Keeping Your Engine as Cool as You Are!

Jun 23, 2017

It has been approximately 1 billion degrees in my apartment this past week and let me tell you, with only 1 fan to my name, I’m not sure I’m going to make it. As the air outside is already center of the sun hot, going for a jog, even in the early morning, is out of the question! One of my friends recently gave me an air conditioner and let me tell you, balance has been restored to my apartment. It is keeping us cool enough that I can do more than sit on my couch and wait for death. I can actually do yoga in my living room and am able to do all the things I was able to do when it was beautiful breezy spring weather.

Now imagine, if you will, that you are a car. Instead of a hot day, your engine is just getting absurdly hot, as engines do, and you have no means to regulate that temperature. Bad news bears, friends! This is why coolant exists. To regulate the temperature of your engine so that it can function normally without problems. It is not just to cool, either. You don’t want your engine to be cold. You want the engine to be hot enough to burn fuel efficiently and cool enough to not melt and seize up. Mechanics call it the optimum temperature. The engine sweet spot.

A running engine is HOT. It can get up to 6,000 degrees F. The optimum temperature for an engine is 1,200-1,700 degrees F. Super hot! The coolant helps keeps the temperature of the engine at a max of 1,700 degrees F. When your car is on, an engine is running continuously, so coolant is continuously being circulated or pumped. It is heated up as it passes through the engine and cools back down as it passes through the radiator. It’s a big circle of pumping coolant to help keep your very expensive engine happy and running at its best!

Fortunately, your car has a way of telling you when it’s getting too hot. You know that C to H gauge on your dashboard? C is for Cool and H is for Hot. Some cars have numbers instead of a C or H. The numbers represent the temperature of the coolant. When you first start the car, the needle is on C. Your engine is cold and the temperature of the coolant is cold. If the gauge does not get up to the middle, the coolant and engine temperature are too cold and your engine will not be burning fuel efficiently.

If the gauge tips past that middle point of the C and H, your car is considered “overheating”. The engine and coolant are starting to rise to dangerous temperatures and you are in trouble of damaging your engine! Coolant will start to boil off making the overheating problem even worse because you will have even less coolant. Shut off the car as soon as safely possible! Coolant also prevents metal parts of your car from corrosion and freezing in cold climates.

The moral of this story is that your engine needs to stay at a regulated temperature to be able to function properly, just like you do. When you’re too hot, moving is not something you are willing to do, and when you are too cold, you’re so bundled up you can’t move even if you wanted to. Make sure you are checking your coolant regularly and if you have any questions, the fine people at Fiore Toyota will be more than happy to help!