I just noticed this today. When I started the car this morning my RPM was around 1500 so I thought that was kind of odd because it seems to little high! After few min later my RPM went down to 700-800!!? Is is just my car or you guys car's as well too?

 

LOL. That is totally normal. The engine should idle around 1500rpm when first started. This warms the engine quicker. Once warm, 800rpm is about right. Also, the A/C compressor can bump up the idle slightly to handle the extra load on the engine.....no worries, man!

Slats

 

Ya... mine goes to 1700rpm when i first start the car too...no worries~

my dealer told me our new gen cars do not need to be warmed up.... jus don't drive it hard (like flooring it/WOT) when you first drive~

 

Wow..............

 

You might want to let it run a couple of minutes in the winter, but 30 sec. to a minute is enough during summer. Just keep in mind not to drive it hard for the first few miles.

 

My old car had a cast iron block with an aluminum head and I had to get the head machinesed at around 100,000km. The dealer and other mechanics said this happened because the two metals had a different heating point therefore causing a warp.

Just my personal piece of mind.

 

about 1500rpm at cold start-up.

i let it drop to 1000rpm before i take off. after that, idle is about 750rpm...

 

A while back in one of my R&T mags,.......someone asked about letting the engine warm up etc before driving. Basically (if I remember correctly) the article said that it is a good idea to let it warm up a bit in the winter (obvious),.......and for summer,.......letting it idle for a bit (ex 20 or 30 sec) wont hurt the car, and prob is a good idea (driving it hard right from start is not a good idea,...obviously). I will see if I can dig it up,....I'll post it if I find it.

 

I think I surveyed the forum a while back on this topic and the general consesus was to let the car warm for at least 30 seconds. I think the reasoning was to allow the oil pump time to get oil flowing into the engine and all part lubricated before driving off.

I personally warm up my car until the navi screen allows me to push the disclaimer screen ok button. I think we all agreed that was the preferred method of timing the warm up before driving off.

 

I seem to recall the same thing. About 30 sec. ought to do it.

 

yea what I do is let the car warm up at 1500 rpm where it starts at. It will slowly fall to around 1000 rpm and then its all good.

 

This presents an interesting dilemma. On one hand, your car is made to run with the engine warm. Tolerences in your engine change with temperature and the engine is not made to run cold, thus it is best to have your car run while warm. On the other hand, your engine is made to be efficient over higher rpm's, and is thus very inefficient while idling. You waste alot of gas while idling, and it is harder on your engine to idle. (If you do excessive idling, I recommend changing the oil filter sooner. I do not recommend idling for longer than a minute if you don't have to. )

So here we are trying to warm our car up. If you wait 2 minutes to warm up your car by letting it idle, you are wearing your engine out because idling is not good for the car, AND its doing this while cold! If you try driving your car as soon as you turn on your ignition, your engine will warm up faster, but putting a load on the engine while it is cold is bad for it. There is no perfect solution. The BEST way about it is to let it idle for 30 seconds when you first turn it on, and then drive it, but be VERY gentle. No hard acceleration or high rpm's until the engine has reached nominal engine temperature. That way, you aren't idling excessively, AND you get it warmed up faster by driving it so it isn't spending so much time with a cold engine.

Capiche?

 

hehe excellent dilemma....

every morning I get dressed, all ready... then warm up my car, while I come back to get my lunch from the fridge and put on the shoes.. about 2-3 mins.. by the time I go back out. all nice and ready

as to wearing car out during idle and cold idle..... not too worry... this car will be gone at 100k or before....im sure itll last til then

thast also why i use mobile 1 full synth and change my tranny oil every 15k

 

Good gosh why the crap are you wasting your money on mobile 1 full synthetic if you aren't going to have the car for more than 100k miles? You're also wasting your money changing out your tranny oil every 15k as well if you aren't going to have it for more than 100k. I guess you can say that you are doing a favor for the next guy who owns your car. I'd say if you are going to waste your money on them, you could at least cause less wear on the car by not letting it idle so long, and you'll save money on gas. It's your decision....

 

hmmm good point as well. lets just say i LOVE cars. not necessarily me wasting money or not... i understand your point perfectly, but no matter how long i will keep 1 car or how expensive or cheap the car i drive, i will always put the best stuff in there, call me anything .. but i love cars too much to put anything less than best in there.................by the way. those of u that are reading this post keep this post in mind when i need to sell my car ok?

 

I believe in letting the car warm up in theory, but usually I don't have the patience to wait for more than 10 seconds after starting it to drive away.

 

Ive also heard that warming up the engine too long is bad for the transmission. Warm engine+cold transmission = who knows. Seems like the consensus is 30 seconds to a minute.

My other cars have aftermarket alarms with remote starts, sometimes Im guilty of letting them warm up for 8 minutes until the remote start timer shuts down the car again, in Houston car interiors get over 140 degrees, so I often just remote start and let the car sit for a while before leaving.

 

so.......basically we should let it warm up then?>?

ya.... but i am also worry about how much gas you waste when you are letting the car warm up....... because, once you start the engine, you are using gas.... and with the gas price right now..... i try to save as much as possible~

 

Thanks for your info. I will do that from now on!!~

 

I went to the Acura new owner clinic and I asked about the idle issue and high rpm when start. The service manager told me that the high rpm is just to warm the engine faster. He said he suggest to warm up the car for about a min or 2 and it should be fine. My cold start rpm now is about 1200 at about 50F outside (it is cold this morning...) The car warm up in about a min and you can see the rpm drop down to about 900.

 

hmmm high RPM is completely normal, if not for past acura cars, but for all euros.........high rpm at cold start is completely normal not an issue at all