Has anyone ever just palced a small heater in the engine compartment for winter times? Ceramic heaters should be safe enough to avoid flammability of any potential fumes. Thoughts?? I intend to trailer the boat to Florida several times during the winter so I don't want to full winterize.

What if the power went out???? What if???

Is it really worth losing two motors because you didnt want the hassle to winterize your motors?? I would just winterize. If its gonna be run often just drain the water and replace with antifreeze.... just my opinion!

Yup and if you did have a issue with the heater causing a fire then I doubt that your insurance would cover it. Plus there is the other things that you do while winterizing like checking the drive fluid, trimming them down.......

MY cheap friend use to do that. he never had a problem. Where do you live? How cold of an area?

I wouldn't trust tens of thousands of dollars to a fifty dollar heater or a blown fuse or power outage

what about when you unplug the heater and start towing??
it will freeze then!

Let us know how that works out for you.

Ok....i know of people putting a 60watt(or some certain watt) utility light in their bilge during the winter...the whole time, but why risk a dock power out? We(in the SW Missouri area) experienced a couple weeks of bad freeze last spring and I put a flameless propane camp heater in my bilge just for insurance.....b/c I already used my boat twice in march/april. If your not going to realistically use the boat than just winterize it. Too easy and cheap not too.

Why not just go through your normal winterization procedure- oil change, drive lube change, full fog of internals etc. Then pull the plugs and drain the block, exhaust manifolds, and hoses completely of water (blow them out with air if it makes you feel better). You can pull it down to Florida at your hearts' content without the risk of engine damage and just repeat the process down there before bringing it back home.
Better yet, just do what I've done in the past; take it down in the fall and leave it down there and get a cheap round trip plane ticket down when you feel the itch to go boating. Repeat as necessary. It would be easier/cheaper to find an in-out service to store and launch your boat for the winter than hassling with tow vehicle fuel cost, driving/trailering in snow, salt, and slush and inclimate weather. Bring it back home in the spring.

Antifreeze has rust and corrosion inhibitor blended in it. It makes me cringe just thinking of nothing but water sitting in my motor for more than a couple of weeks at a time, much less all winter. I would even prefer antifreeze over draining everything completely.