[QUOTE]Originally posted by JL9000
[B]

Hey I thought the owners manual is against operating top when engine is running?

 

Hey I thought it would be better to warm up your engine for about 3-5min or so?! I wait til the revs hits 1 k!

 

Probably a more important issue in cold weather is pre-heating the engine, specifically the oil sump, before pressing the "Engine Start" button rather than the length of idle warm up after the engine start.

I'm actually looking for a portable preheater which runs on a rechargable battery, I guess the closest equivalent to this would be a hair dryer running on a rechargeble battery. Do any of you know any equipment which can serve this functionality?

Well, from another angle, is the damage to the engine from cold starts with 10W-30 mineral oil on -10 celcius mornings significant enough to look for such a solution in the first place?

 

Actually, it IS better to just start the car and start driving right away... No matter how cold it is. I'm not saying to go drive it at 5000rpm or take it to redline, but drive easily, shift at 2000-2500rpm for the first couple miles, and then gradually start going higher in the revs. The key is to not rip on it until the OIL is fully warmed up. Those of you that only wait until there are three bars on the temp gauge are doing some nice damage to your engine by not letting the oil warm up before you start ripping on it. After you have three bars on the temp gauge in the morning, try to refrain from hitting VTEC for the next 3-5 minutes. It takes a very long time for the oil itself to warm up, compared to the water. The thermostat stays closed when the engine is cold, to try to make the water temp warm up as quickly as possible.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by rickycrx
[B]Actually, it IS better to just start the car and start driving right away...

 

i agreed, i usually started it 3 - 5mins

 

does it really matter to have your car warm up before u drive it?? but i do it anyways....