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How do you winterize your ZX

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Old 10-05-2014 | 10:09 AM
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Default How do you winterize your ZX

I figure the water system is the easy part but where do you drain the the blocks at and then how do you fill it up with anti freeze. 500 EFIs. I use to pull the stats on my 311 but the stats on the EFI look impossible to get to. Thanks for any help.
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Old 10-05-2014 | 12:59 PM
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Do you have flush ports, sea strainers or through the drives..
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Old 10-06-2014 | 07:10 AM
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No sea strainers but the previous owner has plumbed in a hose behind the seawater pump to run/flush it out of the water. Pick ups are on the drives.
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Old 10-06-2014 | 11:14 AM
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I run the pink stuff through that hose your talking about once the motors are hot and tstats open. 2 gallons a motor. Shut it down then drain the blocks. No fluid = cant freeze. On both sides on the block you should see a blue wing nut
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Old 10-06-2014 | 11:23 AM
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I run 5 gallon per motor
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Old 10-06-2014 | 04:36 PM
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Originally Posted by prostock3
I run the pink stuff through that hose your talking about once the motors are hot and tstats open. 2 gallons a motor. Shut it down then drain the blocks. No fluid = cant freeze. On both sides on the block you should see a blue wing nut
Can I just drain from the blue wing nuts then fill from the hoses off the stat housing?
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Old 10-06-2014 | 06:03 PM
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Are you really willing to gamble with 20k worth of motors just to take the easy way out? I run antifreeze through the motor and drain EVERYTHING.
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Old 10-06-2014 | 07:49 PM
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I was taught and have always done it this way. Run motor up to temperature, t-Stat open. Remove blue plugs, Drain the block and remove hoses from tstat housing to risers. Refill through the large hose off the t-stat to the water circulation pump and fill till water comes out hoses coming off tstat housing. I live on the Canadian border, and it's gets as cold as anywhere. 500 efi motors

Last edited by donzi33zx; 10-06-2014 at 07:55 PM. Reason: Add context
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Old 10-07-2014 | 09:37 AM
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Yes from what it sounds no one is doing the "easy way out"

The block drains are a mother to get to in the middle. Also make sure you drain the oil cooler, and exhaust. On year I couldnt get to the inside block drain on my port motor. So I filled the motor up with straight coolant not the pink stuff and not mixed coolant and turned the motor over for a sec so the water pump could mix the coolant in the block with water. So any water inside the block with mix with the coolant and not freeze. No issues with that..

Dont forget to add pink to waste tank and water tank and lines. Including the flush lines for bathroom.
But when it comes to winterizing a boat everyone has there own way of doing it and people will always say your way is wrong. The main point is to not let anything freeze and get damage.

Also dont forget to pump the water out where your front bilge pump is, and the a/c has a drain where it picks water up from the hull. Drain that as well!
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Old 10-07-2014 | 06:32 PM
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Originally Posted by Drock78
Are you really willing to gamble with 20k worth of motors just to take the easy way out? I run antifreeze through the motor and drain EVERYTHING.
How is draining from the block plugs, then filling from the stat housing the easy way out. I would think running on the hose then swapping to the pink stuff hoping the stat says open is the easy way out. I was gonna use straight green stuff to just in case there's any water residue. Also I found that pulling the lowest point where water sits then the highest you create a suction pulling all the water out.

As for the waste and water system I was gonna use the pink stuff. Drain as much water a possible then follow the tank with a few gallons of pink then run all the sinks, toilet, and pumps to get the pink stuff in it. Even the pump out valve. Then throw some in the bilge and then turn the bilge on, which reminds me I have a second bilge in the cabin.
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