Just wondered what people thought about short journeys in their car and whether it damages the engine?

I drive 2.5 miles approx to work everyday (and back), the engine temp gauge almost reaches half way by the time I park up, I drive in Eco mode to limit revs too - so I think this should be ok?

I guess that's why it's recommended to have the car serviced/oil changed once a year if you do lots of short journeys and travel less than 6,000 mile.

I'm definitely not a fan of too short a journey in any car. My wife does a 16 mile round trip to work in her TA and it is almost all dual-carriageway from door to door. The engine therefore warms up quickly and it performs well. Today though, she had to attend a meeting which necessitated an 80 mile round trip and so amongst other things, the battery has had a damn good charge and the mpg improves significantly. My own car is a Saab 9-3 diesel and I wouldn't do any journey less than ten miles in it these days, which funnily enough, is the distance to my own workplace. I change the oil in that every 5000 miles, indeed, I just changed the oil only last week. The previous change before that, was six months ago.

With the exceptionally short journeys you are doing you should indeed ensure you change the oil at least annually. I'd seriously consider taking the car out for a decent run once a month. Take a trip out somewhere miles from home, a stately home maybe......

AdyG said:

Just wondered what people thought about short journeys in their car and whether it damages the engine?

I drive 2.5 miles approx to work everyday (and back), the engine temp gauge almost reaches half way by the time I park up, I drive in Eco mode to limit revs too - so I think this should be ok?

I guess that's why it's recommended to have the car serviced/oil changed once a year if you do lots of short journeys and travel less than 6,000 mile.

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Sorry, don't know your personal circumstances. But, I would never use a car for such constant short journeys. Would imagine your exhaust system will rot from inside out.
When I did such short journeys to work I got on my bike. However, that was a few years ago. Apologies for going way off topic, just my tuppence worth.

AdyG said:

Just wondered what people thought about short journeys in their car and whether it damages the engine?

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Unless you're regularly driving the car very hard, I'd say at least 95% of the wear on the engine occurs within the first three miles of starting from cold.

If all you ever do is short trips of about 1 1/2 miles, your engine will have more wear after 10,000 miles than most cars have after 100,000.

Regular oil changing helps a lot. With your mission profile, I'd change it every 6 months if planning to keep the car for 5 years or more.

The irony is that you'll likely be offered a very good price for it if you trade it in after 3-4 years.

Very low mileage cars are, IMO, very rarely worth the premium dealers usually ask for them.

I used to import cars from the UK into Malta.
At first, the Maltese wouldn't look at a car that had done 40 or 50k miles, and it took me a while to understand their reasons. On Malta, traffic is all stop/start - virtually every few hundred yards. Wear on engines, brakes and gearboxes is extremely high. Journey lengths are very short - often only a mile or two.
It took a few years before they understood that a UK car of this mileage had far less wear, and then buyers were happy.
And that is an island where temperatures are way higher than in the UK, so the weather is more sympatico to engines.

When you change your oil, make sure it's good quality synthetic - and never change the oil without also renewing the filter!

My wife does 5 miles each way to work. I change the oil and filter every six months because of the short journeys. I normally know when it needs doing as the oil gets quite dark!

For starters I'd block part of the grill to help the engine get up to temp. Low temps lead to condensation in the oil, if you find 'mayonnaise' on the underside of the oil filler cap, you're not driving enough. If the water is not fully up to temp then the oil is no where near being warm enough.

The idea that short trips cause engine wear is dead and buried, thanks to modern synthetic oils. Think about this, hybrids switch their engines off any time the accelerator is not depressed. Their engines aren't radically different, and I've known Prius drivers to cover 300,000 miles without engine problems. Even the 500 will stop start after being driven half a mile.

I'd look at getting an electric plug in block heater (ideally one that heats the oil rather than coolant).

Finally, you can switch to Castrol Magnatec, I use it in my seldom driven cars and the tappet noise on start up (after being parked for a month) is gone.

The other advice of taking the car out once a month on a proper trip (keeping in mind the oil might take 20 miles to fully warm up, and the gearbox even longer) is sound. As is regular servicing, don't be one of those 'I don't drive much, so I don't need a service yearly' types.

AdyG said:

I drive in Eco mode to limit revs too - so I think this should be ok?

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Eco mode doesn't limit revs, in fact you need more revs to provide the same performance. I'd switch it off.

AdyG said:

Just wondered what people thought about short journeys in their car and whether it damages the engine?

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its a city car after all, perhaps it for a longer spin at the weekends.

Ours does either 5 or 8 miles each way depending which one of us takes it.

This involves about a mile of 30mph, a mile of 60 & the rest at 70.

The little Twinair warms quickly though but we never give it any shove until the 90 degree is hit.

We live in a valley.
In order to get up the lane, we have to tackle half a mile of 1in4 within 50yds of leaving the house. Even then, we have to climb steeply up the main road. It's about two miles to the top.

Good job we have a TA and not a 1.2L, but we certainly have to give the engine some welly to get up the hill.

We've had the TA only a week, and a quick check on the fuel consumption shows 33mpg though we haven't gone any further than 5miles from home yet. This is better than we were getting with the previous car - a 1.6 16v Clio that would average 28mpg over similar distances.

Regards,
Mick