To warm or not to warm...what says GRM

The two cars that are in service this winter.

Wifes 5, gets warmed up for about 10 minutes, she doesn't like a cold car and go means almost floor it so I approve.  

My van, if under 40 degrees has piston slap for 10 to 30 seconds and I have deep mechanical sympathy, so it get at least two minutes.   It also almost never gets more than 25% throttle anyway, but when cold likely no more that 10%, just chug, shift, chug, shift.

I know we are talking about engines, but I feel it is even more important for the transmission.  The friction of it all, the horror.

If its like 0* out ill let a car idle for a few moments just to let everything get circulated...and drive lightly until at least the gauge starts registering some heat.  I avoid WOT until fully warmed up

Joe Gearin said:

My TR6's transmission likes needs to warm up a bit before it shifts smoothly.

My GT6 transmission is the opposite. Shifts fine when cold. Last time I drove it when it was warm, it locked up and had to get towed home. But since then, if I need to move the car around my house, it shifts fine (fine for a GT6, that is).

Oil temp comes up much slower than coolant temp.

One of my cars (Z4M BMW) has an oil temp gauge and runs 10/60 oil, so you want to baby it until it gains some temp.  I think it is dependent on where you live, too.  I am lucky enough to have a couple of kilometers of flat run before I get to a highway so babying is easy.  If I had to climb a mountain as soon as I was out of my driveway, I'd probably sit and warm it up for 5 minutes rather than submitting it to instant load when dead cold.

fidelity101 said:

when its zero outside I can barely use my clutch pedal, it kind of snaps back and its hard to depress. It also it got so cold my dashboard cracked in the rx8. Last year my clutch pedal broke in the cold!

Oh man. When it was -10 degF outside my Evo clutch also wouldn't move properly. So I let the car sit for 15minutes before going back out to try it again. It was ok but the shifter was very stiff. Luckily the hotel was right off the freeway so maybe a dozen shifts and I was able to let things warm at highway speeds. But at -10 it starts to make sense to block off part of the radiator. The engine temp just doesn't rise.

I prefer a warm car for comfort and I don't worry about if someone thinks I am hurting my car 0.05% more than they are. I figure my bouncing off the rev limiter to avoid shifting in competition to be more significant. 

If you want "Fun" (Fun is 2/3rds F U) try replacing the brake fluid in the clutch hydraulics with gear oil as a successful attempt to limp a dying master cylinder along.

Successful until it gets cold, anyway.

Push the clutch pedal down, it stays down for what feels like MINUTES.  In city driving, it warms up enough to only feel hydraulically-damped weird.  But on the highway, the airflow through the engine bay cools things off enough that downshifting at the offramp results in as very long neutral.

The ability to shift without the clutch is a very good skill to have when you take quick-bodge repair advice from someone who lives in a completely different climate than you.

I don't know if there's a big difference either way.  Some mornings I take off right away, others I let them warm up a good 10 minutes.  I've had all my cars last 200k or better and never had one consume a noticeable amount oil.

In reply to Knurled. :

I had a wrx that the throw out bearing always made bad noises when cold, and I've heard plenty of subies cracking flywheel due to cold weather. As far as shifting without clutch isn't really hard, just have to know the "sweet spots"

I fire up the car, let it idle for 30 seconds or so while I set the navigation/change CDs/re-adjust curbside mirror if I parallel parked, then I just drive gently (shifting at 2500 RPM or so unless someone's tailgating me for accelerating slowly) until the car is up to operating temp.

Wally said:

I don't know if there's a big difference either way.  Some mornings I take off right away, others I let them warm up a good 10 minutes.  I've had all my cars last 200k or better and never had one consume a noticeable amount oil.

IT was -30F this morning. I let the car warm up for about 5 minutes, but it had been plugged in (block heater, oil pan heater, battery blanket) for a few hours. Down to 20 I just start it, wait maybe 30 sec to a minute, and drive off. Down to 0 and plugged in, the same, not plugged in I give it a minute or five or ten. 

I’ve started several vehicles at -40 without it being plugged in and neither of us was very happy about it...

This falls into the category of "it's A problem, but it's not THE problem". I don't think there's enough cold start cumulative damage over a 250k engine life to be an issue. Statistically, probably more cars die because people don't clear their windshields properly and then run into something.

I will note purely for conversational purposes, my aircooled car warms up the cabin way faster than any of my water cooled cars. It's blowing warm air by the end of the driveway which is lovely.

In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :

The windshield comment made me laugh more than it should. Maybe it's the coffee. My 6 usually has heat by the time I'm on the highway. The heated seat however has me toasty before I'm out of the driveway. 

My E30 M3 had an analog oil temp gage, it really taught me how long oil really takes to warm up.  Ever notice at the vintage races that there are always cars just running with a kid in the seat for a half hour before each race.   

My DD stays outside overnight and if the temperature is <20F then I'll have problems with ice on the inside of the windshield in the first few miles which is hazardous because I pass 3 school bus stops in the hood before I get to the main road.  Not sure if you know but school age kids before 7am aren't caring much about getting run over as they walk to the bus stops

So my car will get 5-10 minute warmup after scraping the windows.  If I didn't have a visibility  problem I'd just start and go 

There was  an article in todays paper about locking your car and it brought out the subject of a running/warming car as an invitation to thieves.