Cold engine rpm above 1,500

[steve76]

Hey Guys,

Just wondering is it normal to have cold engine rpm above 1,500. Temperatures here in Hungary now scale from 25 to 35 F mornings, and barely above 40-45 afternoons. When it starts up, it's 1,200, then in a minute, or when moving, after a few blocks, it becomes 1,600-1,700.
After reacing the bottom edge of water temp scale it settles on 1,000, then after when it warms up fully, it becomes 750 (next mark under the 1,000 mark). When my mpg is normal, about 25 in city driving. It's a 2.2L manual.
I used to have a 1.3L VW polo G40, and it did maximum 1400 rpm idle when totally cold, with a less smooth engine.
Thanks for any info on this!

steve

[Stillrunning]

None of my specs give a cold idle rpm, just the hot engine rpm of 750. To me it appears to be operating OK but you could clean the IAC valve to make sure it is not sticking when cold.

[fenixus]

my cold idle sometimes reaches 2,000rpm in the middle of New Jersey Winter (sometimes with high winds where I live it reaches down to -20C at early morning), it's normal.

around 0C-10C it idles around 1,600rpm initially. cold idle is high initially and over short time (minutes) it drops down little by little while engine warms up eventually stabilizing at fully warmed up engine at 700+/-50 rpm for the gen4 camry (or 750+/-50 for gen3).

what is not normal, is when the RPM first drops (or starts lower) and then over time increases - that could indicate a crap resistance signal coming from the Engine Coolant Temperature sensor (for E.F.I.) which misreports at cold start or a little later and then works fine. this sensor is a primary feed to the computer, it's unmonitored, very easy to replace without draining coolant on 5s-fe engine. look for the 2-wire coolant sensor sitting on the right (driver side) of engine head, it has a green socket, right next to it is a 1-wire coolant temp sender (for the dash temperature gauge) with a gray base.

get a new one from dealer, here it is around $45 shipped from online dealer, you need to get a matching copper gasket for it separately. torque is around 14ft-lbs and a deep wall 19mm socket fits over the plug.

I noticed, my both cars had issues with ECT for EFI sensors, they both tended to misreport resistance at certain level when car was warming up from cold start during cold Winter morning and they both worked fine in Summer or at fully warmed up engine.

other than that clean the IAC valve opening through the Throttle Body using a o2 sensor safe spray and a toothbrush..

[steve76]

thanks! That's a very thorough and valuable response.
I will check the ECT sensor on the net and get one. A friend is just coming over from CA to here, Hungary. I'm also thinking on little, but valuable parts that surely cheaper in the US and worth replacing. The car has 140k miles on the clock and I feel the suspension floaty at the rear. Also the bushings at front are gone. I have got a new O2 sensor from the previous friend coming over, from Amazon, for 53 bucks. Here Toyota sell it for 230 usd. Insane!

Again, many thanks!

Steve