Jump to content
SAU Community

Warming Car Up At Idle

R33Turbo

By R33Turbo,
in General Maintenance

 Share

Recommended Posts

R33Turbo Proficient

R33Turbo

Posted
Posted

I always thought warming the car up in the morning at idle is a necessary thing to do, until 2 of my mates told me that they read its better for the car to breath air as they warm up so just to drive it normally without pushing it too much for the first 5 mins.

Apparently its not too good for the car to be warmed up at idle, is this true?

What are your opinions on this? (Im so confused)

Link to comment
https://www.sau.com.au/forums/topic/218648-warming-car-up-at-idle/
Share on other sites
br3ndan Mentor

br3ndan

Posted
Posted

the thing is, its not only the engine that needs warming up... ur gear box and diff also needs to be warmed up....

Its better to turn on the engine.. give it about 15 seconds for the oil to start pumping in and around... then take it easy on the road.. i.e shift before 3000rpm, or even better 2700 rpm until operating temp as been reached.

Your engine will warm up faster if ur driving it as well.

Hope this helps,

Brendan

blind_elk Grand Master

blind_elk

Posted
Posted

There was an article in The Age's Good Weekend, about 12 months ago, by Karl Kruszelnicki. Some of what it says:

- Engines run best at their design temp. Idling is not the best or quickest way to warm up an engine. GENTLE driving is.

- When idling, the fuel is not completely burnt. Unburnt fuel condenses on the cylinder walls, washing the oil off the cylinder walls and also thinning the oil.

- Idling drops spark plug temps, leading to dirty plugs, causing poor fuel economy.

- Idling prevents the catalytic converter reaching its design temp (400 -800C).

- Even in Canada, at -20C, it is recommended no more than 15-30 sec before driving from cold start. So even less is desirable in warm Oz.

Canada's Office of Energy Efficiency calculated that 5 minutes less idling each day would save $646 MILLION in fuel costs and and 1.6 million Tonnes greenhouse gases per year, in Canada alone.

R33Turbo Proficient

R33Turbo

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)

hahah thanks for the help, also i shoulda done a search but i couldn't be bothered last night so late. :blush:

yer the thing is i warm up the car every morning for about 10 mins, so i thought maybe i should change my way of warming up now if its bad for the engine. and no wonder my petrol always dissapears every next day lol

Oh yeah another question, then if i wanted to cool down the turbo and engine after a long cruise/speeding, do i keep the car engine at idle for that? is that okay too? or do i just turn the engine off after few mins of turbo cool down for the engine to cool down best?

Edited by R33Turbo
(B1) MR_fanny Grand Master

(B1) MR_fanny

Posted
Posted

i used to let it warm up but i read it might glaze the engine so i just take it easy untill the car is up to running temp. saves on fuel too..ha.

as for cool down, unless your drive way is at the end of a quarter mile, driving your car conservatively a couple blocks befor your home is more than enough to let it cool down i recon...then the ttimer will take care of the rest. mines set to only 30secs anyways, it used to be at 50secs but i found it pointless after a while.

grey pearl Enthusiast

grey pearl

Posted
Posted
i used to let it warm up but i read it might glaze the engine so i just take it easy untill the car is up to running temp. saves on fuel too..ha.

as for cool down, unless your drive way is at the end of a quarter mile, driving your car conservatively a couple blocks befor your home is more than enough to let it cool down i recon...then the ttimer will take care of the rest. mines set to only 30secs anyways, it used to be at 50secs but i found it pointless after a while.

Besides my GTR and some 31's I have a 700h/p daily driver ute and it has forged pistons which are noisy when cold because of the swell required in the piston material to bring it to the required piston to bore clearance.

The way I understand it the result of revving or driving the car before the pistons have swollen to the required tolerance and putting load on the engine is that the piston moves in an oval movement, although only slightly at low revs, until the swelling is complete then it travels in a more direct path up and down the bore necessitating much less wear,obviously the higher the revs when cold the more times the piston is exposed to pre swollen wear as load accentuates the oval movement.

Of course I'm talking about forgies here which is the most extreme tolerance piston to bore clearance,so a normal piston would not have as much problem and therefore warm up would not be as important as I believe it is for my engine,but I believe cold start wear is less about oil temp as many people think and far more about piston swell and tolerances,so in normal car circumstances I agree with the other posters to take it easy till engine temps are reached.Cheers Grey Pearl.

r33cruiser Grand Master

r33cruiser

Posted
Posted (edited)

u do know it only takes 30sec for a turbo to spool down right?'

'mafia' et al.

3 min is a bit excessive for a trip to the shops. i just cool for 10sec maybe 20sec

must be a 'cool' factor in leaving a vehicle running while u strut past all the customers :(

Edited by r33cruiser
bubba Grand Master

bubba

Posted
Posted

I give it the time it takes to smoke a cigarette. Cool down, I just don't thrash it for the last few blocks to my house then give it the time it takes to grab my wallet, phone etc. If I've just hammered it into my driveway I'll give it a minute or so.

nuclear_skyline Mentor

nuclear_skyline

Posted
Posted

Most people do not need turbo timers on their cars... Simple as that... The only reason somee do is because they heat the turbo up so much that it will seize if not given the time to cool down...

Who drives like an idiot on the road, pushing their car so hard all the way to their drive way to need one???

djr81 Grand Master

djr81

Posted
Posted
Most people do not need turbo timers on their cars... Simple as that... The only reason somee do is because they heat the turbo up so much that it will seize if not given the time to cool down...

Who drives like an idiot on the road, pushing their car so hard all the way to their drive way to need one???

Point being is whilst you may be able to get a turbo timer you cannot get a brake rotor timer, a calliper timer, a gearbox timer, a transfer case timer, a diff timer.....

With regard to warming the engine the procedure should be this:

1. Get in car.

2. Start car.

3. Drive off gently.

Anything else is a waste of petrol, will wear your engine out quicker & most importantly will annoy the crap out of your neighbours or the bloke lined up to take your parking bay.

r33cruiser Grand Master

r33cruiser

Posted
Posted
Point being is whilst you may be able to get a turbo timer you cannot get a brake rotor timer, a calliper timer, a gearbox timer, a transfer case timer, a diff timer.....

With regard to warming the engine the procedure should be this:

1. Get in car.

2. Start car.

3. Drive off gently.

Anything else is a waste of petrol, will wear your engine out quicker & most importantly will annoy the crap out of your neighbours or the bloke lined up to take your parking bay.

BAM!! hit the nail on the head.

save the cool down time and warm up time for the track

GeeTR Grand Master

GeeTR

Posted
Posted
...will annoy the crap out of your neighbours or the bloke lined up to take your parking bay

Id glass my neighbor if they idled their stock 34 every morning for 10mins.

- Start, idle 20s from cold, drive gently for 5mins - done.

- Don't load the car up 5 mins before stopping - done.

10MinuteCar Collaborator

10MinuteCar

Posted
Posted
Id glass my neighbor if they idled their stock 34 every morning for 10mins.

- Start, idle 20s from cold, drive gently for 5mins - done.

- Don't load the car up 5 mins before stopping - done.

lol so it wears the engine out at idle than whilst driving in cold is it?

What does it mean by "it wears engine out quicker" is it bad at idle?

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share
Go to topic listing


  • Similar Content

  • Latest Posts

    • Yeetus
      R33 GTST Sh*tbox to Polished T*rd

      By Yeetus · Posted

      Gday Thought it was about time I started a build thread! As expected this project has snowballed into a huge financial liability, but unless you’re strong willed and responsible, it’s not a surprise. Background -  My first turbo car was an R32 GTS-4, got my full license and then totalled my Au Falcon a week later, so while trying to sell my RMZ450 dirtbike to buy another car a bloke offered to swap the R32 which at the time I felt like I was ripped off but looking back and seeing prices of those now ($40kish) it was a good deal, I didn’t know enough about these cars to appreciate what I had so sold it before the RB20 blew up. Between here and there, out of 12 cars I’ve owned the note worthy ones are a V8 Lexus SC400 (soarer), a couple of XR6 Turbos and my beloved S15 which I had for about 3 years, picked it up for $12500, repairable write off but she was fine, gun metal grey/pewter and bone stock/unmolested until I got my hands on it. Ended up spending about the value of the car and 280kw, 2 demerit points by the time I got defected and sold it for $14500 (also $40kish in today’s market, rip) Fast forward to the present day, I’m in a much better position financially and daily an MQ Triton (great cars, pipe down Ranger Bois), I cruised marketplace and car sales for a few months looking for another R32, the best deal I could find was an absolute rust bucket half finished project for $12000, until this R33 popped up in Port Macquarie for $18k - unregistered and barely running but decent shape, kept an eye on it for a few weeks and the price steadily dropped, $16k then $15k then $14k, that was the point where I was like shit someone’s gonna snatch this up! It was owned by a young bloke who had big plans but him and his missus just had a baby so smartest move financially for them but big gain for me. So 2 days later I’m towing a car trailer to pick this thing up. Roughly 2 weeks and $3500 later I’m cruising around Newcastle in my beat up R33 all smiles and dose noises! It only needed some basic shit to get it going, coil packs and air flow meter, electrical stuff and all fluids changed, 158k kms and running pretty good, nice smooth engine after oil and coolant flush - when I say coolant I mean it had been filled up with tap water, every gallery and heater element was filled with rust, 8-9 flushes later and still had brown liquid coming out but she’ll be right. The car was painted R34 Bayside Blue at some point but whether it was a cheap job or just not looked after is anyone’s guess, clear coat flaking like sausage roll.  Was rethinking my choices and contemplating life, had it up for sale for $22k - still cheaper than any registered R33 but got little interest, next minute I had an opportunity at work - 6 months overseas for good money, so that was a no brainer, fast forward again and here we are with a 50% finished project. Current Mods - 200ish KW according to butt dyno Was tuned with Apexi PowerFC EBC (old school Greddy Profec)  Stock turbo (more shaft play than a Tinder date gone right) 3inch turbo back Varex muffler  Aftermarket injectors of mystery size, Power FC showed 36% duty cycle at full boost so not behd good size Someone had good intentions but stuck with the stock R33 MAF so we had misfires at 6000rpm due to the MAF hitting 5.2V So far I’ve redone the entire interior with carpet form Car Mats Direct, new Seats and steering wheel from Autotechnica, also sound system by Autobarn (mainly Kicker) Also MCA pro comfort coil overs - Hands down best purchase yet, worlds of improvement over the tired 30yrold shocks Goals - 450kw/600hp on flex tune New paint job - Midnight Purple 2 Engine is at the shop getting rebuilt with forged rods a pistons, new valves and springs, ATI Harmonic balancer, Aeroflow 7.5L sump, rear head drain and oil restrictors as per oil control thread* and cam covers modded for larger breathers, other stuff I can’t recall of the top of my head Parts purchased and to be installed once the engine is done -  Engine loom from Wiring Specialties including these options: Haltech Nexus S3 R35 Coil pack conversion  PRP Dual Trigger kit Fan controller  Other Parts -  262 Kelford Cams Turbo - Hypergear ATR43SS3-ProS with T51R mod (whistly boi) 6 boost manifold (high mount) 50mm Turbosmart Pro gate (plumbed back for legal reasons) HKS Super Turbo Exhaust with High Flow Cat Custom 3.5inch dump and front pipe 1500cc Bosch injectors  Fuel Pump walbro 525 Haltech MAP and IAT sensors Haltech Flex Sensor Fenix Radiator with dual thermo fans LS1 Alternator Kit Oil Filter Relocation from EFI solutions and Cooling pro oil cooler Many other things sitting in my garage waiting for that engine to come back. Progress pics to follow -  
    • GTSBoy
      Dose's Sometimes DIY and Pay Someone Home & Boat Improvement Thread

      By GTSBoy · Posted

      Losses have to be less with DC coupling. Provided the battery inverter has decent MPP tracking ability - which really shouldn't be a problem. It's not 2005 any more.
    • ossy
      Will R33 GTR rear backing plates fit GTST?

      By ossy · Posted

      Hi, Will the R33 GTR rear brake backing plates fit a GTST? I'm struggling to find GTST ones but can find new GTR ones.   Thanks.
    • Yeetus
      Has anyone put in brand new full carpet? (not floor mats)

      By Yeetus · Posted

      I also got the same floor mats for a bit of extra bazzaz haha
    • Yeetus
      Has anyone put in brand new full carpet? (not floor mats)

      By Yeetus · Posted

      Some more close up pics now that I’m back to working on the car, the loop pile is nice but again haven’t compared it to the other types in person, it’s hard to tell from the pics on the website. View of the hemming on the edges too, it comes in 2 pieces - front and back, honestly very happy with it for anyone on the fence.  Also attached my previous pics from further up as it didn’t let me post them directly before. (Nothing worse than photo bucket pics that aren’t hosted anymore years later)
×
×
  • Create New...