When your machine idles, the engine still needs to burn fuel to continue running. Since it is not performing any work, however, idling is an inefficient use of fuel and contributes to engine wear without any benefit. Here are the main impacts of letting your machine’s engine idle.

Impacts to Your Heavy Equipment

The most detrimental effects of allowing your machine to idle are related to the machine’s engine and its components. There are a number of conditions that can occur when the engine is left to idle excessively.

Wet Stacking

Wet stacking can occur when a diesel engine becomes too cool and the fuel in the engine’s cylinders isn’t fully combusted. The excess, uncombusted fuel eventually builds up, or stacks, in the machine’s exhaust system.

When the machine begins operating normally and the engine heats back up, this fuel may burn off in the exhaust, resulting in the emission of a dark fluid and plumes of black smoke. Excess idling may create the conditions for wet stacking to occur, since idling for too long can cause the engine’s temperatures to drop.

Cylinder Washing

If left idling for too long, a machine’s engine may become too cool. When this occurs, fuel in the engine’s cylinders isn’t fully combusted and excess fuel may run down the inside walls of the cylinders.

This process, called cylinder washing, may strip the oil from inside the cylinders, thereby making the engine more susceptible to damage. Over time, the uncombusted fuel will contaminate the oil, requiring more frequent oil changes and causing additional wear to engine components.

Excess Wear

When idling, a machine’s engine is still running. The engine’s cylinders, pistons, belts and other key wear components still have to perform their functions.

Therefore, idling still wears down your machine’s engine, even though no work is being performed. Over time, this excess wear will cause your engine to require additional maintenance, more frequent oil changes and could even lead to premature component failures.

Increased Operating Costs of Engine Idling

Perhaps the most alarming impact of excess idling comes in the form of increased operating costs. Just because your engine is idling, this does not mean fuel isn’t being consumed.

In fact, a single hour of idling consumes as much diesel fuel as driving your machine 25 miles. Fuel represents a major operating cost for any fleet, so consuming so much fuel without any benefit is wildly inefficient.

In addition to increased operating costs from unnecessary fuel consumption, excess idling can cause other operating costs to balloon, as well. Excess idling may require DEF, oil, bearings and oil filters to be changed more frequently, inflating your operating costs further.

Environmental Impacts of Engine Idling

Not only is idling bad for your machine and budget, it’s bad for the environment too. Idling machines emit a host of toxic pollutants such as sulfur dioxide, particulate matter, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxides. These pollutants degrade air quality, posing a health risk to your team and your project’s surroundings.

Idling machines don’t just contaminate the air, they also generate noise, which can be unnecessarily disruptive to nearby businesses and residential areas.

By minimizing excess idling, you can keep these environmental disturbances to a minimum, thereby minimizing your impact to the environment and fostering a better work environment for your team.