Totally irrelevant to objects. Only affects us and the rate of cooling.
Yes, warming up your car before driving in cold weather can damage the engine
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Has anyone here experienced the instance where you started up your cold car and drove away and the inside of your windshield fogged up to the point where you couldn't see clearly?
I see the warming up portion of driving my car as a Safety Issue.
Clean ALL the snow off the vehicle, clear all windows of frost, ice, snow, while engine is warming.
Personally, I park my work car in the garage so that I don't have to clear it in the early morning hours before I start my sometimes hour commute.
Remote start is great for warming up the vehicle!!
Wifey warms hers up too.
I see the warming up portion of driving my car as a Safety Issue.
Clean ALL the snow off the vehicle, clear all windows of frost, ice, snow, while engine is warming.
Personally, I park my work car in the garage so that I don't have to clear it in the early morning hours before I start my sometimes hour commute.
Remote start is great for warming up the vehicle!!
Wifey warms hers up too.
My Chevy Cruze will only idle for 10 minutes and shuts itself off if not "Started" inside the car. I love the remote start!!
Correct, I'm surprised that it took 4 pages of comments before somebody mentioned this. I suppose that the transmission, especially automatics warm up fairly quickly but the differential, brakes and other components are "warmed up" by driving the car.
My cars are garaged and the insulation of the garage generally keeps the interior temperature about 35 degrees warmer than the outside air temp. It doesn't get super cold here in the winter but morning temperatures in the 20's are not uncommon. So I let the cars idle for 2-3 minutes until the temp gauge moves up about halfway to normal operating temperature and then drive slowly for about a mile until I hit the State Highway. And then I still take it fairly easy and don't do any full throttle accelerations or hard braking and just let all the components come up to full operating temperatures.
I sure do like a heated steering wheel and seat these days, it keeps me from having to turn on the heater for a few miles which also helps the engine to come up to full temperature faster.
I hate scraping windows. Just a little forethought and I haven't done it in years. Even if I get a call at a weird hour I just click the timer to "on" and the car is toasty and defrosted by the time I leave.
For the helos, the heaters are for crew / patient comfort and the meds carried on board. Narcs stay on the crew but everything else like saline, etc stays in the bird.
Yes and no--yes I've seen it start to do that, no I've never driven to the point where I couldn't see properly.
That's why I open a window until the defroster has any sort of heat to deal with it.
Have had cases too where the outside of the windshield starts to freeze back over, that's worse, but haven't seen that in a while, thankfully.
Have to say, getting a house with a garage is really nice now... I almost feel bad for my kids where they have to clean off their car now before going to school. Almost feel bad...
All the time! Well, some days moreseo than others. It probably has something to do with the dew point.
Warm humid breath will fog a window fast; for example, if you've just spent fifteen minutes working hard scraping off the ice and snow. I have long hair, too, so if I just showered it is like a fog machine when I get in the car. Letting the car warm up first is a must.
I've been toying with the idea of reducing startup wear by installing coolant pre-heaters. They can be found used on eBay for cheap. These units would allow you to pre-heat the engine without actually running it, use less fuel, and warm the cabin. There are ones that heat your entire coolant circuit and ones that just heat the cabin. I've got a kit in my basement waiting to be installed. More discussion in another thread here.
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The user manuals usually cover this. The advice that I remember seeing is that in cold weather you start the car, wait for a few seconds and drive gently until the engine reaches normal operating temperature.
This topic should not be a subject to endless discussions - just RTFM.
This topic should not be a subject to endless discussions - just RTFM.
Tell that to my battery when it sat outside for 9 hours at work and cranks slowly at first or the transmission (fluid) when I shifted into R and it took about 3-4 seconds before it engaged. Why do engine block heaters exist ?
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Snow or ice, Car is running while I clean it. No snow or ice, 30 seconds after it starts I'm rolling.
Don't know if it matters, it's just what I've always done.
Don't know if it matters, it's just what I've always done.
me too because i think this lessens chance of fuel drops to hit cyl walls.
after few seconds i drive 2-3krpm
when water >60´c ; lpg goes on. then i don´t have to worry about anything.
new cars have watercooled exhaust headers in head, driving it will warm faster.
police can give ticket for long idling the car.... its against law.
happened on my 1999 old gasoline car only. new one is ok.
it might be also related to me cleaning the new car much more.
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We don't have remote start on either of the cars, and they are pretty far from the house, so that solves that problem.
1 minute MAX idle and off we go s-l-o-w-l-y.
Ok. I confess. if it's below >zero
I don't commute to work anymore so problem solved. Maybe.
1 minute MAX idle and off we go s-l-o-w-l-y.
Ok. I confess. if it's below >zero
I don't commute to work anymore so problem solved. Maybe.
Those of us who understand why letting a car warm up know what you're talking about. Those that live in Florida, Texas, etc and have zero personal experience with these situations yet try and give their input are the one standing their ground on why it's not necessary.
It's just not that simple.
Not following--in the end, all items can't get colder than the -18F in that image, otherwise ambient would be heating up the items, no?
Wind chill factor just means it feels like it is colder than what it would be like, if the wind wasn't blowing. It's a highly nebulous concept, really. If I go out on winter's day in shorts and a tee shirt, I bet I'll feel it's colder than if I wear pants and a jacket. That in turn will feel colder than if I was wearing ski/snowmobile get-up. Why? all about how fast heat is being shed. But in each case, ambient temp is the same.
Where wind chill can matter for you car is if you stop and park and shut down. The radiator is at 100C or thereabouts. How fast will it take to hit ambient? the faster the wind is blowing over it, the faster the radiator will cool down.
Wind chill attempts to describe the rate of heat loss.
I had a 1977 GMC C15 in the early '80's and I installed a coolant heater into the lower radiator hose.
Man, I loved that!
That was a cold winter and I could plug in the heater the night before and have warm heat in the truck in a matter of a couple minutes.
When the idle rpm drops, usually after 20-30 seconds or so, I start driving easy. I don't let any engine idle more than necessary. If I park and know I'll be there more than a minute, I shut it off.
How? Anything else is overthinking it. I know this is the forum of OCD car care, but the next step after having basic mechanical sympathy (IE not revving to redline when first started) will not have any significant impact on wear. Even if it did, all of that stress won't net any more value when it gets totaled by a texting driver.
I take it easy on my car for the first few miles when started in freezing temps, but as soon as the oil is up to temp, redline is fair game IMO.
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