Is it good to take your engine up to redline
08-29-2016, 04:49 PM
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Is it good to take your engine up to redline
Not every time you get behind the wheel but I have heard that it's not good to baby your car all the time and you should at least drive it kind of hard and take it up to redline once a month. What do you guys think? Good or bad for the car?
08-29-2016, 05:03 PM
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I'm of the "it kind of depends" opinion.
If your car doesn't have a rev limiter it's probably best to avoid the redline unless you're very careful.
If your car's rev limiter is at an unsafe rpm, it's probably best to avoid the redline unless you're very careful.
If your car is a Hyundai, your factory rev limiter is fairly conservative and as long as you don't hold the engine at redline you should be fine. I fairly regularly bump the rev limiter in first gear because it's a long jump to second and no matter what it'll drop me out of my power band. Ideally I'll shift just before rev limiter, but I'm human and miss sometimes and I think that's fine.
During autocross sometimes I will spend several seconds riding the rev limiter. I do not recommend this unless you have a very good reason. The engine is never happy with me after that. The Accent is a bit more sensitive to the combination of high rpms and high lateral G force than most other Hyundais but it's not a great idea.
I do not think there's an advantage to redlining your car occasionally to blow out carbon or anything else. I think a full throttle pull into the higher rpm range is a good thing occasionally but redlining the engine is pretty arbitrary on its own. I don't think it's harmful in reasonable doses but I don't think it's helpful either.
If your car doesn't have a rev limiter it's probably best to avoid the redline unless you're very careful.
If your car's rev limiter is at an unsafe rpm, it's probably best to avoid the redline unless you're very careful.
If your car is a Hyundai, your factory rev limiter is fairly conservative and as long as you don't hold the engine at redline you should be fine. I fairly regularly bump the rev limiter in first gear because it's a long jump to second and no matter what it'll drop me out of my power band. Ideally I'll shift just before rev limiter, but I'm human and miss sometimes and I think that's fine.
During autocross sometimes I will spend several seconds riding the rev limiter. I do not recommend this unless you have a very good reason. The engine is never happy with me after that. The Accent is a bit more sensitive to the combination of high rpms and high lateral G force than most other Hyundais but it's not a great idea.
I do not think there's an advantage to redlining your car occasionally to blow out carbon or anything else. I think a full throttle pull into the higher rpm range is a good thing occasionally but redlining the engine is pretty arbitrary on its own. I don't think it's harmful in reasonable doses but I don't think it's helpful either.
