Driving a car hard can make it run better?

[Ramblin Fever]

Thanks for the clarification.

It is fun to hit 4k rpm's, but it's not something I purposely do but once in a blue moon. Yes, it does hit 4-4500 rpm's at least twice a month just climbing the Eisenhower corridor.

Just curious - my Brother-I-L loves to tease about never getting the cobwebs out, and that the engine is going to rot.

If I drove a car, I'd probably have more fun and see more point in hitting WOT daily, but in an SUV with big tires, what's the point?

 

[brianl703]

quote:

---

Convincing people that their cars CAN actually rev past 2000 RPM's is a different stories.

---

That's easy..around here, just try passing them.

 

[jmacmaster]

You don't have to rev it up a lot, or every day, to keep the carbon blown out. And you don't have to be at the redline to blow the carbon out. A thousand rpm's below the redline will do it. Just drive every few months at about 1,000 rpm's below the redline in any gear for a couple miles. I usually do this in 3rd gear on a two lane highway or freeway with my two vehicles, both of which have 5-speed manual transmissions.

kendogg441 said:

"My '05 Subaru outback Sport's 2.5L N/A hits redline almost daily. I believe it's good for it. I've seen these engines with over 80k on them, with all the original crosshatching on the cylinder walls still, and not a bit of a lip in the cylinders from ring wear."

80,000 miles is nothing on the Subaru 2.5 liter 4 cyl. engine that's been around for decades. Its common for this engine to go 200,000 miles or more. Subarus, most of them with this engine, are real popular in Montana where I live and there's old ones from the 80's all over the place. My service station services one with over 900,000 miles on it and has since it was new, and it hasn't had an engine rebuild.

 

[Steve S]

Yep ,it blows the carbon from areas of the cumbustion chamber and piston top and high RPM cause the piston rings to vibrate which frees the rings up.

 

[the_oil_dealer]

lol - i guess I've blown some aluminum off my pistons because, my engine see's 7500rpm every day!

 

[55Test]

There's a bit of a saying around these parts that goes something like "If an engine is driven gently all it's life, then gets driven hard it'll blow up soon. If an engine is driven hard all it's life, then gets driven easy, it'll blow up" I don't know if that holds any truth, it's just something I heard one day a few years ago.

 

[PandaBear]

Don't even worry about above 2000rpm, my car stay at 3100rpm when I am doing 70mph and after 165k miles everything is like new.

FYI the power band starts at 4500rpm.

 

[brianl703]

My car's engine (Ford Duratec 2.5L V6) turns at about 3000RPM at 67MPH and it's got 126K on it. The car I had before that (same model, prior year) has 159K on it now.

That engine makes 75% of peak torque at 1500RPM, and I can actually accelerate faster than 95% of the drivers on the road (when the light turns green) by shifting at 2000RPM and skipping 2nd and 4th gear.

(BTW, I think it would really help our traffic congestion problems if the drivers around here accelerated like they were being passed when the the light turned green!)

 

[Palut]

quote:

---

Don't even worry about above 2000rpm, my car stay at 3100rpm when I am doing 70mph and after 165k miles everything is like new.

FYI the power band starts at 4500rpm.

---

Same here. If I try to do more than maintain speed with the engine below 2000 rpm, my engine starts bogging down pretty bad! That's the only thing I don't like about Honda engines, they're too high strung!

 

[brianl703]

No accelerating from idle in 3rd gear on those, eh?

 

[Rickey]

Gary in Sandy Eggo
"What I said was, an engine run for a long time at low rpm's will eventually form a sharp ridge that the upper ring could bang into if revved into a much higher rpm range.

What I can't tell you is how long it would take for the ridge to form to the point of being a barrier to higher rpm's OR, how much of a real problem it represents.

If you DO occasionally run your engine to a higher rpm for even a minute or so, that ridge would end up being tapered, and be of no serious consequence.

I personally do not believe you will have shortened engine life from driving under 4K rpm. In fact, the more time you can spend at or under 2K rpm, the longer your engine will last. It's simple math. All other things being equal, wear goes up with relative velocity.
Regards, Gary in SandyEggo"

quote:

---

---

I agree with Gary on this. At high RPM the rods ,crank,pistons,wristpins,etc. all stretch a little not to mention the oil cushion in the bearings becoming thinner all leading to the piston and rings traveling higher in the cylinder bore. So if the engine has been used at low RPM exclusively, and long enough to form a wear ridge at the top of the cylinder: the first time some some teenage or older hotrodder drives granny's car BOOM, POOF, oil smoke and maybe a blown engine.

Rickey.

 

[brianl703]

That's why, whenever I drive my mom's car, I make sure to take it to redline at least once or twice

 

[Gary in Sandy Eggo]

After reading all this, I took my car out and revved the snot out of it. When I was done, the lifters were clattering, but they did quiet down some, but not completely. The next day, while driving along minding my own bidness, the engine seized.

So, who's going to pay for all this? Hmmmmmmmm. How about passing the hat?

Regards, Gary in Sandy Eggo

P.S. - I was kidding about the engine seizing. I was also kidding about the lifters clattering. AND, I was also kidding about buzzing the snot out of the engine in the first place.

Back in the 1950's and earlier, this was known as "blowing out the carbon."