Daniel J. Stern wrote:
> On Thu, 20 Jan 2005, Steve wrote:
>
>
>>>Near universal use of 5W-30 oils and more common use of synthetics.
>>>(10W-40 used to be the most common oil used).
>
>
>>Nope
>
>
> Actually, Steve, yeah, that is one of the factors in the much greater ease
> of super-cold starts. You live in Texas.

While I'm sure that the better oils increase cranking speed and allow
the engine to start quicker and idle with less effort, I don't think it
has anything to do with the sputter/die/restart that everyone used to
know about with carbureted cars.

I live in Toronto. That alone
> makes me more qualified to comment on it than you (which is hardly a fair
> exchange: You get to have barbecues and mow your lawn in the middle of
> January, I get to prattle-on about cold starts. No fair.) What's more,
> I've got direct and recent (last month) experience with the difference oil
> weight makes in ability and ease of starting an engine from cold. So,
> shutchyer mouth, you!
>

You can come mow my lawn in January ANYTIME, if you miss mowing lawns so
much :-p And maybe you can snort some cedar pollen while you're at it so
I don't have to breathe it:-)

>
>>Its ALL because of multi-port high-pressure electronic fuel injection
>
>
> Naw, it isn't. That's a major factor, but certainly not the only one. EFI
> makes newer vehicles much less tricky to start in the very cold, but other
> factors apply to new and old cars alike. Oils with lower pour points and
> better cold pumpability, gasolines that burn cleaner (leaving the spark
> plugs cleaner so they require less arcover voltage), etc.
>
> DS

Again, I don't really disagree, but I don't think any of that has so
much to do with start/sputter/die/restart as EFI does. EFI can meter,
vaporize, and evenly distribute fuel FAR better at low temperatures than
a carburetor can, while at higher temperatures the difference is far
less noticeable. Oil thickness, plug condition, and battery power all
matter, but those are second or third-order effects compared to the
better fuel control from MPEFI. And there's even a noticeable difference
beetween low-pressure throttle-body injected cars and moder
high-pressure EFI cars in the "cold" weather we get here in Texas, too.
TBI cars often gripe and grumble a lot like carbureted cars because the
intake manifolds are "wet" and fuel distribution is very poor in cold
temps, whereas MPI cars almost never do.