If my engine blows heat....

[ryansride2017]

If my engine blows a significant amount of heat within a 1/2 mile of driving on a cold morning (much quicker than any car I have ever owned), does that mean there is alot of friction in the engine causing damage or is there something else at work? It's a 2003 Saturn with the 2.2L engine. Thanks.

[ February 25, 2003, 10:30 PM: Message edited by: ryansride2017 ]

 

[Patman]

It means the cooling system is small, so it heats up fast. My wife's Civic is the same way. This is good because there is less engine wear in an engine which warms up this quickly.

 

[Rick in PA]

What Patman said. Check your cooling system capacity, you may be surprized.

I was surprized that my 2001 PT Cruiser only has a 7.4 quart cooling system capacity. It heats up nice and fast. On a cold winter morning, I'm usually getting heat out of the heater in a mile or so. Plus, come cooling system service time I only need a gallon of (expensive type) antifreeze.

I've noticed that the designers have reduced the amount of metal, coolant, etc. in engines over the last few decades. This reduction in weight is part of the effort to use less material (reduce cost) and improve mileage. As a side benefit, these changes reduce the thermal mass so the engine heats-up faster.

Years ago, I had a '68 IHC Scout. It had a small displacement V8, but there was an awful lot of metal and coolant in that block. On a cold winter morning, it would take a good 6 miles before any heat would appear at the heater (and the cooling system was operating properly, OK thermostat, etc.)

 

[Patman]

My wife's Honda has less than a 4qt cooling system! I couldn't believe it when I read that.

My Firebird's is in the 13-15qt range, no wonder it takes forever to heat up on a 0F morning.

 

[Dr. T]

I don't think it's capacity since a larger v-8 will obviously produce more heat than a lawnmower 4 cyl..

It's just that newer engines/engine designs have better/tighter designed cooling systems which allow for faster warm-up. eg. better designed/tighter thermostats and/or zero coolant flow until engine temps begin rising. I've seen this through ownership of different vehicles...eg. older U.S. designs vs. European/Jap cars.

 

[Shannow]

My 4Runner will have heat very very quickly. Quicker than anything I've had before. It's a big system, but controls inlet and outlet temps.

As to heaters, the cores are all similar sizes, and engines run at similar temps, so the heater capacities are similar.

 

[FordManVT]

It's not the amount of coolant, it's the amount of coolant in relation to engine size and engine thermal efficiency.

If you have a large system that heats up quickly, your engine is poor at thermal efficiency. If you have a small system that heats up slowly, your engine is very therrmally efficient.