Engine warm-up FAIL
 

Five Ways You May Be Prematurely Aging Your Car

As of now there are 551 posts commenting on this Autoblog article. I've only read 40 or 60 or so comments but much to my chagrin- but not surprise- there was only one lonely post defending the notion of not idling engines to warm them up.

Thank you fellow Duhmericans- you cease to amaze me yet again. :mad:

My focus can idle all day in the cold and it will never come up to temperature. ..

I idle my insight for ac in the summer. Still going strong.

In the winter I idle it with the defroster on. It doesnt get to room temp, but enough to melt frost. :thumbup:

When I have to scrape the ice off then I usually run the engine, pain in my heart for the waste of fuel, but if I don't the windows do fog up and I have to stop again within a minute to clear it away once or twice; the A/C just does not cut it below freezing when the car is still (completely) cold.

And my kids complain about the cold.
They'll be out in the cold again at the school yard (nowhere to park close by).
The short idling warm up makes a bit of a difference; I'll do that.

If it doesn't freeze it is start 'n roll.

You need a new thermostat.

regards
mech

Been there, done that. The first time it wasn't on my dime. I don't want to throw another $200 thermostat at it.

Whoa whoa whoa... back up a little bit. $200 for a 'stat?!? :eek: Does the thing have a microcomputer in it?

Some new cars have electronically controlled T'stats to aid in warm up. They don't open at all until the ECU is happy with engine temp. This contrasts with a Bimetal spring which starts letting cold coolant in well before the engine is up to temp.

The traditional thermostat has a bulb full of wax that expands as the engine warms up and opens at a given temperature threshold, opposing the force of a large strong spring. The one for my Sentra was $18 from a Nissan dealership.

Maybe if it wasn't on your dime, it wasn't done.

In 45 years working on cars, I have never seen an engine that would not warmup that was not fixed with a properly operating thermostat.

Without properly warming up your cars engine will suffer long term term damage from the effects of running too cold, to say nothing about the significant loss in mileage.

regards
mech

Ahhh, $200 electronically controlled 'stats... Now THAT's progress! :rolleyes: