Well for one thing in the winter.. its good just so there is heater as soon as you get in.. and ESPECIALLY if you have autostart.. this more than offsets the gas cost..
As to gas cost.. 10 minutes of idle is pretty insignificant to me.. plus im sure if its super cold you could possibly help with oil temp ect. .which can reduce where and tear since cold oil is thick oil.. but i think primarily.. its a comfort thing...
One of my friends dad bought him an 04 altima.. and convinced him he needed to let it warm up at least 5 mins before he drove it every morning .. winter summer fall... we live in florida.. his dad was an idiot...
LOL, that is super funny, if i lived somewhere like florida I would never have even thought to "warm up my vehicle"
---------- Post added at 10:48 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:45 AM ----------
A friend of mine who is a tuner has always warned me against warming up a car by just letting it sit there and idle. He told me that when you start up a car, the computer is keeping it in a "warm up" mode and it is runnign much richer than normal, and that does not change until you drive it. So, he said if it sits there running so rich like that, its going to kill your cats and 02 sensors pretty quickly.
that is part of the info i read online and wasnt sure how valid it was, i didnt want to say anything about it and see if it was brought up here. Ill see if i can find the article again and post it to see what you all think
---------- Post added at 10:50 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:48 AM ----------
heres the article I read that made me question running my tahoe for 15 minutes every morning:
Although you might think it’s easier on your car to let it sit and gently warm up, doing so is a bad idea for a number of reasons. Most importantly, it does indeed waste gas.
The vast majority of cars on the road today use electronic fuel injection. When your car’s engine is cold, the computer tells the fuel injectors to stay open longer, allowing more fuel into the engine to help it run cold. As the engine warms up, the injectors let in less fuel and everything returns to normal, so to speak.
The problem is, letting your car sit and idle is the slowest way to bring it up to operating temperature because it’s generally sitting in your drive at just above idle speed. And this method to warm up also invites other problems. Remember that modern cars are equipped with a multitude of devices to help them run clean, including a catalytic converter (sometimes three of them), a device in the exhaust system that works to burn off unburned hydrocarbons in the exhaust stream. A cold engine emits a far higher percentage of unburned hydrocarbons than a warm engine. Unfortunately, the average catalytic converter can’t process 100 percent of unburned hydrocarbons even in the best of times. Importantly, the catalytic converter needs high exhaust temperatures to work properly. Throw in a cold engine emitting a high percentage of unburned hydrocarbons, repeat several hundred times, and you can end up with what’s called a “plugged” converter. In a nutshell, the converter becomes overwhelmed and literally ceases to function. This won’t happen all at once but over time, the end effect is the same: poor mileage and significantly dirtier exhaust.
The best bet? Even when it’s 10 degrees F outside, start your car, let it run for 30 to 60 seconds to get all the fluids moving, then drive off gently. Your engine will warm up faster, your exhaust system will get up to temperature faster so the catalytic converter can do its thing, and you’ll use less fuel. Which is what you wanted all along anyhow, right?
If it's below zero outside, it would be a good idea to give the engine five minutes or a little less before you drive off into the frozen wilderness!
— Richard Backus, editor in chief, Gas Engine and Motorcycle Classics magazines
