Winterization advice please

[AGLyme]

First time attempting this project.
Boat lives on the CT shoreline, it gets cold here… 4 degrees is not crazy, it happens.
I watched “as the prop turns” which provides a good general overview.
Boat is a 2013 RT 31cb, so older model than on the company how-to video.
I bought 14 gals of pink anti freeze.
Turned on all fresh water sources, except heads, to drain the potable water. Everything was just spitting… check !

Removed fresh water filter in starboard laz and emptied the water in there - out.

Decided to do the pink program vs the air one for logistical reasons…
Dumped 4 gals of pink in the potable water tank. Went to forward head first and turned on the sink and shower…
Basically a frothy, spitty water show for the longest time…then finally kinda pinkish water… def had air in the system, so I tightensed up the water filter previously emptied. Note, the water filter was half water on the bottom, and half pink on top. So I emptied it again to get the water out.

Again the “spit show”, so I dumped 4 more gallons of pink in… eventually more until I now have 12 gals of pink in the potable water tank.

seems like there is still air in the system with very little pink coming out of the water sources.

So i thought maybe I need to empty out out the hot water tank. I stopped work because I only had a few small plastic pails… there is a clown car amount of water in the hot water tank… so I went home and built a hose to attach to the HW tank and will empty the tank in the AM.

Why can’t I get a steady flow of pink stuff ? Instead of the spit show…?

And finally, if I have a macerator, would the switch location be prominent in the head ? The helm ? I hope I don’t have one…

Thank you in advance.

 

[AGLyme]

Starting to solve some of my own issues here… I found a short 9 year old Ranger Tug DIY winterization video.

2 things I learned from it:

1) empty the hot water tank FIRST before loading the pink into the potable water tank. This probably explains why I am getting pinkish water instead of the full pink liquid.

2) I saw an actual vid of a macerator valve… I do not have a macerator.

The remaining mystery in the potable water step is why there is so much air in the system with 12 gallons of pink in the potable tank.

Will try again in AM

 

[AGLyme]

Thank you to GZ for your excellent advice. All is well, and pink as hell.

My mistake, I did not empty the hot water heater before I sent pink into the potable tank.

I did end up bypassing the HW heater with a homemade hose bypass.

 

[KlaassyC]

I added an RV style winterization kit between the potable water tank and the pump. Essentially it’s a three way valve with a short hose that allows the existing pump to draw from the tank (normal use) or from the hose (winterize use). I insert the hose directly into a bottle of antifreeze and it only takes a little over a gallon to winterize the potable water system. This also keeps the antifreeze out of the tank which significantly reduces the residual taste in the spring.

 

[AGLyme]

Yeah I am going to pay the potable tank clean out price in the Spring. If able, can you post a pic of your gizmo ?

Thanks