Ahh, question of the year (and every year I suppose).

Came across this 1+ year old thread that just started up again on the General Discussion: http://forums.maxima.org/showthread.php?threadid=14679

Anyways, what is the best way to warm up your car during winter?

What I gather (from that thread) is, newer engines need only 30-60 seconds to warm up during winter, and idle warm doesn't allow the oil to circulate through the engine ... it's better to:
1) Winter warm-up 30-60 seconds idle
2) Drive gently with low rpms (I'm guessing low is about 2500 or less) for several minutes until the engine warms up

Can anyone can provide a solid, reputable answer to the proper way to warm up our Max's during winter?

Also, I know synth oil is good (and expen$ive ) but how well do you think synth blends, or even regular oil performs with regular change every 3500 miles?
From previous posts, I see everyone recommend Mobil-1 Synth but I happen to like Castrol's synth-blend based on how smooth it 'seems' to run, and absolutely hate Valvoline!!!

 

Can anyone answer this?

 

You've pretty much got it with the 'start right up and drive conservative until it's warm idea.' I posted a poll a while back and it seemed to mirror the rejuvinated thread you spoke of: warming it up just wastes gas and offers no real benefit with the possiblity of harm (oil pooling?). No one's answering probably because you are a newbie and a lot of people here don't take too well to newbies, unfortunately....i'm recently out of that phase but I still get no answer sometimes....so it goes, I guess.

the oil thing is opinion...if you like castrol - right on. the only thing that question does is start up the debate again and after all the discussion you're left with what you started...you're own opinion.

Hope this helps, just thought I'd give you an aswer since I have been there before! Keep hanging out, keep reading and don't stop using the search function (strong work referencing the previous thread, by the way...).

My two pennies,
IndyMax77

 

IndyMax77: Thanks for the reply. I think my Max will still get a couple of minutes of a warm-up during those cold winter days. Figure with it idling at about 1.5k, oil pump should be doing a decent job ... and the synth blend will do just fine (if not, they wouldn't be making it right???)

Yeah, I know I'm a newbie, but been on the forum even b4 I got my Maxima Good place to be, when you've got an hour of lunch to kill *lol* (and after I testdrove a 4th gen 4 months ago, fell in love, and decided I just needed to get one - so I did!!!!)

Wonder when will I be able to shake my Newbie status off

 

I guess my answer to you would be it depends on how cold it is outside. Where I am it gets extremely cold (down to -20 to -30 WITHOUT windchill)and a quick 30 second warm up won't work on extreme days (Below 10 degrees). I let it run for about a minute or so and then keep it below 200 rpms. Alos, I have synthetic oil and tranny fluid which helps dramatically in these extreme temps. For all other "cool" weather, the procedure you described is fine. Pretty much as long as you don't heavy throttle it for the first couple minutes your car will last forever.

 

i hope you mean 2000 rpm's cause 200 is in stall range.

 

 

uhhhh......well then....

Forget something there, bro?

 

New movie:

pocketrocket: blah blah blah
IndyMax77: blah blah blah
party_boy: blah blah blah
kratz74: blah blah blah
iwannabmw:

Everyone: huh?

(I see dead people)

Just kidding, iwannabmw is cool. Helped me out b4 with the starter thing, thanks! You probably fell victim to the "Slow/Try again Forum Page" ehh?

 

DOH! UMM, just trying to see if everyone is on their toes. Must have more coffee

 

Okay, I think my computer hates me! This is what I tried to say earlier, er, I think. BTW if shows up like three times in a row, this computer's going through a window.

I think it is better to drive the car easily to warm it up, but not doing this will not HURT the
engine, it's just not as good for it. The reason is that there are many different metals in the engine that heat up and expand at different rates. For example, a piston would be made of a different metal than the block. If the piston expands faster than the block (we are talking microscopic differences) it will exert more force on the sidewall thus creating more wear. This is why it's better to drive the car, the metals will warm up to their correct operating tolerances faster. I'm not saying drive it hard, though. It is bad to pull a lot of power from a cold engine, as well as lug a cold engine with low rpm and lots of throttle. It's a tough compromise to warm it up ideally. Maybe we should never shut them off

 

I know it's not the greatest thing to let it idle for extended periods, but it's not easy to drive when the front windshield keeps fogging up so I let it idle 5-6 minutes while I scrape the ice off the windows and the defroster is at full blast. During the warmer months, I drive once I'm buckled in and I put in a CD

 

Yeah, I actually do the same thing. I'd rather be warm and toasty than worry about getting another 2 miles out of the car because it wasn't warmed up properly. I just thought it would help to try to give people a better idea as to what actually happens when you warm up cars in different ways. Life's too short to really stress over it anyways