My old buddy from high school (many moons ago) used to drive a bright orange Pinto (and some people think yellow looks silly). He and his father and his grandfather before him used to swear by the reliability of Ford products. Well, every morning when Tom cranked up his faithful Pinto, he always allowed it to warm up to "operating temperature" before he drove off, which usually took a couple of minutes. He swore that this was one of the secrets to Ford's reliability.

Well, I don't know if he extended the life of his engine or just wasted gasoline, and without getting into a discussion on "Ford reliability," (an OT subject if there ever was one) I wonder how many other guys believe in, and practice, the same routine?

Personally I drive away within a minute (or less) of cranking my cold engine. My Miata has 139,000 miles on it and counting. I don't see any difference.

 

I don't have my stook yet,but I've been taking off in my slammer pickup every day of it's 220,000 mile life as soon as the oil pressure light goes out and I've settled in. It probably takes me less than a minute to buckle up, get the stereo on the right station and garage door down.

 

I wait until I get two bars on my temp. Then I drive very slow and keep it on low revs until it fully warms up to 3 bars. I'm babying the hell outta this precious engine (except when I mash on the throttle). Latez!

 

Moving the following from the thread about how hot the cars get.... to hear where it is more appropriate.

Repeating:

The topic of warmups is one full of opinions and sorcery... but it is very hard to pin down.

A statistic I remember from my engineering studies showed something interesting. Everyone in the class was asked what was the most significant variable in the wearing-out of an engine. Most said that it was mileage as we have been trained that way... but in fact, it was the time the engine spent operating cold.... by a threefold greater significance in r-square for the variable.

The example our professor mentioned were Oil rig Chrysler Hemi's that often would clock the equivalent of 2 million miles without even stopping. Never cooled off, so never went through the high wear phase. The professor went on to explain that what destroys engines is the time the engine spends working with the parts not yet at working temperature, and thus not at working SIZE and Fit. The suggestion was therefore to drive your engine at a moderate workload so that it would warm up as quickly as possible.

Idling up to full temp he said maximized the time the engine had to run at non-full temperature equilibrium and was thus suboptimal.

Just another theory I'll grant, but it makes sense to me.

Dan.

 

That backs up everything I always knew about the warm up procedure. After the first minute your just wasting gas.

 

Most engine wear occurs in the first 30-45 seconds of engine running. This is when the oil is getting to all the high spots from the oil pump. So it doesn't matter much.

Turn it on, and go --- don't beat it until you got your three bars of heat.

Or --- like a race engine, buy one of those turbine construction heaters, and blow it into radiator area for about 30-60 minutes, or until the block and oil are up to about 200 degrees F; and then start it. (this will cut way back on the engine wear --- but make for some very frustrating times when you are in a hurry and have to get up at 4am to leave by 7.)

 

I wait for the idle to drop to 1000 rpm. Then I drive slowly (no more than 3K rpms) until 3 bars.

2x6

 

I think the computer pretty well handles the warm-up and cold running duties. Just drive moderately until you see three bars on the gauge. Don't do it like my neighbor (we don't speak). He thinks you're supposed to start it up, rev it high to warm up quickly and go. This is the same guy that repainted his truck one weekend in his closed garage; not the sharpest knife in the drawer, my neighbor

 

ot;cold starting a gp bugatti...1. drain the crankcase oil..2. warm the oil to 110 and carefully decant it back into the engine..3. pull the plugs[8]..4.crank the engine by hand 'till the oil guage flutters..5. replace the plugs..6.manually pump the fuel pressure to .5..7.turn the supercharger oil supply valve 2.5 turns...8."tickle"the carb to flood it..9.open the upper manifold petcock and squirt a teaspoon of raw fuel in..close the petcock...10.manually retard the spark..11.switch the magneto switch to "on"11.select neutral[point mort]12.with the clutch depressed[to lessen drag ]hold the throttle open 1/2 and push the[no kidding] "start"button....BLAMMO [hopefully]...run the revs to 2200 and hold it there to avoid flatsiding the crankshaft rollers...wait no more than 30-40 seconds and move off briskly..so not to overheat the radiator[small capacity,no fan.]....

the honda? hell..push the red button and go!!

 

I usually wait until the 3 bars (which tells you the coolant temp is up to snuff) but I also wait a few miles before getting on it, since the oil being warmed up is important too...

and lets not forget, that just because you might back your car up and let it idle for a while to get the oil and coolant temps up, you still arent ready to flog it... your gearbox and diff are still cold...

thats why the 3-6 miles of driving that cdelena mentioned is a good plan of action...