Do you let your car warm up?
-
Letting the car idle especially in the cold is horrible - snap already hit on it with carbon buildup. "Warming up" the engine should involve immediately driving it and keeping the rpms in check. This way all components of the car properly heat up. Another way to think about it is ok, so you let your car idle to warm up (which by the way letting an N54/N55 BMW idle to get the oil gauge up to temp will take like 30 minutes), but let's just say you do let it idle to warm up. At that point, you go to drive and everything else important that's mechanical is still cold as fuck like, let's say your CLUTCH. People who warm up their cars like that and then drive like normal are 100% doing long-term damage to their car, reducing the life expectancy of parts.
High rpms when the engine is cold is indeed a bad idea. Good way to crack a block. I've seen it happen. The internals of an engine are made of metal and alloys, which contract and expand with cold/heat. Also, in a BMW, oil is used as a cooling mechanism which is why so many of them require 7-8 quarts of the stuff. Same concept as what Porsche does. The oil temperature should be at regular levels before putting undue stress on the engine (high rpms) when it cannot cool effectively.
Bottom line is, I immediately start driving when I start my car and do not go above 3k rpm until the oil temp is good.
If only more people understood this.
-
Blah Blah Blah, I add no relevant info
My auto tranny blah blah blah
Fixed
-
nice thing with the n52/54/55..er..basically any new bmw is the electric water pump/thermostat . it starts blowing heat very quickly because it keeps the pump off or on very low till the coolant warms up.. and even when its cold the factory tune limits boost to somewhere around 5 psi till oil is 120f
i let mine run for like a minute when its super cold. otherwise i start driving
-
E91 328xi - F15 X5 40e - Hopes and dreams of eventually having a cool car
-
nice thing with the n52/54/55..er..basically any new bmw is the electric water pump/thermostat . it starts blowing heat very quickly because it keeps the pump off or on very low till the coolant warms up.. and even when its cold the factory tune limits boost to somewhere around 5 psi till oil is 120f
i let mine run for like a minute when its super cold. otherwise i start driving
"nice" is relative to context - being there is 0 indication that your water pump is about to fail because it's electronic instead of mechanical. So then you get to be like me and one day pull into work only to have your orange water temp light come on and 2 seconds later go red and piss water all over the ground
ahah...ha....ahhhhhhh fuck my life.
2011 E92 M3 6MT ZCP - ESS 625 supercharged
2007 Z4MR
2003 E39 M5
2002 E46 M3
2021 X5 40i -
You could always run a bleed cycle and listen to it once on a while, and i hate the cost, but ive had a mechanical pump fail on a 1.8t vw suddenly without a warning, and it cost the entire valve train when it spat the t belt. Can we complain too much..? Lol
-
Remeber too that the oil pump speed is propotional to engine speed. Oil doesn't compress, so the flow volume should be roughly proportional to rpm. My gut feeling is that an engine spinning 4000rpm doesn't require 4x the oil flow of one that's spinning 1000rpm. The pump is likely sized to provide barely adaquate flow at idle so that there's not exsessive losses and heat generated at higher rpms.
-
i generally follow the mantra somewhere else also mentioned: easy 'warm up' rpms until the car is up to temp, and in the winter i start the car and let it idle while I clear windows of snow and ice.
Dan
-
I seem to have the best luck if I just start it and drive. Seems like if I let it mine idle for any length of time on a cold start up, I end up with junk in my ICV and the car starts running like crap. If I just start and go I don't seem to have too many problems. I live in town, so I don't end up going much over 30mph for the first 5 minutes or so anyway.
Hello! It looks like you're interested in this conversation, but you don't have an account yet.
Getting fed up of having to scroll through the same posts each visit? When you register for an account, you'll always come back to exactly where you were before, and choose to be notified of new replies (either via email, or push notification). You'll also be able to save bookmarks and upvote posts to show your appreciation to other community members.
With your input, this post could be even better 💗
Register Login