AZjeff
$50 Site Donor 2023
What had been a hypothetical question based on a possibility turned into a real situation. Do I take delivery as soon as possible or have it trucked and follow the recommended procedure?
New car break-in
- Thread starter AZjeff
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What had been a hypothetical question based on a possibility turned into a real situation. Do I take delivery as soon as possible or have it trucked and follow the recommended procedure?
I'd wait. The last thing I'd want is someone from the dealer driving it, especially if he's not happy wasting the better part of the day transporting the vehicle.
Another thing to keep in mind is the PDI is not done at the depot, it's done at the dealership. So if for some reason the vehicle is low on coolant or oil coming off the line it isn't getting topped up until it's at the dealership. It doesn't happen all the time but it does happen.
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I agree with that. I do wonder, what would happen if that was to happen? What would be the typical result if a new owner does it all wrong? How many miles does it ultimately cost off the vehicles life?
I'd do what the manual says, as close as possible. I don't recall my 17 Toyota saying anything about break in. But, yeah, machining tolerances and equipment are way better than, say, 40 years ago.
Kestas
Staff member
Can someone explain this to me in detail? I understand how pressure contributes to break-in, but I fail to see how vacuum helps.
This advice is similar to that for piston aircraft engines. Run it at high cylinder pressures, but don't let it heat up. That promotes piston ring seating. Ring seal is so important, new airplane engines typically recommend running at 70% power or higher for the first 50 hours. Oil consumption is the key that tells you when rings have seated. It typically stabilizes in the first 10 hours of operation. But if you don't follow the break-in procedure, the rings could glaze instead of seating. That means you have to take it apart and re-hone the cylinders.
How much of this applies to cars is debatable, as airplanes are using 60 year old engine manufacturing processes. With cars, I prefer to give it a few easy heat cycles before stressing it. With airplanes you shouldn't do this. First, easy running could glaze the cylinders preventing proper ring seating, and it's unnecessary as each engine is individually run up and dyno tested before delivery.
The symptoms of poor break-in may be similar between airplane & car engines. One is excessive oil consumption. Some cars are prone to this. I wonder if people followed a bit more aggressive break-in similar to what airplane engines recommend, if we'd see fewer car engines with oil consumption problems.
How much of this applies to cars is debatable, as airplanes are using 60 year old engine manufacturing processes. With cars, I prefer to give it a few easy heat cycles before stressing it. With airplanes you shouldn't do this. First, easy running could glaze the cylinders preventing proper ring seating, and it's unnecessary as each engine is individually run up and dyno tested before delivery.
The symptoms of poor break-in may be similar between airplane & car engines. One is excessive oil consumption. Some cars are prone to this. I wonder if people followed a bit more aggressive break-in similar to what airplane engines recommend, if we'd see fewer car engines with oil consumption problems.
Great thing about the wife's new Prius for break-in - the CVT will vary the RPMs for us. On my stick shift VW, I had to ensure I didn't cruise the same RPM for very long during the first 500 miles.
Bad thing about Prius Prime break-in - with so many EV miles, who knows when its fully broken in!?!
Bad thing about Prius Prime break-in - with so many EV miles, who knows when its fully broken in!?!
The Feds did return the control of maximum speed limits to the states in 1995, however almost 50% of states still use 55 as their maximum speed so it is kind of the defacto national speed limit.
Great.
Why would you want them to drive 100+ miles on your brand new vehicle? I’d wait for it to be delivered by truck if it were me.
Any ideas? How many miles would you typically lose in a vehicles life if it was all done wrong?
