You may or may not have a garage, depending on where you fit into the Cycle of Life in Alaska. Maybe you just graduated to a gray-water system in your cabin. Maybe you even just got a washer so weekends are not spent at the laundromat.
If you are a true sourdough and you have arrived at running water (with a septic system) and you have a heated garage, well. There is no more to say.
You wake up, pour your coffee and saunter out into a warm car. Sometimes you even forget to bring a coat, until you get to work and have to plug in and walk across the parking lot. Dang it! Or, heaven help you, get a flat tire at -20, and you are in your short-sleeves.
You have undoubtedly paid your dues and mortgage to get to the point of a heated garage, but there is a larger price you may be paying for the privilege of crawling into a Toyota that is 65 above.
This is a price you neither realize nor see because it is entirely hidden from view: Metal Corrosion.
The maintenance routine in Fairbanks involves a salt brine that slathers your entire vehicle, uniformly. The result is the rapid deterioration of metal components due to rust.
A heated garage accelerates this process EXPONENTIALLY. The rate of decay to metals which are frozen is significantly slower than those exposed to moisture at above freezing temperature. Add a catalyst such as salt to moist steel and it corrodes quickly.
This is a wonderful resource on the whole process of rusting (along with Jay Leno’s explanation about how to over come rust)
If you want to preserve the investment of your vehicle, as long as the roads are salted, park your car outside as much as possible. Turn back the clock on your car’s rust problems: Park it outside this winter!
Or weigh in at Fairbanks Area Surface Transportation and let them know you’d like to use your heated garage!