Auto gear box high revving on cold start up

[Anonymous]

Morning all,

I've noticed recently that on cold start up, my RCZ is sticking in 1st gear far longer than I'd expect before the auto box changes up a gear. The engine revs quite high (not sure to what though), even to the point where I sometimes manually knock it up to second to avoid looking like a novice driver.

My car is due its second service on 22nd Feb with Swansway Chester and I've asked them to take a look at it.

Until then, does anyone have any ideas what might be causing this please?

I'm interested to get everyone's ideas.

 

[RCZ-R]

hi,

The question here is, how high does it rev? and the next question, is it your first winter with this car or a car with auto box?

I'm asking as it is pretty normal for auto box cars to rev the engine higher in cold conditions to warm up the engine as quickly as possible. The electronics are considering input values like intake air temperature, ambient temperature, coolant temp., accelerator position and the actual gear and will hold on longer to a lower gear before changing up. All to warm up the engine.

So does it rev like to 5k? Or is it just a bit higher than "normal"?

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for your reply RCZ-R.

It is revving to 3k and then changing up. I've had the car just over 12 months now and cant say I noticed it last winter.

I've had autos before and haven't noticed it revving higher on cold start up., but your theory makes sense.

I will update once the servicing is done and I'll ask the service manager what their thoughts are.

 

[RCZ-R]

You're welcome!
I drive two auto box cars currently, both with electronically controlled boxes. They all do it. 3k is not that high. This is also the revs I ride when warming up my manual R.
Driving with low revs for a long period of time while warming up the engine is considered to do more harm to the engine as to warm it up as quickly as possible. Of course it doesn't mean to rev it like stupid. It is a fine balance between putting a bit of stress on the engine and giving it enough time to warm up. The electronics in auto boxes attempt to do exactly that.

 

[Anonymous]

The outcome from Peugeot was as expected...
They contacted Peugeot HQ for an official reply which went a long the lines of, "The auto box considers a number of factors before changing up or down a gear, including ambient temperature, engine and auto box oil temperature, driver input (I guess this refers to my right foot)."

So I'm satisfied that my auto isn't going to go boom.

On another note, during the service the garage contacted me to ask if i'd noticed how loud the timing chain tensioner was, which I hadn't. As I'm still in warranty they offered to change this for me which I agreed to. Although I hadn't noticed the noise before, its now noticeably quieter whilst idling.

I was extremely impressed with Swansway once again, the service they offer is truly exceptional. They collected my car from my work place at 9.30am and had it returned to me at 4.30pm the same day. The full service, including oil change, new oil filter, new pollen filter, new brake fluid and systems health check (and of course the work under warranty) set me back £240.

 

[thornebt]

Just to further reassure you I can say that my automatic 1.6THP also revs close to 3,000 in first gear when starting off. Cheers. Bruce.