Cold weather = bad gas mileage?

[Shane@DBPerformance]

How?

[scheides]

I still put a piece of cardboard in front of the radiator, its the only way i can get the car up to operating temp.

Are you still running 'E85' ? This could be the issue?

[niterydr]

Most new cars (like 2G DSM's) will run the same coolant throught the bolck over and over till it's warm. 3S's (even 91's) do it, and so do a lot of other cars. Helps them warm up quicker. Also, one reaon they use more fuel when cold is that when it's cold, fuel atomizes poorly, so to get the same amount of burnable fuel in the cylinder, you have to put more in.

Thank you for correcting that mis-information.

A rich mix burns cooler than a leaner mix fyi guys ;).

[tpunx99GSX]

When i lived in MN i used to get really bad gas mileage in parking lots mainly.... VROOOM!!!

[Kevin 1G Drummer]

My car doesn't take any longer to get to operating temperature when it's 7 degrees then it does when it's 70. Like Swanny said, rich mixtures burn cooler than lean mixes, so what Jet said, doesn't really make sense to me. The only reason I can see for an engine running a bit rich is because of the density of the air. I also don't totally buy the wheel bearing thing. I've worked on cars that had been sitting outside in the cold for days, and I haven't expierenced one that was a huge difference in resistance from one that was warm.

[TwoTalons]

You ever notice how much higher your idle speed is when you start your car in cold winter weather as compared to when it's warm in the summer months?? More fuel used. It takes more fuel to warm your car up in the winter than in the summer. I guarantee it. Your coolant may be coming up to operating temp in the nearly the same amount of time, although I don't see how that's possible, but that doesn't mean your engine and everything else attached to it is fully warmed up yet.

The fluids in trannys, xfer cases, and rearends gets thicker in the cold. Until those fluids warms up, they're adding parasitic loss to the drivetrain. This all adds up to more fuel consumption. One of the nice benefits of synthetic fluids is they don't get thick in the cold like regular dino oils & lubes do. I remember having conventional fluids in one of my DSMs and parking on an incline in the winter. After sitting overnight in near zero degree temps, it would not roll back in neutral. It was like I still had the parking brake on. After switching to synthetics, it was like releasing the parking brake.

[NOT THE BLUE LAMPSHADE]

I thought I was going nuts out here at WyoTech. I get about 20% less fuel economy in this cold out here!! And I'm at like ~7500ft. about too if that matters with gas consumption.

More air(denser and lower elevation and cold) = more fuel to get A/R
Less Air and Less Dense+Freezing Air = opposite?

I dunno.

[turbotalon1g]

I am talking about in the corolla, the talon is not seeing winter this year.

[A//// Guy]

The corolla should be the same... shouldnt take that long to warm up, and you shouldnt have to use cardboard.

[niterydr]

You ever notice how much higher your idle speed is when you start your car in cold winter weather as compared to when it's warm in the summer months?? More fuel used. It takes more fuel to warm your car up in the winter than in the summer. I guarantee it. Your coolant may be coming up to operating temp in the nearly the same amount of time, although I don't see how that's possible, but that doesn't mean your engine and everything else attached to it is fully warmed up yet.

The fluids in trannys, xfer cases, and rearends gets thicker in the cold. Until those fluids warms up, they're adding parasitic loss to the drivetrain. This all adds up to more fuel consumption. One of the nice benefits of synthetic fluids is they don't get thick in the cold like regular dino oils & lubes do. I remember having conventional fluids in one of my DSMs and parking on an incline in the winter. After sitting overnight in near zero degree temps, it would not roll back in neutral. It was like I still had the parking brake on. After switching to synthetics, it was like releasing the parking brake.

More fuel consumption due to a higher IAC offset values (larger steppers values) because the ICS motor is directly related to coolant temperatures? YES
Longer time in warm up enrichment, due to the ICS Motor values being a higher value and it spending more time outside of operating coolant temperature minimums? YES

Needing more fuel so the car will run "warmer"? NO, the car burns more fuel because it is in warm up enrichment longer.

:deadhorse::deadhorse::deadhorse:

FYI, I think we are agreeing :) I just broke it down a bit so it made sense to me.