Had to give the car a little gas

[petitepedal]

Was taking longer than usual to start..gave it a little gas and all is well..been sitting out here since 8 this morning..air temp at 8 was about -13..windchill was like -30 but cars don't  need to worry about windchill..

[bikeman564™]

8 minutes ago, petitepedal said:

 cars don't  need to worry about windchill..

but you do

[Longjohn]

but cars don't  need to worry about windchill..

Unless they are diesel 

[sheep_herder]

33 minutes ago, Longjohn said:

but cars don't  need to worry about windchill..

Unless they are diesel 

Plugged the VW in at 6:00am, and it was ready to go at 10:00am.  Temps were -12F with windchills in the -20s. We have heaters on all of our vehicles and tractors.

[Longjohn]

4 minutes ago, sheep_herder said:

Plugged the VW in at 6:00am, and it was ready to go at 10:00am.  Temps were -12F with windchills in the -20s. We have heaters on all of our vehicles and tractors.

How about the fuel tanks? Do you use winter blend?

[sheep_herder]

Use additive, but have blended in the past.  Much of the fuel sold in the area already has additive added.  Several places have pumps with different blends, but I am not sure we have any in town.

[MickinMD]

3 hours ago, petitepedal said:

Was taking longer than usual to start..gave it a little gas and all is well..been sitting out here since 8 this morning..air temp at 8 was about -13..windchill was like -30 but cars don't  need to worry about windchill..

I wonder about that.

I had a flat tire on my '68 Camaro in Chicago, in an IIT parking lot on a bitterly cold night when the windchill was something like -40F. I think it's the coldest I've ever experienced and was pissed-off I had a flat tire during it. The actual temperature was well below zero, too. I had a spinner lug wrench in my trunk - which was apparently a little warmer. Someone had given it to me and it always worked without stripping the lug nuts but it never seemed to fit them perfectly tight. I wondered if it was metric, but it always worked so I kept using it.

When I tried to change my flat tire at IIT, the spinner wrench spun on the lugs - it didn't grab them at all. I thought I had the wrong end and tried all four: all of them spun.  It was around 3 am, I was exhausted from doing lab research, I felt frozen from the moment I had walked outside, and I had wrapped rags around my hands to change the tire because I had forgot my gloves that day. So I walked back to my lab with the intention of sleeping on the floor and dealing with it when it was warmer.  But then I remembered that we had a huge adjustable wrench, over a foot long, in the lab that was for some no-longer-existing instrument.  So I got it and I could get just enough of an angle to solidly grab the lugs!  I changed the tire and still have that wrench somewhere in my basement.

Afterward, the spinner wrench worked fine, but I never tried to use it anywhere close to that cold!

[Longjohn]

1 hour ago, MickinMD said:

was around 3 am, I was exhausted from doing lab research, I f

And I hear the tune “ I was working in the lab late one night and my eyes beheld an Erie sight.”

Did you do the Monster Mash?

[Bikeguy]

Over the years, I’ve had a few cars that didn’t start in the cold.    

Back in 2005 I purchased my first Prius. That car sat outside all of the time.  I never worried about it starting in the cold.  The hybrid system battery starts the car.  It always started just as easy in winter, even below zero, as it did in the summer.

[Longjohn]

Old Fords didn’t want to start in sub zero weather. My shop Forman was the service manager at a Ford dealership before starting his own shop. He showed me the trick to starting Fords in cold weather.

[maddmaxx]

1 hour ago, Longjohn said:

Old Fords didn’t want to start in sub zero weather. My shop Forman was the service manager at a Ford dealership before starting his own shop. He showed me the trick to starting Fords in cold weather.

Sure.  Leave us hanging.

[Tizeye]

2 hours ago, Longjohn said:

Old Fords didn’t want to start in sub zero weather. My shop Forman was the service manager at a Ford dealership before starting his own shop. He showed me the trick to starting Fords in cold weather.

Move to Florida?

[Tizeye]

Can't say that I have had a problem starting a car in freezing 40 degree weather. But, heat will zap years off the expected battery life...and with no warning it suddenly won't start.

[smudge]

2 minutes ago, Tizeye said:

Can't say that I have had a problem starting a car in freezing 40 degree weather. But, heat will zap years off the expected battery life...and with no warning it suddenly won't start.

Hmmm, maybe that's why we get so many years out of batteries. (-7° right now)

[bikeman564™]

13 hours ago, Longjohn said:

but cars don't  need to worry about windchill..

Unless they are diesel 

temperature matters, but not wind chill

[maddmaxx]

When it's that cold my car may or may not start but I don't care.  I'm not going out there to try.

[Longjohn]

2 hours ago, maddmaxx said:

Sure.  Leave us hanging.

Ok, this was in the days before fuel injection. On days it’s below zero you absolutely cannot flood the engine on a Ford. Pump the piss out of the accelerator pedal and give it a try, it starts right up. We would get service calls because people were afraid they were going to flood the engine so they didn’t pump it enough. Then they kept on cranking until they ran the battery down. We would use my vehicle to jump them and it would start first try. They would have us drive the car back to the shop and replace the battery, give the car a complete tune up points, plugs, and condenser (remember those days?). We hated giving away the secret with Fords but we had made our boat payments so we clued them in.

[Razors Edge]

2 hours ago, bikeman564™ said:

temperature matters, but not wind chill

A thermometer reads the same temp at 0^o in zero wind or 40 mph wind, so other than everything being harder for a human in cold weather, and then add in the "comfort" factor of a wind chill, things will suck worse, but from a mechanical standpoint, wind chill seems irrelevant.

I could see a situation where high winds mean greater cooling speed as the air around a heat source is steadily replaced by fresh cold air, so maybe wind chill would have the result of cooling (and freezing) stuff faster? So a car in high high wind chill area achieves a lower/deeper level of cold (closer to ambient?) than it would in no wind?

[bikeman564™]

4 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

A thermometer reads the same temp at 0^o in zero wind or 40 mph wind, so other than everything being harder for a human in cold weather, and then add in the "comfort" factor of a wind chill, things will suck worse, but from a mechanical standpoint, wind chill seems irrelevant.

I could see a situation where high winds mean greater cooling speed as the air around a heat source is steadily replaced by fresh cold air, so maybe wind chill would have the result of cooling (and freezing) stuff faster? So a car in high high wind chill area achieves a lower/deeper level of cold (closer to ambient?) than it would in no wind?

Air passing over objects will cause them to cool faster, e.g. fan on a radiator.  But objects will not experience colder than ambient air temperature. So if the air temp is 0°, the objects temperature will be 0° regardless of wind speed. You on the other hand will be freezing your balls off

[Razors Edge]

1 minute ago, bikeman564™ said:

Air passing over objects will cause them to cool faster, e.g. fan on a radiator.  But objects will not experience colder than ambient air temperature. So if the air temp is 0°, the objects temperature will be 0° regardless of wind speed. You on the other hand will be freezing your balls off

Yep - that's my impression.

What I was thinking, though, is that a car left out in the high winds overnight would "cool" quicker and more deeply.  So, the oil and anti-freeze and other lubricants would be closer to the ambient temp after six hours in the wind chill than they would be after six hours at the same temp but with no wind???  That might make the car more hesitant to start?

[bikeman564™]

23 hours ago, Razors Edge said:

Yep - that's my impression.

What I was thinking, though, is that a car left out in the high winds overnight would "cool" quicker and more deeply.  So, the oil and anti-freeze and other lubricants would be closer to the ambient temp after six hours in the wind chill than they would be after six hours at the same temp but with no wind???  That might make the car more hesitant to start?

Correct, it would cool off quicker. If your anti-freeze is freezed, you shouldn't be oot

[Ralphie]

13 minutes ago, bikeman564™ said:

Correct, it would cool off quicker. If your anti-freeze is freezed, you shouldn't be oot

I always had a hard time with the statement that wind chill doesn't apply to equipment because it does that way - I guess it just doesn't "feel" colder, but the effect is the same.  BTW, affect/effect can be very difficult!  Let's see, from the top of my head with no googling of binging, effect can't be a verb, and affect can be both?  I hate those words!

OK, I was on the right track.

https://www.grammarly.com/blog/affect-vs-effect/

[sheep_herder]

However, folks use bras, cardboard, whatever to reduce air flow during winter in our area.  They indicate it takes longer for the engine to warm up and thus the heater, without the restricted air flow. Also, helps keeping snow from packing into the radiator.  I like to park with the vehicles facing the sun, to warm the cab and melt the snow. Just much easier for us to plugin when temperatures approach zero, and I am sure it is easier on the engines.

[maddmaxx]

2 hours ago, RalphWaldoMooseworth said:

I always had a hard time with the statement that wind chill doesn't apply to equipment because it does that way - I guess it just doesn't "feel" colder, but the effect is the same.  BTW, affect/effect can be very difficult!  Let's see, from the top of my head with no googling of binging, effect can't be a verb, and affect can be both?  I hate those words!

OK, I was on the right track.

https://www.grammarly.com/blog/affect-vs-effect/

It's easy.  One pays you cash which is just like money.

[Further]

The wind will chill a machine quicker but not further.

The engine will go from 180 to -20 in 2 hours instead of taking 5 hours

Something that is making heat will have to make more to overcome the wind chill, so your furnace will work harder in high wind, specially if your house is a bit leaky. A body will lose heat much faster in wind

[bikeman564™]

10 hours ago, RalphWaldoMooseworth said:

I always had a hard time with the statement that wind chill doesn't apply to equipment because it does that way

The thermometer in your vehicle reads the air temperature.  If it's 20° oot when you get into your vehicle, it'll still be 20° oot when driving at 70 mph.

[Further]

On 2/14/2020 at 8:51 AM, Longjohn said:

Ok, this was in the days before fuel injection. On days it’s below zero you absolutely cannot flood the engine on a Ford. Pump the piss out of the accelerator pedal and give it a try, it starts right up. We would get service calls because people were afraid they were going to flood the engine so they didn’t pump it enough. Then they kept on cranking until they ran the battery down. We would use my vehicle to jump them and it would start first try. They would have us drive the car back to the shop and replace the battery, give the car a complete tune up points, plugs, and condenser (remember those days?). We hated giving away the secret with Fords but we had made our boat payments so we clued them in.

I remember pulling the cover off the air cleaner and dumping a few ounces of gas down the carb when it was below 0. Starting the car was always a bit iffy on a cold morning back in the 60's & 70's

"Did ya have to jump it ? " was a common question at work on a cold morning

[MickinMD]

4 hours ago, Further said:

I remember pulling the cover off the air cleaner and dumping a few ounces of gas down the carb when it was below 0. Starting the car was always a bit iffy on a cold morning back in the 60's & 70's

"Did ya have to jump it ? " was a common question at work on a cold morning

I've also done the gas down the carburetor trick back in the days before computer sensors balanced the gas and air. Of course, my first two were $300 cars that were on their last legs when I bought them. Today, I worry I'll flood the engine if I touch the gas pedal while starting the car.

[maddmaxx]

Ether.