Hello! New cars have this fun feature of turning your car off when you idle for too long. Whenever I drive a new rental care with the feature I always turn it off because it drives me nuts. I started thinking about it and I thought that idling (at least at a stop light) is more efficient than starting your car again since it takes more fuel to start. Why then do all of these new fuel efficient cars have this feature? I would assume it’s more fuel efficient since they all have them now, I was just wondering how?
Thanks!
In: Engineering
It *is* more efficient. Some reports have it up to around 10-13% more fuel efficient for city street driving. It drives me nuts and I shut it off as well. For me, the bother is the A/C compressor. When the engine is off, so is the A/C. I live in an area with hot summers so this isn’t tolerable.
It doesn’t take more fuel to start your car. Newer vehicles don’t just randomly stop the engine, like you do when you park your car and shut it off. Engineers have timed it such that one cylinder is just about to fire when the engine stops. So when the vehicle starts again, there isn’t this prolonged period of the engine cranking over and over before it starts. They start up immediately.
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