Winter sleep?

Add stabiliser , pump up the tyres , trickle charge it .
Periodically start it to turn over fluids and get heat into it to drive out condensation.Roll it out back n forth to ease the brakes .

 

This is what I have been doing every year since 2008 when I bought my 328, standard pump 91 ethanol gasoline is the only fuel I have ever used:

Add stabilizer (I use StaBil) to gas in recommended amount while refueling. Drive car for at least 10 miles to ensure StaBil is distributed throughout system. Park car in garage, disconnect negative battery terminal. That's it.

5-7 months later reconnect neg terminal, start car. It always starts as if it had been running yesterday.

I do the same with three other cars and 5 motorcycles.

 

I just drive it as needed

 

I pretty much do what Mike does, I use ethanol free super unleaded without Stabil, disconnect the battery. Dino and Alfas always start up no problem.

 

I do the annual fluid changes after the last drive of the season, then fill the tank with gas and add StaBil. After that, drive around for about 5 minutes to circulate the fluids. Then I thoroughly wash the car and vacuum the interior. Disconnect the battery and hook up the trickle charger, and count the days until spring

 

I don’t judge the end of season time by when it gets cold. When they throw the first salt on the road is when the cars go into hibernation. I fill the tank with stabilizer added and then have it on a trickle charger. I have heard to not start it during the winter as it can attract moisture. Let it sleep. Good to go in the spring.

 

What everyone else said except the starting don,t start the car at all you do more harm then good leave it alone til the spring

 

I parked it, disconnected the battery and forget until spring. No additives. Done it for 38 years. No down side. Car as always started on the 1st crank come sprint. Same for my 355 and Cayman S. And we have 10% ethanol.

 

I have heard from a few mechanics that, since so many fewer people actually purchase non-ethanol fuel, it ends up sitting in the underground tank considerably longer than the ethanol fuel and is somewhat aged by the time you're putting it in your tank. Fuel with ethanol isn't going to age a whole lot sitting until spring in your aluminum fuel tanks.

On my end I will park my car as normal and try to get it out on nice days. No salt on the roads here in Southern Oregon so if the sun's out, the classic cars come out

 

It is so important that you remember to drive for a few miles once you've added the stabilizer! Consider moving to Florida where you can just drive all year long

 

Matches my experience with ethanol-free... Carbed cars are more sensitive to bad gas than FI, and my carbed cars run better on the local E10 than any locally available ethanol-free.

 

A few other ideas...

• Good to change the oil before storage.
• Put the car in gear and/or use wheel chocks and leave the parking brake unengaged.
• Trickle chargers that have a desulphinating function can extend the life of the battery considerably.

 

I won't argue that fact, but FWIW I'm on my 4th battery since I bought my 308 QV in 1985. The last battery lasted 15 years and was replace 2 years ago. So that and average of 12 years for the first 3. Current 355 battery is at lease 10 1/2 years old. Just disconnect and check voltage in spring. Trickle charge in spring for a day before I start the cars if necessary. On my newer cars I do connect a trickle charger because I don't want to disconnect the battery due to all the electrical stuff that is saved. And for that I just use one of these old Schumacher units that is either on or off. No fancy charge cycles.

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That is amazing battery life!

 

This is the battery maintainer I have used for 20 years...the cost is very low at $54, and it does have the desulphination feature,

https://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/elpages/vdc-1500.php

Other private label brands of this are probably even cheaper off of Amazon.

 

When I bought by previous 348 TS from Kent High Performance (previously The Ferrari Centre) in the UK, I asked them what was the best thing to do with the car come the winter time.

Their advice was, so long as the roads were dry (no rain, snow or ice on them), and had no traces of salt on them, to just drive the car at least once a week, making sure I drove it long enough to get the oil up to full operating temperature.

I asked what was best for the car when there was salt/snow/ice on the road, whether it was better to leave it sitting on a battery charger and not start it up, or start it up and let it run up to temperature.

Their advice was, if you can't drive the car, at least start it up once a week, and don't let it just idle up to temperature, but instead, apply the throttle in the same way you would when driving it from cold (so gently revving the engine up and down to @ 2000rpm for a bit, as though you are driving down the road doing making gear changes, then increase the revs to @ 3000rpm after a while, then 4000 rpm - They said there was no need to go above 4000rpm). They advised to do this until the engine oil was up to operating temperature, and that keeping the oil and coolant circulated around the engine once a week was better for the car than letting the oil drain down, and the coolant to just sit for several months.

That made sense to me, so I see little reason to stop the practice of running the engine up once a week with my current 328 GTS.

Each to their own at the end of the day.

 

"Carb Defender" is a fuel stabiliser and can be used in FI cars too