Warm Up Time / Oil Temp - When is it ok to cut loose?

[aVex]

Interesting this thread has now become active it's made me consider what I've done in recent weeks to my car. The more I read this, I want to break down and cry if I've already done heaps of damage since I received my car on the 26 March.

I normally wait for the car water temperature to hit 50C before driving off and not going above 2,500RPM, and once it's at about 65-75C of oil temperature that I drive it hard if not harder. Will this be sufficient?

This week I've been banished to work in Traralgon, VIC. It's 2 hours out from Melbourne and it's really cold out here in the mornings. I found that to get the car to hit 50C of oil temperature takes at least 15minutes! I had no choice but to drive off, and before it's even hit the optimal 75C I already needed to drive up to speeds of 100KM (the road I commute on is the main highway). Feels like I'm murdering my car.

If there was only a way I could peer inside my engine to see how much damage and gunk I've already produced in 1.5 months.

[Corey_R]

Hey aVex. I wouldn't worry too much. When I turn on my R, I don't sit and idle for that long - usually just the <1 minute whilst I put my bag in the boot and get in the car and get comfortable. During this time the idle revs are higher and once they drop to the "regular idle speed", I drive away.

You are correct that it in colder temps it can take quite some time for the water to reach 90 and the oil to start registering at 50. I find with my R, it then takes about that time again to reach it's full operating temp (~88 when "cruising" in my R) - and really, unless you start flogging it earlier, it's not going to get there any quicker.

It's not about speed though. It doesn't matter if you're driving at 100km/h. It's about engine load. i.e. Don't be putting down 50%+ throttle until it's warmed up.

[Ideo]

some of these responses confirm why I will never buy a used performance car. To drive an engine hard on cold oil should be criminal.

Before I deliberately drive either of my cars hard, I wait for oil temperature to peak. I answered above 95C on the poll, which may be excessive but that's what I wait for. If I need to rev the car hard to get out of a traffic situation prior to it reaching that temp I do, but I never intentionally 'thrash' it unless I believe everything is at peak operating temps. Probably explains why my other car has over 100,000km of hard driving on it with extensive mods and has no issues and burns no oil. Look after you car and it will reward you with a long life of performance.

How do you get your oil to 95C? Seriously? I’m on the open road when I drive. It sits on 88-ish so based on that, you would never give it a good blast.

As for 100,000kms, that is nothing. As I said, 300,000+ is what I get out of cars, and I have done that both new and secondhand. It’s not that hard.

I think this whole thread just goes to show how precious we can get as soon as we get more information. Suddenly we have to do xyz otherwise the car will blow up (oh no, I’m doing 100 and the engine might still be cold). What did we do before this? If we had mechanical sympathy we waited for about 10 minutes, more if it was cold, if we didn’t we thrashed it from cold. That has seemed to work in the past. The only car I have ever had that used oil was my old e36 318i (but not my 318is) that had 380,000 on the clock when I sold it, and that was from a slight leak around the rocker cover.

In summation, drive with sympathy, but don’t be too precious.

ETA, and don't idle your car for long periods for it to warm up. Read you manual if you don't believe me.

[Corey_R]

Keep in mind guys that we have members with different cars here. TSI's, TDI's, GTI's, GTD's and R's. Not only are there obvious differences in fuel types, but there are cooling system differences too.

The Golf GTI which furiousgibbon drives has a smaller intercooler than a Golf R for example. Whilst I don't know if that is the only contributing factor of why the GTI boys have higher temps than the R boys, that is one factor. I personally have the APR Intercooler on my R and noted a drop in oil temp. Plus we have the environmental factors such as weather.

So drive around "normally" and observe what is "normal" for your car.

Beyond that there is obviously a big difference between to cruising on the open road and driving aggressively. There are people who've had oil temps up to 130 on these cars when tracking them etc.

[brad]

If there was only a way I could peer inside my engine to see how much damage and gunk I've already produced in 1.5 months.

Probably none.
What are you revving to? About 3500rpm in the bottom 3 gears & 2500rpm in the top 3 using about half/threequarter throttle? At 100kmh in 6th your doing about 2200rpm?
So much of a non-issue.

What's the gearbox oil temp? Don't care? Of course you don't - because there isn't a guage. Are the brakes, bearings, universal joints, etc up to temp? Is the damper oil at the right temp before you hit a pothole?

edit: CoreyR: How does a more efficient intercooler affect oil temps - surely there isn't a huge correlation between intake temp & oil temp? (genuine question - can't see the crossover between the two myself)

[Corey_R]

More efficient intercooler = lower charged air temps = lower combustion temps. This means the engine and the oil is going to be cooler by a certain amount - not a huge amount, but an amount all the same.

[dave_r]

I think this whole thread just goes to show how precious we can get as soon as we get more information. Suddenly we have to do xyz otherwise the car will blow up

Quoted for truth. Ignorance is bliss. That and let the 2nd/3rd owner worry about it lol.

Besides, they build these things to cater for 95% of the retard/noncaring population. If you needed to be so precious, every 2nd car would be parked on the side of the road!

[Ryan_R]

Depending on mood I'll drive the car 'medium' (to about 4000 rpm) while it's "cold". That way it warms up faster compared to doing 60kph in 7th at idling revs.

[Brian916]

I know that you can theoretically run an engine fairly hard these days as the oils used are so damn good for protection and they way they behave. Basic rule is you can drive the car in a normal (read as sedate for most of you lot!) manner immediately after starting the thing. When the oil light goes out, you have appropriate pressure in the system.

That being said, I still drive quite gently till the coolant temp hits 90, then drive it sedately until the oil temp hits 85 - most of the time, it's around 6km. Come to think of it, even then I only hit the go pedal hard at very rare intervals, and NEVER less than 3km from a stopping point as I'd like all the temps stable when I turn the car off - comes from owning some after-market turbo conversions on diesel engines that could have EGT issues if you didn't.

[hooba]

More efficient intercooler = lower charged air temps = lower combustion temps. This means the engine and the oil is going to be cooler by a certain amount - not a huge amount, but an amount all the same.

I'd say that the oil cooler would have a bigger impact. It's been covered on here before, the R has an uprated cooling package which means its oil temp runs a lower temp extremes and cools down quicker.


Ideo nailed it in one.