove box. (But I take the boards home.) And so on. I keep cases and cases of drinks in the locker, but never leave any in the built-in ice chest. Babes and suntan lotion onboard.

My locker has a wind-driven turbine vent in it (rolled aluminum chimney, vertical-axis turbine for a cap). It provides moderate circulation and filtered light. In short, no mildew problems, period.

My biggest (and only) problem was a beetle infestation last year. We had a freakish wet summer last year. My yard and trees were killed by June bugs and Japanese beetles. The boat locker was taken over by hoards of some little black beetle. I put beetle spray along the bottom weatherseal of the door, but they got in, and died everywhere. I had to broom out the locker each use.

[I'll attempt to upload a pic.]

I have a clothes line rigged up in my unit to hang vests. I open all the compartments to air out. My unit is a very good storage facility in my opinion compared to what I've seen out there. Plus, at $85 per month including power and rolling door that has a rubber seal and no wind driven rain gets in due to the floor being 2" taller than the parking lot. My unit has one power outlet with a timer up to 12hrs so I put in two small shop fans in the rear lockers to dry them out.

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u...ambler0002.jpg

pic yet?

Great pictures!! Awesome clean storage, better than my old creep barn.

The facility I would be in is one big huge open area where you aren't even allowed in. You drop off your boat in a drop off\pick up area that everyone who stores there has access to. Leaving items hanging to dry off the tower in that area would be like inviting poeple to walk by and take something IMO. Maybe its like camping, where everyone is an honor system, but still...

Thanks everyone so far!

i've researched places like that and never would feel comfortable doing that. i ended up finding a place with individual spaces similar to the ones above. i'd look around some more and see if you can find an individual unit storage place. it can't be that much more expensive and probably worth not having to pack up all your gear every time or worry about someone jacking all your stuff.

my 2 cents.

I used to leave the cover on. Its gonna naturally dry as fast with the cover on or off. I left the cover on, removed the seat cushions and used those moister wicking bags and hung them all around. I would use 3 or 4. Never had a mold issue. And it use to get put away wet alot.

Mine is like you describe, it has a gated area outside where you drop off and pick up but it is pretty secure. Most of the boats in the facility use a cover of some sort. My particular storage place gets a lot of traffic, so I tend to take the valuable stuff out (primarily the boards) but I will take home the wet jackets so they can properly dry out. I do put my cover on (my cover goes below the water line and above the tower) to keep it clean from the dust. I don't have any issue with mold and I am in my 4th year with this facility. My carpet is typically pretty wet when we get home from dealing with the sacks and I haven't had any problems.

In my last facility- which was a POS compared to where I am now - I had my cover on and they got everything and I mean everything. So thanks to my insurance I got new stuff but it was a pain.

I store my 07 Malibu at an indoor facility. I drop it off in a secure area outside and although I've seen other people leave their boards up on their racks, I always take mine home. I've gotten to know the guys that work there and they're always willing to put my cover on for me if my boat is really wet and I want to let it dry for awhile out in the sun. I've never had a problem stopping by to pick up stuff out of the boat when I've needed to, either. Overall, I've been really happy with the storage facility and love just being able to drop my boat off and having it ready and waiting for me when I need it.

We use a huge warehouse surrounded by 12' doors. Each person has painted lines on the floor for their boat/rv/camper/cars. Cameras only on the outside and gated. I keep the cover off and store my boards under the seats. Take the boards that don't fit home. Wet towels, carpet, tubes, kneeboards are left out in the boat to dry-if it gets stolen oh well.
Test the water with a tube or kneeboard for a few weeks.
Ours is so clean but with dust that I can see if there's a footprint on my swimdeck or trailer wheel covers. So far so good.
I cover in the wintertime when the dust sets in and the few bugs in the rafters die and fall on the boat.