Automotive & Mobile Equipment
A parked vehicle is warm shelter, and modern wiring is built with bio-based insulation that rodents are drawn to chew. From a daily driver to a combine to a boat in winter storage, DETOUR® protects the wiring they target and the spaces they nest in.
Why Rodents Nest in Vehicles
A parked vehicle gives mice and rats everything they want: an engine bay that stays warm for hours, wiring to chew through, insulation and upholstery to shred into bedding, and cover from predators.
DETOUR® products provide a protective barrier over the wiring and repels rodents from entering the vehicle in the first place
Wiring Harnesses & Engine Bays
The engine bay is the target. It stays warm long after the engine’s off, it’s enclosed and hidden, and it’s laced with wiring. Rodents nest against the block and gnaw harness insulation, connector boots, and cable looms while they’re in there.
DETOUR® Wire Protection Gel (11 oz. aerosol) coats harnesses, hoses, looms, and connector boots with a durable film that forms a physical barrier over the surfaces rodents chew. Spray directly onto wiring bundles and the insulation around them.
Underneath the car, apply DETOUR® Rat Repellent Gel on the wheel axles and suspension components.
Apply to clean, dry wiring . Focus on the runs closest to the firewall and along the base of the bay, where rodents travel and nest.
Stored & Seasonal Vehicles
Classic cars, RVs, tractors and motorcycles parked for a season undisturbed for months turns to the conditions a rodent population needs to move in, nest, and chew unnoticed.
The owner discovers it in spring: a nest in the air box, droppings through the interior, and wiring damage that turns the first drive of the season into a tow to the shop.
Protect the vehicle when it goes into storage. Coat engine-bay wiring and looms with DETOUR® Wire Protection Gel rodents would target through the layup. Apply DETOUR® Rat Repellent Gel to the undercarriage.
Treat the storage space with DETOUR® Rat Repellent Gel — door thresholds, wall penetrations, and the perimeter where the vehicle sits.
Treat the week it’s parked, and note it on your storage checklist alongside the battery tender and fuel stabilizer. Plug the tailpipe and air intake with steel wool with DETOUR® Rat Repellent Gel over it.
Fleet & Commercial Vehicles
Delivery vans, work trucks, and buses sit overnight and over weekends in yards and depots. A chewed harness is a unit out of service and a route uncovered, meaning lost revenue and downtime for the operations.
Build wiring protection into scheduled fleet maintenance. Coat engine-bay harnesses with DETOUR® Wire Protection Gel on a set interval (1-2 months).
Treat the yard and depot structure with DETOUR® Rat Repellent Gel such as building access points, storage areas, and the perimeter.
Tie treatment to an existing service interval so it doesn’t need its own scheduling. For yards with known pressure, treat the perimeter structure first; it protects every unit at once.
Dealership & Vehicle Storage Lots
Protect inventory with a lot-wide approach. Coat harnesses on long-dwell units with DETOUR ® Wire Protection Gel, prioritizing the back-row vehicles that sit longest.
Treat the lot’s structures along perimeter fencing bases, storage and service buildings, ground-level utility access with DETOUR® Rat Repellent Gel to lower the rodent population feeding into the lot from surrounding cover.
Protect inventory with a lot-wide approach. Coat harnesses on long-dwell units with Wire Protection Gel, prioritizing the back-row vehicles that sit longest.
Treat the lot’s structures — perimeter fencing bases, storage and service buildings, ground-level utility access — with repellent gel to lower the rodent population feeding into the lot from surrounding cover.
Prioritize by dwell time, not location — pull the inventory-age report and treat anything past 30 days first. Those are the units carrying the real risk of a discovery at delivery.
Cabs, Interiors & HVAC
Rodents don’t stop at the engine bay. They get into the cabin through the fresh-air intake and cowl, then nest in the blower housing, behind the dash, and in seat foam and headliner insulation.
Beyond the chewed cabin wiring, it’s a health and comfort problem: droppings in the air system, nesting debris blown through the vents, and an odor that’s very hard to fully remove once it’s set in.
Treat the cabin entry points rather than the interior surfaces. Apply repellent gel around the cowl and fresh-air intake screens, firewall pass-throughs, and any gap where cabling or hardware penetrates into the cab.
For exposed cabin and dash wiring reachable from the engine side, Wire Protection Gel adds a barrier film over the cable itself. Keep applications on structural and mechanical surfaces, away from occupant contact areas.
The cowl vent below the windshield is the most common cabin entry — check it for nesting debris first. Treat its screening and the surrounding channel; that one spot accounts for a large share of interior invasions.
Agricultural & Heavy Equipment
Combines, tractors, skid steers, and generators spend long off-seasons parked in sheds and open barns. A machine that sits eight months is a heated, sheltered, predator-free structure the moment it’s last run.
Modern equipment carries the same bio-based wiring as cars, plus far more of it. A severed harness on a late-model combine is a major repair, and it surfaces at first start-up in the busiest week of the season.
Coat wiring runs, looms, and cab harnesses with DETOUR® Wire Protection Gel across the extensive cabling these units carry.
Treat the equipment’s access points and the storage structure with DETOUR® Rat Repellent Gel on floor-pan gaps, intake screens. For the shed and barn place DETOUR Gel Trays for easy deployment.
Monitor the movements of rodents throughout the offseason using the DETOUR® Rat Trax® UV Tracking Tunnel to effectively use DETOUR® Rat Repelent Gel across the storage facility.
Treat the week the machine is parked for the season, and put it on the same layup checklist as fuel stabilizer and battery disconnect. Re-coat annually at the same point in the storage cycle. (For full farm-site coverage, see the Agriculture page.)
Marine & Powersports
Boats, Jet Skis, ATVs, Snowmobiles, etc. spend much of the year in storage shrink-wrapped, tarped, or shedded. Each is a warm, enclosed nesting site with wiring to chew.
Marine and Powersports layups are especially vulnerable because they’re long, sealed, and unchecked. Owners open them up at the start of the season to find nests in the hull, engine, or airbox and wiring that needs replacing before the first ride.
Before wrapping or covering for the off-season, coat engine and accessory wiring with DETOUR® Wire Protection Gel over the harnesses and looms in the bilge, engine bay, or under the seat.
Treat the access points where rodents get aboard on trailer tongue and frame contact points, hull drains and vents, and the storage structure around the unit with DETOUR® Rat Repellent Gel before the cover goes on.
Treat before you shrink-wrap or cover once it’s sealed, a rodent inside has undisturbed run of the unit all winter. On trailered gear, remember the trailer tongue is the gangplank; treating those contact points closes the main way aboard.
PROTECT WHAT YOU DRIVE, STORE & SELL
From a single stored classic to a full fleet or sales lot, here’s where to go next.