The Lemon Fool

For a variety of reasons my car hasn't been run for 5 weeks, and probably won't been used again for 3 or 4 weeks.

Would it be a be a good idea, just to set it going, and leave it going, and for how long and how often?

I'm most certainly suffering from brain fade at the moment.


Slarti

I would start the car and leave it running for at least half an hour, to get the engine thoroughly hot and recharge the battery. In these circumstances I would aim to do this at least weekly.

Run the air-con too, to protect the seals.

If you can take it out for a drive, even better, to remove any corrosion from the brake discs. But, if it's SORN'ed, at least drive it back and forth a few times and leave it in a slightly different position in order to avoid flat spots developing on the tyres.

If possible, when leaving a car standing for this long, avoid having to apply the handbrake if possible, to prevent the pads/shoes sticking to the discs/drums.

HTH,

Watis

Watis wrote:If possible, when leaving a car standing for this long, avoid having to apply the handbrake if possible, to prevent the pads/shoes sticking to the discs/drums.

HTH,

Watis

But remember to leave it in first or reverse (or P if an auto)

I agree run it till it's up to temperature. Running it just for a few seconds/minutes is the worst thing you can do, the water in the exhaust gases will settle in the exhaust and catalytic converter and just rust it.

Scott.

Watis wrote:I would start the car and leave it running for at least half an hour, to get the engine thoroughly hot and recharge the battery. In these circumstances I would aim to do this at least weekly.

Run the air-con too, to protect the seals.

If you can take it out for a drive, even better, to remove any corrosion from the brake discs. But, if it's SORN'ed, at least drive it back and forth a few times and leave it in a slightly different position in order to avoid flat spots developing on the tyres.

If possible, when leaving a car standing for this long, avoid having to apply the handbrake if possible, to prevent the pads/shoes sticking to the discs/drums.

HTH,

Watis

If I was currently allowed to drive, I wouldn't have a problem

I'll give it a run in the morning for half an hour, and will reposition it so that the tyres are not on the same same position.

I'd not have thought of the air-con, and that will also help keep the interior dry.
Luckily, being a auto, I can leave all brakes off the garden being being flat, with a nice hard bit of grass.

Thanks all.

Slarti

I run my car's petrol engine weekly during the Winter if I haven't used it. I use a couple of bricks to slightly depress the accelerator to about 2-3000 rpm. It warms up more quickly which is probably better for the engine and causes less pollution, at least that's my theory.

RC

I have a 60's classic that I lay up in my garage for the winter. On the rare dry and salt free days I take it for a 20 mile run. Generally I get the opportunity about once a month.

That seems sufficient to keep everything in working order.

I had a six week no driving period about three years ago when I had a hip replacement. Just left the car on my drive and did nothing with it. After that time I got into the driving seat and of course it started first time and I drove off. Not the slightest problem.

Relax Slarti!

Dod

Parked up at Stansted airport and went abroad for 8 weeks. Came back, started ok, no problems but it was May not deepest winter.

I would say once a month is fine, and agree with all te comments about letting it warm up properly, and moving it back and forth.

If you can't drive, can someone else drive it around the block a couple of times?

Also put the heating on full heat, then full cold, aircon on and off, open and close all the windows fully, move the steering lock to lock, run the windscreen/headlight washers and wipers, move the seats back and forth, similarly any electric mirrors, and cycle the air vents through all their settings.

To be honest a lot of these things should be done monthly anyway - I suspect MM can tell you more about MOT failures for blocked washer jets or stuck electric seats.

Paul

DrFfybes wrote: I suspect MM can tell you more about MOT failures for blocked washer jets or stuck electric seats.

Paul

Don't get me started …….

Oh go on then, since you asked

Stuck seats - seemingly a very rare occurrence, in my experience, not saying it doesn't happen, just very rare. Only ever personally seen two failed that I can think of, one electric and one manual. The manual one was a seat cover tie tape that had got wedged into the runner, easily sorted. Somewhat embarrassingly the electric one was on my own car, 'cos I had forgotten to plug the switch back in after a repair a few weeks earlier

Section 6.2.5 for seats:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/mot-inspect ... tion-6-2-5

Washer jets however, are another barrel of Halibut altogether! Some come in only mildly out of alignment, nae bother, just a quick adjustment after the test and hey presto, retest and pass. Others, mined ewe, make one wonder about taking up professional fog knitting as a new career

Had a VW Golf a few weeks back, one jet into the middle of the windscreen, one over the drivers door mirror straight into the face of any overtaking motorcyclists, one jet bypassing the windscreen altogether and up onto the roof, and, most impressively, one firing a full ten feet at 90 degrees sideways onto any bus queue the car was passing at the time

And really? People wonder why they get a fail ticket for no washer fluid, when there is a dashboard message saying it is either low or empty

Details in section 3.4 just here folks, note that mis-aligned jets can also be a fail (not mentioned in the link below):

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/mot-inspect ... visibility

I would recommend the purchase of one of those little washer jet tool doo-dads, like this one from Halfords (only seven quid), which can be most helpful. Just note that not all washer jets are suitable for use with this tool, some modern ones are a special spray pattern from a flat plastic jet, which don't take lightly to being prodded with a needle!

https://www.halfords.com/workshop-tools ... r-jet-tool

MM (apprentice fog knitter)

MonsterMork wrote:Had a VW Golf a few weeks back, one jet into the middle of the windscreen, one over the drivers door mirror straight into the face of any overtaking motorcyclists, one jet bypassing the windscreen altogether and up onto the roof, and, most impressively, one firing a full ten feet at 90 degrees sideways onto any bus queue the car was passing at the time

Aaah, the infamous VW conical washer jet. The one that you're not supposed to clear with a pin, like everybody else does, or it'll wreak its conical revenge on you in a thousand unpredictable ways. The one that will invalidate your warranty if you ever dare to fill your reservoir with anything but the official VW washer fluid at £14.95 per eggcupful. The one that's specially designed to squirt upwards from deep in the windscreen well, nine inches below the bonnet panel. (I might be exaggerating a bit there.)

Sod that, I thought, and I kept my Passat and the wife's Golf topped up with Lidl's finest, and when the jets blocked I used a pin. Nothing bad ever happened.

Bad things did happen, however, to the seats on my friends' super-expensive Jeep Big Chief Grand Cherokee Potus Plus, where every bloody seat control in the car was electric and all of them failed at one time or another. Forty eight grand, it had cost them, and that was fifteen years ago at least. They were not very amused.

BJ

...my car hasn't been run for 5 weeks, and probably won't been used again for 3 or 4 weeks...

In case you're not aware, on some cars with remote locking, the car system shuts down after a long period of non-use (about 4 weeks on my Ford). This is to stop the battery running down. If your car is nearby, obviously you can stop this happening by unlocking and re-locking after 3 weeks.

But if you get back to the airport carpark after a long trip, you may assume the battery is flat because the car won't open using the remote. In the case of my Ford, hidden in the fob is a piece of metal which cunningly slots into a hole in the car door. Twisting it unlocks the car and the electrical system starts up again. Knowing this might save you a bit of stress on your return from a lovely holiday.

Watis wrote:If possible, when leaving a car standing for this long, avoid having to apply the handbrake if possible, to prevent the pads/shoes sticking to the discs/drums.

As happened to me a couple of years back after leaving the car parked in Southampton for a few weeks in February when I went off on a cruise and the UK suffered some bad weather in my absence.

Got back to the car, put the luggage in, car started first time, but then refused to move in either direction. Got it moving in the end after sufficient revs to overcome the stuck brakes, but an 'interesting' few minutes.