Idling

Is it bad to let truck idle for long periods of time? I have the 3.4 twin turbo v6 engine guys. Sometimes may be on a job and have to sit for couple hours or so?

 

I definitely would NOT let it idle for too long, especially hours at a time.

 

Gotcha. Thank you!

 

My truck actually displayed a message on the dash recently that it would shut off at a certain duration...I didn't pay attention to how long, though.

 

Idling is being reported as the leading cause of gas dilution in the oil.

 

Let it run. More frequent oil changes.

Where I work the road techs have to let the vans run for hours if not the whole day.
200,000+ miles as this is there only source of heating/cooling/power and such.
*Ford 3500 Hightop v6 gas

 

If I sit long enough it says it will shut off after 1 hour.

 

I don't believe we have any information that idling this Toyota 3.5TT engine is bad. Of course it's better to keep engine off than idling it for longevity... But it may not make much difference if any.

In comparison, it's a belief among many users and techs that the Hemi v8 engine in Ram trucks should NOT be run idle because of the design issues in that engine, and oil isn't getting to the top of the engine at low rpm eventually resulting in camshaft and lifter grinding each other down. Many Police hemi engine cars had lifter failure believed because of extended idling.

It took about a decade of lifter and camshafts failures in Hemi engines to come up with this observational recommendation to avoid idling it long as much as possible. Will we have something similar for this Toyota 3.5TT? Probably not as it idles so smoothly...

Myself? I really don't care about idling and idle this engine as much as I need to for AC to run. I have a 1 year old, and if he's sleeping in the truck when I arrive at my destination, I would not wake him up and stay in the truck with him for 30-60 min, running AC while he's still sleeping.

This 3.5TT engine failing because of idling is least of my concerns as I got 10 years warranty on it. If anything, the Turbos will probably fail first, or the bearings if my truck is the Chosen one.

Make sure you change your oil every 5k miles, or more frequent deepening how long you really idle!

 

Ok, perhaps this is so, but if you change oil every 5k miles, will there really be enough gas in the oil to make any difference?

 

This is what I was referring to and I was able to turn it off, although I don’t know if this is temporary. My only point is that it may shut off if unattended for an hour.

 

When I crank up and get out to get something I forgot (never closed the door) I get a message that the engine will shut off in 10min or I can select to leave it running.

 

Ya, I think I may have an option for it not to shut off. Probably resets like the auto start/stop when you cycle the key.