Master Auto Repair and Detailing

Should You "Warm Up" Your Car in the Winter?

It's a bone-chilling morning, and you're on your way back inside to make your coffee after starting your car to "warm it up" ahead of your commute. Smart thinking, right?

Not so fast.

Nobody likes to shiver in a freezing car. It's also true that a cold engine sustains greater wear, is less efficient and produces more pollution than a warm engine. That said, the best way to warm up your car is to drive it gently for the first five to ten minutes of operation. Your engine will warm up twice as fast as it will in your driveway.

In most gasoline powered vehicles available today, it takes 30 seconds of operation or less for the motor oil to be drawn up from the oil pan and into the engine block. It some vehicles, it takes as little as 10 seconds, even in cold weather. Any idling beyond the 30 second mark isn't providing your engine any benefits. It does, however, waste as much as one gallon of gasoline per hour.

That's because the electronic fuel injection systems in modern cars are programmed to send more fuel through your cold, idling engine than they do when you're warmed up and on the road. Long idles increase the risk of fuel residue building up in your engine, which can impact your performance and fuel economy.

[Photo: Comedy_nose via Flickr, used under CC-BY-2.0 license]