Why do you need to warm up your car during winter?

1. To get the juices flowing

This is something that does not really sound so new to you. The engine oil tends to settle at the bottom of the oil pan if the car has not been used for a while. And it will take a while before it can properly circulate again. The cold temperature makes the oil thicker, which is why the car takes longer to start up. The oil is what reduces the rubbing of the metal against each other in the engine and that is why it is important for you to make sure that it is all lubricated.

2. Thermal expansion

Metals, just like other solids, expand when they get warmer that is why when designing engines, engineers take this also into consideration and allow some spacing to give room for changes in the size. This means that it is important for your engine to be at the correct operating temperature so that its bits and pieces will be in the right size to avoid friction and reduce the potential wear and tear.

3. Your tyres also need a warm-up

Before driving off, your tyres also need a warm-up, so it is not just your engines. Cold and hard tyres are known to have weaker grips, so this is something you must also consider.

Effects of warming up your engine

Cold fuel-injected engines run to compensate poor fuel atomization, which means that more fuel is required and is injected into the combustion chamber.

Since fuel is a solvent and when there is excess fuel in the cylinder walls, the oil in the cylinders and pistons is washed away. When this happens, there will be less protection for the cylinder walls. The cold oil also makes it harder for the cylinder to be replaced.

This means that when the engine is colder for longer periods of time, it will be more prone to wear. Putting the engine on idle, though, will not really put so much heat into it, which means that the car will still stay cold for a longer duration.

If it is really cold outside, you will only have to wait for about 15 to 30 seconds so as to make sure that the oil is flowing, but you don’t necessarily have to wait until the engine is warm. If you drive the car lightly, it will just get warmer by itself faster.

Generally, warming up your car or vehicle before driving is a leftover practice from a long time ago – from a time when carbureted engines were still the ones which dominated the roads, but that is no longer the case now. Second hand cars will have to warm up before driving or they will stall out. But, these vehicles are not very common anymore these days. Unless you are driving a 1970’s car, you can just go ahead to that cold car and get it moving.