Systems fail when your boat sits idle

SAN DIEGO—While most passionate boaters want to spend as much time as possible on our boats, life and work requirements often interfere, despite our best desires and intentions. That’s what happened to us this year. Because of a prolonged renovation project at our condo and several other unavoidable matters, Arv and I weren’t able to enjoy our boat as much as usual – and Arv wasn’t able to perform all the routine maintenance tasks he normally does. Every January we need to vacate our slip for the Sunroad San Diego Boat Show, which enables us to experience other marinas. But as Arv began preparations to move Burgundy various problems showed up with a vengeance, as generally occurs whenever a boat’s systems aren’t exercised regularly. What happened? Despite starting the engines periodically, this time he couldn’t start them. He suspected a failure of the batteries used to start the engines. When he looked up his maintenance records – he notes the date and type of work he’s undertaken – he realized the batteries, which he’d replaced soon after we bought the boat, were more than nine years old. He learned that AGM batteries, newly available on the market when he purchased them, have an expected...