How long does everyone warm their engines before driving?

I always go at least a minute in warm weather and when it's cold I'll warm it up to operating temps most of the time but if in a hurry, I'll just wait for the needle to start moving.

What do you do?

 

I drive away as soon as Oil Pressure comes up. Temp doesn't matter. I can't afford to let my V-8 sit and idle.

 

yeah i get in, crank it and drive off. if it is really freezing, i'll wait until the needle shows a sign of movement

 

Warms up faster when ya drive it.

 

true...lol. but there has been times when it has been so cold that when i cranked it, it had a very weak idle for the first 5sec so i waited then.

something about intense heat flowing through a freezing engine in a matter of seconds at highway speed kinda makes me uneasy

 

Alright, Yet if you think about a gasoline engine it makes Fire! fire creates alot of heat. So no. Its fine.

 

Warm weather cold start, I always let it idle until the oil pressure is up and about five seconds more, then shift (auto trans) into neutral for 15-20 seconds, then run it up to about 1000RPM for another five seconds or so. On the first shift into gear I leave it to idle for a few seconds before moving. I want to keep my transmission happy.

Cold (freezing) weather cold start I let it run until the temperature gauge comes up off of the pin, then shift through the quadrants stopping in each for around ten seconds. If it's 20F or below I go back in the house after scraping the windshield and brushing the snow off and let the heater come up to a tolerable temperature before going out and shifting through the quadrants. Again, it's mainly to keep the transmission happy. A few bucks worth of fuel spread out over the course of a winter is a lot easier to tolerate than a big bill at the transmission shop.

 

My truck is not my daily driver anymore, so when I do drive it, I usually let it sit for 4-minutes before driving away. My DD, I let sit for about a minute in the morning and then I'm off, unless it's very cold out.

 

worst getaway driver job application ever!




just kiddin ya, you have a lot more patience than me haha... I wouldn't even be able to remember to do all that, but it'll pay off in the long run

 

Warm weather: Start and idle in park for about 20 seconds.
Cold weather: Start and idle in park for 1 to 5 minutes and then idle in drive for about 5 seconds.