GC cold weather start ??

[buickanddeere]

Well I do feel sort of guilty posting that but it was so tempting. I found my detroit 2-53 starts best when the throttle is set to have the fuel rack at approx half travel. A quirk of that engine yet others start better with full fuel applied.

 

[buickanddeere]

So this was the next logical argument to make. Easier starts, and your right...The warm up is a lot quicker with warm coolant.

Warm coolant however has no bearing on the tractors​ ability to start. It will start independent of coolant temperature, there is a distinction there.

You will have to make the distinction that your experience is with an indirect injection diesel with glow plugs which starts and initially idles similar to a model airplane engine with a glow plug. There are the direct injection diesels that require hot combustion chamber air from compression for ignition instead of a red hot piece of metal. The prewarmed engine both rotates faster which increases the compressed air temperature and the warm combustion chamber, piston and cylinder walls do not provide as much delta T to slow absorbion of heat from the compressed air.

 

[AxleHub]

Ever wonder why warm coolant allows the starter to crank the engine at higher rpm's. Or why the starter just goes "urugg" and then stalls in really cold weather with the engine at the ambient temperature. Or why it helps to press the clutch in on a geared transmission? Or why the shift lever on a geared transmission will not move at first?

I thought you made an excellent example of the biggest benefit I see provided by an engine block heater in winter. Yes, engine lubrication at startup is improved too and yes the time for engine full warmup (and windshield etc.) is improved, and yes starter winding speed is improved, and yes less partially burned fuel is sent out the exhaust pipe - all those four are benefited. But your example is explaining what I consider the biggest advantage for starting - less original piston and component oil stiffness and thus, less resistance to initially turn properly. I've been saying it like you (but mine in too many words) LOL.

 

[atsah]

If you live in a cold climate your diesel machinery will benefit from a block heater, a good synthetic oil and letting it run for 30 minutes or so at 1600 rpm's before use, that is what I do here in northern Maine and it works, there isn't much more you can do other than move to a state that's warm.

I do pretty much the same thing with my 7.3, and have done to my 6.6 and 6.0 trucks and makes a world of difference for them as well.

 

[Snobdds]

So now Snobdds you are saying that the "coolant" is somehow magically isolated from effecting the temperature of the engine block ?

Yet they call it an engine block heater for a reason. The engine block heater causes the engine block and its components in the block to be warmed to temperatures higher than the exterior environment temperature that makes the block and components so cold over night . . . before you turn the key, if you have the block heater plugged in, the block and components get heated so then the oil and engine components have less resistance to turn because they are warmer than the cold environment. If there is less resistance to move those components, then there is less starting momentum required to turn initial fuel burning into pistons cycling.

A hot engine block is cooled by the coolant in summer, and a deeply cold engine block is warmed by heated coolant before it is first running in winter. I just don't grasp how you can deny this. No matter what engine oil is chosen. . . It still thickens at 0 degrees from its situation at 65 degrees (outside temperature). An engine at starting has more resistance to turn when the oil is thicker. And even 5w oil displays this. If we put oil in our engines that didn't thicken at all . . . We'd have no protection at normal operating temps. Regardless synthetic or Dino oil.

We add additives to the fuel in winter specifically so it is at minimum not a jelly consistency too. If you choose to not pre-warm your engine block and the oil and components that are inside that block . . . that is your choice . . . but to what purpose is it to mislead people that somehow an engine block heater does not pre-warm your engine block and it's components and oil inside it ?

If there was a method to INTERNALLY pre-warm a subcompact's hydraulic/transmission fluid - I'd do that in the winter too. But sticking pads heating pads externally on the bottom of the pan - I don't consider safe and is very inefficient compared to how block heaters work.

Manufacturers mention engine block heaters in their manuals because they work - but they are optional choice for those in locations where cold temperatures are an issue - just as diesel fuel anti gel additives are optional if cold temps are an issue.

 

[buickanddeere]

I thought it did not get that cold in Maine. My snow blower tractor gets 2-3 minutes of warmup while I dig the shed doors all the way open. Light duty snow blowing for the five minutes in the lowest gear then all she can handle.

 

[atsah]

-25F is a common ambient temp in Jan-Feb at 8:00am in Coburn Gore Maine, I fight these temps in many ways including engine preparedness, I know what works and what doesn't.

 

[buickanddeere]

BRrrrrrrrrrrrr that is colder than here. Some longer warmup is a good idea. We don't get those temperatures until the Lake freezes over.

 

[atsah]

It's pretty annoying when the wind is blowing 35mph first thing in the morning..

 

[Egon]

Yup, I'd be banging my head also If'n the concept of what it takes to start engines in cold weather just weren't there.