Dear Tom and Ray:
My sister and I recently had an argument. She drives only short distances, rarely more than five miles. She wants her '98 Buick Regal with 40,000 miles to last as long as possible. Therefore, she refused to drive the 350 miles to visit for the holidays. I believe that an occasional long drive actually extends the life of the car. Which one of us is correct, and why?
-- Bill
Ray: Well, I think she just didn't want to visit you, Bill. Do you have a houseful of bratty kids or a neglected cat box or something?
Tom: She certainly wouldn't ruin the car by putting another 700 miles (round trip) on it. After all, that's what cars are designed to do: Drive places. But is it GOOD for the car? Not really.
Ray: In the old days, when cars had carburetors, and excess fuel poured into the cylinders, taking a long, high-speed ride could help burn off some of the carbon deposits that tended to build up on the pistons. But fuel injection meters the fuel so precisely on modern cars that carbon deposits rarely are a problem.
Tom: The only problem with repeated short drives now is moisture. When the engine runs, one of the byproducts of combustion is water. That water is sent out the tailpipe. But if you drive only a few miles, the exhaust system and muffler never get hot enough to vaporize that water. That makes the exhaust system rust prematurely.
Ray: So your sister may drive up to the pumps and say, "Fill her up, check the oil and change the muffler!"
Tom: But you don't need to drive 350 miles to heat up your exhaust system. Five or 10 miles will do it, depending on the weather. And, in any case, a long trip once a year is not going to help keep your muffler from rusting anyway, if it's staying moist the other 364 days.
Ray: So there's no real advantage for her car in making this trip. In fact, the opposite is true. There's a pretty direct correlation between the number of miles driven and the end of a car's life. So in general, the fewer miles a car is driven, the longer it lasts.
Tom: So forget about the car, Bill. Send your sister a plane ticket for Christmas next year. But if she starts chirping about all the potential wear and tear on the airplane, give up.
(Car Talk is a nationally syndicated column by automotive experts (and brothers) Tom and Ray Magliozzi. Write to them at the Car Talk Web site.)
4 Comments
By Linden Malki on September 6, 2009 1:01 PM
Not necessarily. I have been in the auto parts and service business for a lot of years, and we see more garage queens than daily drivers. In general, cars that are not driven often or only short distances have more problems with fuel contamination, rubber components taking a "set" and losing flexibility, cylinder walls that get dry and eat rings, batteries that go flat from not being recharged enough, etc, etc. Time is worse on a car than miles. Here in Southern California, there are a lot of people that do major long commutes, and those steady freeway cruises are almost "free" miles in terms of wear. I have read that the hardest miles on an engine are the first five minutes and the last few minutes.
By Sam on September 6, 2009 11:16 PM
A '98 with 40k on it? TIme will kill that car long before miles do. May as well drive it a little.
By theantibush on September 9, 2009 10:20 AM
I have found that buying cars new and then replacing the oil with pure synthetic at the first change pretty much eliminates internal wear. I tore down my 3000GT (127,000 miles) to soup it up and found that the internal parts matched specifications for new parts. Im much more used to seeing cams worn into half-moons, and sludge everywhere. It was operating-room clean.
Another thing is to not run external components to failure. Change out belts, engine-driven accessories, batteries, brakes, and so on before they fail. Use synthetic ATF and differential lubes. Flush out the radiator and replace the hoses and thermostat. Replace the water pump before you have to.
I took these lessons from General Aviation, where planes are not allowed to fall apart. Many piston aircraft are over 50 years old and still flying. It doesn't take much to stay on top of your vehicles.
Yeah, running a car diminishes slightly, as the authors say, though not running it at all will certainly doom it well before its time. Its like a bank account: be sure to put something in for your withdrawals.
By John Bailo on September 10, 2009 9:00 AM
My goal is to keep my 2007 Spectra until 2015 when they will have a hydrogen fuel cell car.
45,000 miles currently, but bought it used and don't expect to put more than 7,000 per year on it.