Conanski(Paul), and I where starting a disscussion in another thread about idle/warmup time when its cold out..

Well he said 5 min is plenty, I say warm up 15 min, or untell 100* on water temp..

What do you guys think?

 

I generally let it sit idle until that cold/not-as-good-oil-flow engine sound goes away (5 minutes or so), but I don't get above 35-40 until the torque converter locks up. With light driving, I figure if the transmission has warmed up, the engine has probably warmed up too (usually 2 miles or so, so another 5-6 minutes). I guess my temp gauge isn't accurate enough to go by temp alone (since operating temp is barely on the N of normal).

This is what I've done because I get out of class and have to be on the road within 10 minutes in order to make it to work on time. Just wondering if this is an OK procedure.

I figure it's easy to monitor the engine by the temp gauge. What I would like to know is if there needs to be a warm-up period if I were to plug my truck in. The engine is warm, but what about the (auto) tranny and rear end? Should I start the truck and let the torque converter warm up for a period of time before taking off?

 

as far as I know, it takes much longer to get the tanny up to temp than the engine.

I usually let mine warm up for 10 min or so just because I don't like driving in the cold. However, i always figured that 5 minutes was enough. One thing to consider is that it probably depends on how cold it is. I know we have a Toolcat 5600 and it sets the gloplug time based on how cold the engine is.

 

Yeah, what I'm thinking about is the average 0 or above temps. When it starts getting colder I definitely let it warm up longer. When it was -20 a little bit ago, I just let my boss know that I'd be a couple minutes late because I didn't want to just take off and go.

Does anybody have a tranny temp gauge installed so we can get an idea of how fast the tranny warms up? If we find that out, what is a "good" temperature to consider the tranny warm enough for normal driving?

 

I'm running a mechanical water temp gauge in the thermostat housing, so I know the temp of the water coming out of the motor, I just went on lunch brake, and it was running for 15 befor I left, and the hour I was on lunch, water temp was only up to 180 when I got back to work...

I also have a temp guage in my trans, and it takes forever to get that up to 100* and higher.

 

my boss's chevy 1500 SS, has a tranny temp guage. I can let the truck warm up 5 min, then drive for 10 min and it doesn't really even move. I took it to Canada in december and only after a long drive, did it finally start coming up.

 

I live in south FL & it takes about 15-20 of driving for the trans temp to reach 100*...Lew

 

If you put the E-brake on and left the trans in low while it warmed up, I bet your tranny and engine both would warm up faster. Not that I reccomend this.

 

I had the most dumbfounded look on my face while I was reading this.

 

I suppose you could cold start the truck and do a brake-stand for a two-fer.

 

Warms up the tires too for better hook up. Can't go wrong!

 

Ok, guys, this was meant to be a valid discussion. Paul was sayin it takes 5 min to get the computer into closed loop, witch is warm enough for driving.

I said in 0 or around 0* weather 15 min minimum is a good amount of time.

 

5 minutes or less,usually less,only time it is more than that is if I have snow or frost to clean off. I just don't romp on it until the temp gauge has moved some. I don't see any reason to sit around and let the motor burn gas needlessly. 160,000 miles on my truck,no engine noises,doesn't use oil,so it seems to be working for me.

 

Really?! I find that kinda crazy. I guess I have always let them warm up, hell everyone I know let's there vehicles warm up, well unless they sit in a heated garage. My parents always had me run out and start the vehicles 15 min before we went anywhere when it was cold out... Maybe that's just a thing you have to do on the older carbed rigs...

 

It would seem this warming the vehicle up so it's room temperature inside is a very common practice, people also do it in the summer with the AC on. It has been proven to be nothing but a colossal waste of fuel and is getting more negative attention all the time, for example there is talk here of starting to ticket people who leave vehicles running and unoccupied for more than 15minutes. Data I have seen suggests the engine reaches operating temperature faster when it is under load and that it takes at least 30min of driving to warm up the rest of the driveline enough to evaporate moisture in below freezing temperatures. I think the max I have ever let a vehicle run before driving away would be about 5 minutes, and that only happens on the those days when the windshield is completely frosted over, any other time I drive away after a minute or two. There is no evidence to suggest doing so it at all hard on the engine or drive components, I get 5000k out of an oil change without loss of oil and have never had any driveline or seal failures on my vehicles, and my truck has about 385k on it.