Thread 28707035

should you warm up your engine in winter or not?

>>28707035 (OP)
You should let your engine warm up every single time.
Oil needs to get up to operating temperature to properly lubricate your engine.

if you're car manual says to warm up your engine in winter then warm up your engine in winter
if you're car manual does not explicitly ask you to idle like a boomer tard then do not do that dumbfuck

>>28707045
>old car do new car don't
>is says yes do it if says no don't
ok

You “warm up” your engine by driving your car after you’ve given it about 30s to get off initial high idle. Leaving it idle for half an hour is peak boomerism that does more damage to the engine, as you’re taking longer to heat the engine as it’s continuously running.
Remember that there is more gas being injected in the engine even for the same given RPM while in gear, as it is supporting a load.

OP what is worse,
A cold engine with cold oil staying cold for 12 minutes while you pre-idle it up to hot COOLANT temperature,
Or an engine that has circulated in idle for 30-60 seconds and then been driven (gently) for a couple minutes sllowing the oil to also warm up along with the coolant?

>>28707035 (OP)
temps here are usually below freezing. even when I'm running petrol instead of diesel, I still let the engine warm.

on really old cars with manual chokes, you need to let them warm for about 3 minutes as you progressively close the choke, even in perfect weather.

the thing people forget is to let your coolant circulate before turning the car off. on boosted cars, you need to wait 2+ min. on non-boosted, I wait about 30-60s.

also depends if u have something like an evo which has intercooler spray nozzles to keep the bay cool. can use it after a drive to speed up cooldown.

I like for my car to get warm before I leave, but that only takes like 5-10 minutes. If there's Ice on the windshield it's getting warmed up no matter what for 15 minutes to let it met the ice, fuck scraping it off in the cold. I wish I had a bigger garage so I didn't have to any of this, but my car isn't showing any signs of west 4 winters on.

>>28707035 (OP)
I start up the engine with the acceleration pedal pressed all the way. It's good to hit the rev limiter once a day so I just get it out of the way first.

>>28707145
it warms up faster that way

>>28707145
unrelated but so many retarded amerifats destroyed their mazda rotary engines but never fully opening the throttle at least a few times a month. then they wondered why the cars failed.

>>28707175
*by never

>>28707035 (OP)
Just drive below 3k rpm until fully warmed up

Waste of fuel to just idle and takes much longer to warm up

Idling is bad, just start the car and clear the ice off and go, don't be one of those tards that starts it for 10min then goes.

In my hybrid the engine rarely starts when you turn the key, but when it's cold enough it will just start and idle the engine at like 3k rpm to heat up the engine and hybrid battery

>>28707035 (OP)
If it’s actually cold outside, I’ll let it idle for about a minute to let the oil in the engine and trans circulate a little then drive gently until everything is up to temp. Letting it idle for like 30 minutes does nothing for you other than wash your cylinders down with gas and dilute your oil a bit. Just remember, your engine is full of different metals that all expand at different rates so no high revs and no high load on a cold motor.

>>28707042
retard

>>28707035 (OP)
I let it run a minute or two, maybe until I see the temp gauge needle move a little. By then there's probably some oil everywhere it needs to go. No hard revving until it's close to normal operating temperature.
If it's way below freezing, I use a block heater that heats up a part of the engine block (and the fluids around there) with external power. Easy to see when the fluids from the heated parts have spread around the engine when the temp gauge suddenly bounces up a notch. If the blower heater inside (powered from the same cables) didn't manage to heat up the interior enough to melt the frost outside, I can scrape ice off the windows while the engine warms up.

>>28707035 (OP)
My car has a fast idle startup. When that is done I'm gone.

>>28707119
>on really old cars with manual chokes, you need to let them warm for about 3 minutes as you progressively close the choke, even in perfect weather.
At least that gives you some control over it. I can still barely remember the 90s, a time when many people were driving around in carburated, rusting 70s and 80s shitboxes with some kind of rudimentary auto choke. The dark bluish gray smoke hovering over the roads on winter mornings was really something.
Some of the cars struggled to keep their engine running even then, and you could see a few of them farting out even thicker puffs of smoke as the drivers revved the cars in the traffic lights, trying to keep them from stalling.

A modern-ish engine with computer-controlled injection is definitely a more pleasant experience for everyone involved. Except maybe the mechanic.

>>28707111
and how do you suppose that the oil gets to the tippy top of the engine to lube up the camshafts?
it couldn't possibly be through the channels bored through the engine block, could it?
and it certainly isn't the engine block that heats up due to the combustion within the cylinders, is it?
>trips
wasted

>>28707409
he's saying that the engine is idling with cold oil for much longer than if you just gently drove it around right after optimum oil pressure has been reached

By idling you are hurting the environment (by wasting fuel and generating pollution), the economy (by extending the lifetime of an obsolete product and having it compete with fresh production), and yourself by wasting your own precious time.

Why would you do all that?

>>28707415
To piss off little faggots like you.

Start engine f* off is my manufacturers running in period.If the car says hang on a moment then you hang on a moment, otherwise you're golden.

>>28707035 (OP)
OP, I still have a fucking carborator. I don't get a choice.

>>28707411
yeah true, I was just being a pedantic asshole
after 12 minutes of idling the oil will get up to a decent temp unless you're a diesel-loving europoor
at the end of the day, it's up to the user to juggle with idling and steadily cruzing because running a cold engine at higher revs is bad, but running it at higher revs warms it up faster which is good

>>28707415
nigger everything fuel powered except for passenger cars is measured in engine hours, not mileage

I live where it gets to -35 -39 C regularly overnight in winter. 5w-30 full synthetic in all of my shitboxes. I'll idle them minimum 10 mins at that temp before driving. 15 to 20 mins often. Never had a problem.
Been idling one particular LS for almost 13 years of ownership. Sometimes 25+ mins.
If it's only -10 then they just get a short 5 min idle. Idling to warm up is fine, fuck the haters and fuck the climate jews.

I sometimes let my cars idle if it's particularly cold not because of the engine, but because the cabin is cold.
Sometimes, especially on fresh snow, I hop into my car and drift it out of my driveway onto the main road, usually tend to SEND IT sideways through the curves and bends too, but winter drifting isn't the same as on asphalt drifting, so it's not that big of an issue.

Anyone who says otherwise is a dumbass wrenchlet.

>>28707379
>I let it run a minute or two, maybe until I see the temp gauge needle move a little. By then there's probably some oil everywhere it needs to go.
Your car most likely handles this automatically. It's why they idle high on cold starts.

I remote start it, mostly to get the ac or heat going, but yeah I guess there could be engine lubrication benefits too

>>28707840
Examples?

>>28707119
>the thing people forget is to let your coolant circulate before turning the car off. on boosted cars, you need to wait 2+ min. on non-boosted, I wait about 30-60s.
what?

>>28707918
Hot turbos need oil to stop them eating themselves. Some cars have electric pumps to stop the feeble minded from destroying their cars.

I'm going to add to this discussion. Most of you don't live where it's cold cold. 32F is not cold. I consider anything below -6F the beginning of cold and when you need an excessive idle warm up.

>>28707924
70f is cold for a mechanical system of aluminum and steel, retardo.

>>28707930
Even at 70f I'll idle all my shit for 2 minutes. I never ever start up at go.

>>28707933
*and go.

Sorry, I am a filthy phoneposter.

I find a gearbox has a bad time when cold. I've never tried a frozen automatic

>>28707035 (OP)
Yes because it's cold as fuck outside and the heater doesn't work until the engine has warmed up. When it's cold I always start my car and go back inside for @ 5 minutes so when I get in it it's nice and toasty inside.

>>28707939
Sure, but you don't warm the gearbox up by letting your car sit idling, you warm a gearbox up by driving.

>>28707035 (OP)
old boomer wive's tale from when they learned to drive. if you have a fuel-injected engine (which you do), warming up is is just wasting gas. hell i still have a bad habit of pumping my brakes since that's what my step-dad told me to do when helping to teach me drive despite ABS being standard in cars for decades at that point (and when i knew a lot less about cars).

>>28707939
My old Subaru outback's 5 speed felt like a cement mixer at -25C or colder. -35 and below it was just stupid how thick the oil was. You let the clutch out off a cold start and you could hear and feel the massive increase in load just at idle from thick oil.
People who don't warm their shit up when it's extremely cold are actually stupid.

I will die on this hill that idling to warm up is fine.

>>28707952
If it's truly cold, you likely need to warm up anyway to see where you're going. The windows will fog up quickly or even freeze from the inside if there are humans breathing inside the car and there's no heat available.

>>28707035 (OP)
non issue for me, because when it's winter i have to let it idle long enough to thaw it

in regular weather i wait about minute, i can feel how engine works and if it's ready to go
i almost never wait for idle revs to fall down

This thread reminds me of my brother, who is responsible for my extreme paranoia when buying second hand.
>never idles, even in blizzards
>if he stops somewhere during a mountain climb he'll immediately turn off the engine "to save gas"
>will do the same when dropping off the highway
>20k++ oil changes
>air filter changes? huh?
>diesel fuel filter??
>stuff other than the engine needs oil?
>"why does the turbo keep breaking"
>"the blue coolant was cheaper"
Some people are literally born to destroy and you cannot reason with them.

>>28707035 (OP)
No. You start the engine, wait maybe 10 seconds and then drive gently until your oil is up to temp. It's that simple. If you don't have a oil temp function in your car, it's five or so minutes after the coolant is up to temp. There's special procedures sometimes for people who live in actual fucking arctic conditions, but if you're one of them you already know and if you're going there don't get your advice from 4chan.

The original reason for letting the vehicle warm up is carbureted vehicles don't run well when cold. It also sucks driving in the winter without heat but you already knew that.

>>28707175
Strange that you think that sort of behavior is isolated to Americans. Everyone is a pussy now.

>>28707933
Ok well enjoy your lowered compression idiot.

>>28707888
Post wrenching nigger

>>28707900
Not that Anon but if you are legitimately that ignorant of every other industry that uses engines it's not his job to bring you up to speed.

>>28707952
>idling to warm up is fine
yeah but just driving it gently warms it up quicker

>>28707985
My oil pressure gauge psi goes down with increased rpm with extreme cold oil.
Takes several minutes for it to flow properly. I'll keep idling to warm up.

>>28707764
2500rpm at 0c air temp and 5c coolant temp isn't hurting the engine as much as 5 minutes of cold idling.
A high engine load at 2500rpm will, but here's the thing just drive more gently than normal for the first mile or two and you can then drive normally for the next 2-3 miles.
As soon as the coolant is up above 185F/85C the oil is usually warm enough (50-70C range) that you have the flow and pressure characteristics to drive "sporty" but not hard.

>to be pendantic
Naw....naw....

>>28707042
no it doesn't.

>>28708068
>0C
So not actually cold?

>>28707035 (OP)
Yeah, with an external heater

>>28707035 (OP)
No. Idling doesn't circulate oil properly and that destroys your engine over time. Engines are meant to work under load. Start, wait 30 seconds, then go.

>>28707035 (OP)
I idle for as long as it takes me to put on the seatbelt, get comfy and find something to listen to, which can be anywhere from 15 seconds to a couple of minutes.
It's a Volvo diesel 5-cyl, so it will never get warm anyway, it always idles at 750rpm. Takes around 10 minutes of city driving for warm air to start coming from the vents.

>>28707924
I'm somewhere in between I guess, lows in the teens or 20s with occasional single digits. My engine seems fine in the morning but the transmission is really lurchy until it warms up.

>>28707944
I was thinking about that, it seems logical that the transmission wouldn't get much from idiling, but there's a definite improvement if I remote start my truck and let it idle for 10 minutes or whatever before driving. It's particularly significant at my place because I have to turn onto a fast moving road almost right out of my driveway (only a couple of houses between me and it) so I really have to punch it and it's really rough when cold. I've got a Ford 10 speed with 70k mi on it too so I'm doing what I can to try and keep it from grenading.

>>28707977
>puts load on his vehicle with no temp in the reciprocating assembly
>thinks he's some kind of authority on the subject because he has a 40 year old bike in a shed with some crumby single mom tier tool set
the state of this board is insane

It's not even about oil temp. You should let your shit idle for a minute or two so there's temp in the block and head and the tolerances have filled out before putting any load on it. It's not a debate you're just a lazy fucking bumpkin.

There's a reason racecars cycle 200 degree water and oil through their engines for 30 minutes before cranking them.

>>28707035 (OP)
regardless of the time of the year or the outside temperature, i always warm up the engine by driving slowly and not going over 2k rpm until it gets up to the temp.

i never warm it up by idling. i hear that is worse than driving it straight away because the oil pressure on idle is lower and it doesnt lubricate top part of the engine as efficiently. exception is if it is covered in the snow, then i will start the car and turn the heater while i remove the snow/ice, but i do it for my comfort and not engine desu

my latest dd has auxiliary heater with remote control and, supposedly, alongside of heating up the cabin it also moves warmed-up coolant through the engine which helps it warm it up a little bit before starting it. not sure if that makes any difference or at all, but it sure is nice to enter a warm car. also it helps tremendously with removing snow and ice

>>28707969
Absolutely terrifying.