Quote:
Originally Posted by California98Civic
I always start the car with the heater on the cold side. It warms up faster. Years ago I found that I could start the car with the heater core bypassed by the cold setting, drive until it hits running temperatures on my UltraGauge, switch the heater select to "hot," and watch the coolant temp drop 10 or more degrees F (depending on how cold it was to begin with). Then it would creep back up within about a minute. So, the difference is significant, but not huge.
|
I think the heater core only holds about 1/2 of a quart of fluid, so I wouldn't expect the difference in warmup time to be huge. The effect from actually using the heater during warmup is very significant though, so I wait until the coolant is fully heated up before I use the heater. Fortunately I live in the south and park in a garage, so my coolant is always fully heated up by the time I get to the expressway about 2 miles from my house and the oil is pretty warm by then too (140+ degrees).
I did notice that the oil to coolant heat exchanger I added delayed the coolant's warmup by about a minute or so since some of the coolant's heat is being used to heat the oil during warmup, but I'm sure that heating up the oil much quicker and more completely during the winter more than offsets any additional fuel consumption or engine wear from the slightly delayed coolant warmup. It also keeps the oil nice and cool when I'm beating on it in the middle of the summer
