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Excessive Idling?

5479 Views 11 Replies 7 Participants Last post by  Midnightsky228
Well delivery day is Saturday and I wanted to check in with the masses and ask about excessive idling. Over the years I have developed an affinity for sitting in nature spots in my car for hours on end, 1-3 hours. Historically in the summer I idle the vehicle during those periods with the A/C running and in winter idling with the heat on. Where I live it gets frigid cold in winter and gross dry heat in the summer, Alberta to be precise. My body has never gotten very good at adapting to the heat of summer or the frigid cold of winter so I rely on my vehicle to help balance things out. Why I do this? I enjoy the solidarity, the peace and quiet away from general city noises, its a great way to collect my thoughts and relax. I generally do this once or twice a day depending on various life circumstances. Typically I will watch red winged black birds, hawks/falcons, deer, and coyote's. Occasionally I will have music playing in the background sometimes at minimal volume and sometimes its blasting. At worst my vehicles will idle for 3-4 hours a day, at best 1 hour per day. What negative effects may this have on my 2017 Mazda 3 Hatch 2.5L engine? What suggestions would you give me to prevent any excessive wear on my engine from all this idling? I could reduce idle time but if I am starting/stopping the engine alot that puts extra wear on my battery and could require a new battery more often, which may in the end be a cheaper solution than replacing an engine. Also for the initial "break-in" period I would assume I need to prevent any idling, more or less at all costs correct? For about 1000-2000km? Any information, thoughts, and opinions are greatly appreciated.
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have to disagree with a lot of the above

yes - for the first 1500km or so, you need to load up the engine with a mixture of all driving, full throttle etc... to seat in piston rings, try and avoid excessive idling during this period, try and avoid long periods with the same revs

after that, no issues - do what you want

our work cars run for about 8 hours a day, for various reasons we don't turn them off, sometimes they are driven for those 8 hours, sometimes they idle for 7 hours

NEVER EVER had any issues with any cars over the 15 years we have been doing this - we run about 200 vehicles like this, day in day out and sell them once they reach 60000km
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