How is that the lady’s problem that you’ve chosen to run something so disgustingly polluting with a disregard for her health?

Its not my fault she parked behind me.

Maybe her health isn’t actually impacted and she’s just ignorant?

It's pretty well established that diesel motors produce PM2.5 particles that are damaging to humans, if it's a 30 year old unit it's probably pumping it out in good quantities with little restriction. PM2.5 particulate from a diesel motor starts to irritate the lungs and eyes pretty quickly.

We've always given a pass to cars for the unpleasantness they bring into a city because we figure there's no alternative, that's just how the city runs. But there are alternatives now, and people are getting fed up with the noise, smells and pollution.

Even without the very well document health affects, cars are just shitty to be around when you're not inside one yourself, I think it's fair that we'd rather not deal with them when on foot or in your own home when possible.

If it's sufficiently old it probably doesn't produce as much PM2.5. Very old engines tend to produce larger particles. There was an unfortunate period in the development of diesel engines where the engine burnt the fuel well enough to produce very small particles and high amounts of NOx but before filters were mandatory. Of course the old engines will in put out a lot more hydrocarbon pollution which is not particularly healthy either.

That's true, and if I'm not mistaken the increase in PM2.5 particles produced is due to the emissions requirement to reduce NOx output. Balancing two negatives in a way.

That is my understanding also. There is a tradeoff between very complete combustion in a lean mixture under high pressure that produces few particulates but lots of NOx and running a rich mixture at lower temperature that produces less NOx and more particulates. Fortunately modern engines have filters both for NOx and particulates, so that neither is really a problem. At least once the car has warmed up, which in cold climates and city driving can be roughly never...

Let's all try to be a little less ignorant, starting with how diesel exhaust can affect everyone's health, dose-dependent: https://oehha.ca.gov/air/health-effects-diesel-exhaust https://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancer-causes/diesel-exhaust-a...

Why do you drive a 30 year old van?

As far as I know, it is more environmentally friendly to drive an old car until it falls apart than producing a new one that has a better eco balance while driving.

I remember from the "Cash for Clunkers" debacle, it was pointed out that scrapping an older car for a newer fuel efficient one took 20,000 miles driven on the new one to break even in emissions.

(Manufacturing a new car releases lots of CO2.)

Your wording makes it a bit unclear, just for clarity: this means that GP is wrong, it's definitely better for the climate to have your old car crushed and buy a new car. The amount of CO2 expended during manufacturing of your car is not significant on the lifetime of the car.

If it's really just 20,000 miles then frankly it might even be one of the most effective ways to turn your dollars into reduced CO2 expenditure.

This is where a hyper focus on solely CO2 emissions is likely harmful. One also needs to consider the environmental impacts of mining for all the raw materials, for example, for that new car.

And the cost of new cars these days with the inflation over the past 1.5 years

> Your wording makes it a bit unclear, just for clarity: this means that GP is wrong, it's definitely better for the climate to have your old car crushed and buy a new car. The amount of CO2 expended during manufacturing of your car is not significant on the lifetime of the car.

I did not claim climate-friendliness, but environmental friendliness though.

Well if you want to be good for the environment you also have to consider nitrate emissions and fine particles.

Also, it was my understanding that most of a (ICE) car can be melted and reused, so maybe the mining impact is lower but I don't know what the real world consequences are.

That still would ignore major sources of pollutants, such as tires (that get distributed into the air and on the road while driving). Electric cars do not improve that at all. If we just focus on emissions from the motors, why can't we just replace the motors instead of producing new seats, steering wheels and doors, while attaching a bunch of computers to it that also undermine the driver's privacy, and selling the package for double the price?

A yeah 100%. You couldn't replace an ICE with an electric motor, at least not with current technology, but you could definitely replace it with a more efficient one. Maybe even with a hybrid if you're willing to give up some room.

None of your business.

On the contrary what people do to the atmosphere is everyone’s business. I can empathise or understand if they need it for good work and can’t afford a new one. Unfortunately a lot of society has been misdirected into being over reliant on cars.

Not to mention all the other inequalities in society. They mentioned volunteering, If it’s good they should probably be compensated more than some worthless crypto tech bro for example, and should have a good van. But we have to work in the current system.

No; why I drive a 30 y/o van is none of your business. You’re just going to have to get over it. Sorry, dude!

Want to buy them a new one? I'm sure they'd be happy to accept it.

Driving a vehicle with a cold engine (without a warm up idling period) will eventually destroy the engine.

I don't think that is true except, perhaps in the case of much older vehicles—particularly carbureted, rather than injected—vehicles. Most of the advice I have read in, say, the last 20 years for gasoline-powered vehicles, is to allow no more than about 30 seconds to a minute of standing warm up before gently driving off. The engine will be fully lubricated within 10-15 seconds and ready to go.

>allow no more than about 30 seconds to a minute of standing

This heavily depends on the temp range you are discussing.

Lubrication is the least of your worries at certain temperatures. The engine block and pistons being too cold cause problematic expansion and contraction which can lead to block cracks or permanent engine knock issues from what I've seen. This will eventually lead to needing an engine replacement.

But if driven hard while cold, it will warm up faster, reducing the damage that can be done.

It's a trade-off, and nobody seems to have done the science properly - it's just mechanics and engineers guessing which effect is worse.

>But if driven hard while cold, it will warm up faster, reducing the damage that can be done.

Is this sarcasm? I can't tell because it is literally the opposite of the truth.

You can actually hear my '96 motor quiet down as the oil makes it's way through the head. Takes about 15 seconds. I wait for the engine coolant temp to reach 75c before I give it a good wick. It fluctuates between 75c and 85c under good load.

Interesting to me, is that when idling down a hill it does not drop, but if left in gear going down a hill it does drop in temp. It can actually get itself below operating temperature in gear going down a hill. I presume because the heat being pulled out via pumping air through the combustion chamber is greater than the thermostat would allow to be pulled out via the radiator.

> You can actually hear my '96 motor quiet down as the oil makes it's way through the head. Takes about 15 seconds. I wait for the engine coolant temp to reach 75c before I give it a good wick. It fluctuates between 75c and 85c under good load.

Pretty typical of engines of that vintage with hydraulic lifters.

> Interesting to me, is that when idling down a hill it does not drop, but if left in gear going down a hill it does drop in temp. It can actually get itself below operating temperature in gear going down a hill. I presume because the heat being pulled out via pumping air through the combustion chamber is greater than the thermostat would allow to be pulled out via the radiator.

I didn't think that would significant but I could be wrong. Is it a diesel or gasoline engine? My guess would be the thermostat is leaking or wrong temperature.

Two factors, deceleration fuel cutoff in gear not producing combustion heat, and water pump spinning faster.

I would have thought the thermostat would account for faster water flow, at least stopping the temperature drop at operating temp. But as another user pointed it, it could be a bad thermostat also.

That's why when I get in the car I start the engine first, then fiddle about with the seatbelt, parking brake, getting settled, check the mirrors, etc. By the time I finish all that the car is ready to ease into gear.

Yep, that's my routine as well.

That's not really true for modern vehicles. They handle it a lot better. Many are also designed to turn on and off constantly at stop lights, so they're designed to properly handle temperature and lubrication during the start/stop cycles.

If you're in a particularly cold winter you might benefit from it but really that's a judgement call. If you live somewhere mostly above freezing and drive a modern car, you're probably good to drive from the moment you start the car. Unless you're about to go full throttle on a racetrack, should be fine.

I warm up my 96 Nissan before driving, but I just go easy for the first 5 minutes in the 2010 Nissan.

> Many are also designed to turn on and off constantly at stop lights, so they're designed to properly handle temperature and lubrication during the start/stop cycles.

Many late 00's engines were also designed to turn off cylinders to improve engine efficiency, but that turned out not to be implemented very well and engines died from carbon fouling. Big problem with Honda in particular iirc, and people would routinely bypass it to save their engines.

Automakers have to comply with CAFE standards and other mandates, but at the end of the day there's no mandate that an engine made with gen-1 technologies will make it to 300k miles either. Automakers don't really care if your engine dies in 10 years or not, they've put out lemons before and they will do it again.

Early CVTs failed at extremely high rates/short lifetimes, for example, and early OAT coolants like Dexcool were notorious for eating up every seal inside an engine. Early high-compression diesels had about a decade of their fuel injectors being eaten away by the abrasive sulfur before the ultra-low-sulfur highway diesel changeover. These technologies are of course completely normalized and trustworthy today, but that's not much consolation if you're the one paying the repair bills on a gen-1 lemon.

For some reason "don't upgrade to a v0.0 release of a new major version of iOS" is common knowledge here but nobody wants to apply that same logic to cars. The general public gets it though.

Now that cars have got 10 years of stop-n-start under their belt it's probably more reliable but still, it's a challenging design criteria for an engine.

Not saying diesel fumes aren't a problem either, mind... we probably need to go electric in the long run. But at the same time, on the level of personal self-interest... it's probably better for your engine to not start and stop constantly. It's just bad when everyone is idling because they don't want to start and stop. Tragedy of the commons.

Witch is why you have an electric engine heater in cold(er) places, no need to idle :shrug: