How cold is too cold / what's your idling policy?

Schneider says to Opti-idle only if it’s 10° or below or 90° or above. My biggest problem with that is how to keep the batteries charged in between those temps. It’s not like we have solar panels on top of our trucks. My personal opinion is that if at any time it’s cold or hot or if the batteries need charged… this truck is going to run. They’ll just have to get themselves a big tube of but cream to relieve the pain.

 

Company policy where I’m at in trucks with APU’s and tank heaters is to idle below 0, but we also don’t use fuel additives anymore since they started using tank heaters. Don’t forget the reefer unit either. You never know when someone bought fuel in Laredo and dragged the trailer up to Minnesota. We do use additives on the trailers when warranted

 

Im a wimp, anything under 20 degrees is idle weather... Lol

 

It depends on the individual driver and individual truck. Typically in the newer trucks I would decide to idle for cold temps around 0 F.
In hot temps, I typically idled when temps were over 95 F. In hot/cold, if I was going right to the sleeper, I could stay comfortable with the APU HVAC in maybe 5 F hotter/colder since the sleeper curtain kept the warm/cold air where I wanted. I found the Espar heater very effective at heating the truck interior. IMO, you could bake a roast in the truck using the Espar. I rarely ran the bunk heater above the minimum fan speed, if it had a fan speed adjustment. Driver rest is more important than fuel economy from my perspective, I was a company driver.

 

If the engine has been running all day and working hard for 13 hours, it is not a big deal to shut it off for 8 hours at -20c/-4F. If you don’t have cab heater you will have to start the engine in a few hours anyway. But that big block of steel and 10gal of oil will hold heat a long time.
I am assuming it is winter and so running 0w-40 or 5w-40 syn.

 

What's a strategy for idling when company has automatic engine shutoff after several minutes?

 

i don't shut mine off in any temp ether the heat is on or air is on