# What Temperature does your Diesel run



## Heavymetal (Aug 30, 2016)

What temperature does your diesel run. Mine is at 180-183 and it seems low. 2018 1.6 diesel Equinox.


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## BodhiBenz1987 (Jan 13, 2018)

Heavymetal said:


> What temperature does your diesel run. Mine is at 180-183 and it seems low. 2018 1.6 diesel Equinox.


That seems similar to what I've seen but I'll have to check ... the Cruze's don't show temp in the DIC so I have to check on the ScanGauge.


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## MP81 (Jul 20, 2015)

Diesels run pretty cold, so that's about right.

It's why, at least in the 1st gen Cruze (but probably the 2nd gen and the Equinox/Terrain, as well), they have an aux heater for winter.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

MP81 said:


> It's why, at least in the 1st gen Cruze (but probably the 2nd gen and the Equinox/Terrain, as well), they have an aux heater for winter.


2nd generation Cruze has water-cooled EGR, so upon "cold" start (even in summer temperatures) it is dumping exhaust heat into the coolant circuit for a quicker warmup. Also, every 2G Cruze diesel comes with seat warmers standard. Not sure about the Equinox & Terrain, but it wouldn't surprise me if they also had seat warmers included with the diesel engine.


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## MP81 (Jul 20, 2015)

1st gen Diesels came with heated leather standard as well. Even with dumping heat into the coolant, diesels, by nature, run cold. But that should help. The grid heater helps more, though.


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## TDCruze (Sep 26, 2014)

Normal on the gen 2 diesel 1.6L is 180-185F
The gen 1 diesel 2.0L ran much hotter.


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## 406 (Apr 5, 2019)

My engine temp usually sits in the 180-185F range too, which is normal. In long high boost situations, like a steady uphill grade, coolant can climb to 200F, but drops back down quickly once on level or downhill ground. To bring up another question, what are others with the 9T50 auto running at temp wise? My tranny will easily hit 200F running steady on the highway at 80 MPH in 9th, especially on a hot summer day. Are others seeing this high of tranny temps?


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

MP81 said:


> The grid heater helps more, though.


G1 Cruze diesel sedans had a grid heater?!

I know that's a standard feature of the Cummins B-series engine because it isn't equipped with glow plugs. At idle the grid heater cycles on and off depending on the outside temperature, but once boost is above a certain threshold it turns off because it is unnecessary. That grid heater draws a lot of amps. I had a friend with a Cummins pickup who was complaining the headlights would dim on a cycle when the engine was idling and the grid heater was cycling. I told him DRIVE THE TRUCK TO GET SOME BOOST GOING! Don't let it idle when it's cold like that.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

406 said:


> My tranny will easily hit 200F running steady on the highway at 80 MPH in 9th, especially on a hot summer day. Are others seeing this high of tranny temps?


Wow. Maybe my advice is antiquated, but it sounds like that tranny could use a small aftermarket cooler.


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## MP81 (Jul 20, 2015)

No, I mean a grid heater for the interior - an aux heater.


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## Heavymetal (Aug 30, 2016)

It just seemed low. Thanks I feel better now. I couldn’t find a good forum for the Equinox diesel.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

MP81 said:


> No, I mean a grid heater for the interior - an aux heater.


Oh, that's interesting. I wasn't sure there could be enough heat from one of those to matter. Does the alternator put out enough amperage to make a significant difference? I've seen those cheap 12v heaters at auto parts stores, but those are limited by the fuse in the 12v socket. I guess if you had a high-amperage heater wired right to the battery, it could work reasonably well.


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## plano-doug (Jul 1, 2015)

Barry Allen said:


> I guess if you had a high-amperage heater wired right to the battery, it could work reasonably well.


But the alternator still needs enough excess capacity to supply the heater or the battery will be in a discharge mode (for an extended period).
...
Back in the day, I heard a story that the JC Whitney company was built largely on the sale of gasoline powered aftermarket heaters for air-cooled VW's. Seems the stock heaters in those were failure prone, and not much better when properly working 

I can dress warm to fight the cold, but not having a defroster surely sucks !

Doug

.


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## pandrad61 (Jul 8, 2015)

Barry Allen said:


> Wow. Maybe my advice is antiquated, but it sounds like that tranny could use a small aftermarket cooler.


The diesel G1 has a actually big trans cooler that’s oil to air after it goes in the radiator tank heater. Personally I’d bypass the radiator heater and just run a straight trans cooler that’s stock.


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## MP81 (Jul 20, 2015)

Barry Allen said:


> Oh, that's interesting. I wasn't sure there could be enough heat from one of those to matter. Does the alternator put out enough amperage to make a significant difference? I've seen those cheap 12v heaters at auto parts stores, but those are limited by the fuse in the 12v socket. I guess if you had a high-amperage heater wired right to the battery, it could work reasonably well.


The aux heater is the reason why you get a fair amount of heat in the cabin shortly after starting the car. It puts out way more heat than the engine could be capable of at that point.

Looks like the second gens have one as well.


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## plano-doug (Jul 1, 2015)

pandrad61 said:


> The diesel G1 has a actually big trans cooler that’s oil to air after it goes in the radiator tank heater.


My 2013 LS 1.8 gas has the same setup for trans cooling. The big piece is sandwiched between the radiator and condensor, down low.

Doug

.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

plano-doug said:


> heaters for air-cooled VW's. Seems the stock heaters in those were failure prone, and not much better when properly working


When functioning properly they are great! They take air from around the exhaust manifold and pipe it into the cabin, so you get heat nearly instantly after start-up. I think it's the same for Corvairs.

The downsides are multiple. If you get a little bit of exhaust leak in the heat exchanger you are sucking raw exhaust into the cabin when the heat is on. If any of the piping along the way to bring that hot air forward leaks or is broken, you get cooler air instead of hot air.

Water cooling is far easier because you are bringing the hot water to the heater core right inside the dash and then blowing air through that, so it's less chance of cold air leaks. That, and the exhaust problem is eliminated.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

MP81 said:


> Looks like the second gens have one as well.


Really? I get, like, no heat out of the vents on cold start. The engine has to warm up to get anything.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

plano-doug said:


> But the alternator still needs enough excess capacity to supply the heater or the battery will be in a discharge mode (for an extended period).


This is what the older Cummins pickups do:






If he would drive the **** truck it would be fine! Build some boost and the grid heater turns off.


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## phil1734 (Aug 30, 2019)

The second gens do have the aux heater, but I believe there is some voo-doo programing involved in its operation and it only turns on if you have the highest heat settings selected, and will also lower the fan speed.

This is all extremely obvious if the engine is still cool and you turn the fan speed all the way up with the heat setting a few clicks below the highest setting (the little LED should be at the 3 o'clock position.) Then turn the heat setting to the highest setting. Observe the change in fan speed and air temperature. If it's really cold, it make still take 30 seconds or so for the heater to warm up and push the cold air out of the ducts.

This of course only works with the manual HVAC controls. If you have automatic ones your experience may vary.


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## MP81 (Jul 20, 2015)

It's not instant (ours isn't), but it's definitely _wayyy_ faster than if you waited for the engine to heat up enough to provide cabin heat (even with the ~17 mile city drive into work, the engine in ours barely gets up to temp by the time we'd get to work).

But yes, as mentioned above, the heat needs to be on "full hot". I'm not sure how it works when you have the ability to change the temp specifically based on degrees (like in my Volt).


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## coalminer (Oct 31, 2018)

I used to have a 2005 Sprinter van, and that had a diesel fired aux coolant heater, and on the really cold days it was needed. I remember times when I was stopped in traffic on cold days and you can watch the temp gauge go from the normal location in the middle to just above cold in a matter of a couple minutes. There was an option on those vans that used a small pump so that you could run that aux heater and the pump and turn the heater blower on low so that you could heat the inside of the vehicle without running the engine.


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## plano-doug (Jul 1, 2015)

MP81 said:


> ...even with the ~17 mile city drive into work, the engine in ours barely gets up to temp by the time we'd get to work...


That sounds like a thermostat stuck open.

Doug

.


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## phil1734 (Aug 30, 2019)

If it is than both of ours are stuck. And mine would have had to been bad from the factory.

If the outside temperature is in the low teens (common for my morning commute several weeks of the year,) it takes about 10 miles of straight highway driving for mine to be up to temp. And it will noticeably cool off coasting down off-ramps or long downhill stretches.


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## MP81 (Jul 20, 2015)

plano-doug said:


> That sounds like a thermostat stuck open.
> 
> Doug
> 
> .


Nope. It's how diesels run. They're cold blooded.



phil1734 said:


> If it is than both of ours are stuck. And mine would have had to been bad from the factory.
> 
> If the outside temperature is in the low teens (common for my morning commute several weeks of the year,) it takes about 10 miles of straight highway driving for mine to be up to temp. And it will noticeably cool off coasting down off-ramps or long downhill stretches.


Yup - exactly this.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

plano-doug said:


> That sounds like a thermostat stuck open.


When it's zero or below (or in single digits, really) the engine will never warm up with light stop & go city driving.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

phil1734 said:


> The second gens do have the aux heater, but I believe there is some voo-doo programing involved in its operation and it only turns on if you have the highest heat settings selected, and will also lower the fan speed.
> 
> This is all extremely obvious if the engine is still cool and you turn the fan speed all the way up with the heat setting a few clicks below the highest setting (the little LED should be at the 3 o'clock position.) Then turn the heat setting to the highest setting. Observe the change in fan speed and air temperature. If it's really cold, it make still take 30 seconds or so for the heater to warm up and push the cold air out of the ducts.
> 
> This of course only works with the manual HVAC controls. If you have automatic ones your experience may vary.


Interesting. My use must have never discovered it. I always turn the temp to max, the blower to the windscreen and on fan setting 1-2 until it warms up. I guess that electric heater never kicked in for those settings because I was patiently waiting for the car to warm up normally (by driving it).


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

phil1734 said:


> I believe there is some voo-doo programing involved in its operation


I'm convinced that the magic only happens when you turn on the front defogger. I choose that first thing in the morning and the display on the dash says the "Front Enhanced Defogger" is consuming extra fuel to run the engine. To me, that sounds like an electric grid heater to give some warm air on the inside of the glass even when the engine is cold.


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## pandrad61 (Jul 8, 2015)

Here in Florida maybe 5 min of idle with ac on me it’s 1/4 warm, 10min then it’s at operational temp with needle pointing roughly south.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

pandrad61 said:


> Here in Florida maybe 5 min of idle with ac on me it’s 1/4 warm, 10min then it’s at operational temp with needle pointing roughly south.


Oh yeah, having the AC on helps the engine warm up faster. Not only is there extra fuel consumed to run the refrigerant pump, the heat from inside the car also gets pumped to the condenser where it blows over the radiator to warm up the engine coolant.


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## pandrad61 (Jul 8, 2015)

Barry Allen said:


> Oh yeah, having the AC on helps the engine warm up faster. Not only is there extra fuel consumed to run the refrigerant pump, the heat from inside the car also gets pumped to the condenser where it blows over the radiator to warm up the engine coolant.


Florida heat helps too lol. Nothing like 98 degrees with 99% humidity to help heat soak an engine.


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## phil1734 (Aug 30, 2019)

Barry Allen said:


> I'm convinced that the magic only happens when you turn on the front defogger. I choose that first thing in the morning and the display on the dash says the "Front Enhanced Defogger" is consuming extra fuel to run the engine. To me, that sounds like an electric grid heater to give some warm air on the inside of the glass even when the engine is cold.


As far as I am aware, the enhanced defogger is just turning on your AC to help with defogging the windshield. It also has a mind of its own when it comes to fan speed, most notably turning down the speed if you connect a phone call over your car's bluetooth.

I confirmed my previous post this morning (38F at my house.) The aux heater works - at least for me - with the floor and dash vent setting, so I'm assuming it works on all of them. It was more noticeable turning the temperature back down from having it on and feeling sudden cold air, in comparison to the 30-60 second ramp up of the aux heater.

And just to be clear - it's not really "hot" air you get from it. More like luke-warm. A regular heater core runs at 180-200F. I doubt the aux one gets much over 100 by itself.


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## MP81 (Jul 20, 2015)

It's just hotter than the heater core would be at that point.


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## Snipesy (Dec 7, 2015)

phil1734 said:


> As far as I am aware, the enhanced defogger is just turning on your AC to help with defogging the windshield. It also has a mind of its own when it comes to fan speed, most notably turning down the speed if you connect a phone call over your car's bluetooth.


This is exactly what it is. It decreases humidity.

You can sometimes hear the compressor engage and disengage when you switch from defrost to one of the others.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

pandrad61 said:


> Nothing like 98 degrees with 99% humidity


What you describe does not happen. You claim a heat index of 179 F, which would be a world record.


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## 6speedTi (May 18, 2018)

pandrad61 said:


> Here in Florida maybe 5 min of idle with ac on me it’s 1/4 warm, 10min then it’s at operational temp with needle pointing roughly south.


My needle after full warmup points straight up north. 🤔


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## pandrad61 (Jul 8, 2015)

6speedTi said:


> My needle after full warmup points straight up north. 🤔


Gen 1 or 2? Gen 1 for what ever reason it points south when operating, west for cold, east for way overheated.


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## pandrad61 (Jul 8, 2015)

Barry Allen said:


> What you describe does not happen. You claim a heat index of 179 F, which would be a world record.


Dude it’s a Florida joke but thanks for ruining the fun


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## 6speedTi (May 18, 2018)

pandrad61 said:


> Gen 1 or 2? Gen 1 for what ever reason it points south when operating, west for cold, east for way overheated.


This is the GEN 2 forum. I have a GEN 2. I guess the GEN 1 slipped in under the radar. 😉


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## Snipesy (Dec 7, 2015)

GM doesn’t know what straight up means. This is ‘operating’ temp.
2018 gas


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## 6speedTi (May 18, 2018)

Snipesy said:


> GM doesn’t know what straight up means. This is ‘operating’ temp.
> 2018 gas
> View attachment 289062


Looks like my Chevy Colorado.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

Snipesy said:


> GM doesn’t know what straight up means. This is ‘operating’ temp.
> 2018 gas


Keep in mind those gauges only show you what the manufacturer wants you to see with ECU programming. You can have wild temperature swings and the gauge will have a "hump" where is stays steady. The 3rd generation Mazda RX-7 was notorious for this.


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## 6speedTi (May 18, 2018)

Barry Allen said:


> Keep in mind those gauges only show you what the manufacturer wants you to see with ECU programming. You can have wild temperature swings and the gauge will have a "hump" where is stays steady. The 3rd generation Mazda RX-7 was notorious for this.


Correct, GM and I'm sure others have desensitized their gauges to keep those wild swings from happening. Fuel gauges were notorious for swinging back and forth. What was stupid back in the 90's was temperature gauges reading C and H at both ends and color codes across the scale. Then you had oil pressure gauges with L and H at both ends.


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## pandrad61 (Jul 8, 2015)

6speedTi said:


> This is the GEN 2 forum. I have a GEN 2. I guess the GEN 1 slipped in under the radar. 😉


Yes I’m well aware but figured a little extra info to reference on the previous gen diesel would help. But anyways see ya then.


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## Snipesy (Dec 7, 2015)

6speedTi said:


> View attachment 289063
> 
> Looks like my Chevy Colorado.


Ugh so many GM vehicles have this issue.

Like if the gauge doesn’t show anything at least make it point in an OCD friendly way.


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## Aussie (Sep 16, 2012)

This is where my 2012 Holden Cruze temperature sits. The heater starts to produce warm air well before the needle moves off 0, which is at 51C. The day this picture was taken it was over 100F, 39 is just over 102F. Now at 8 years old it still runs in the sane range between 77C, 170F and the highest I have ever seen is 92C, 197.6F and I think that is when it was doing a regen.


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