Engine Hours – Do They Truly Matter?

People sometimes believe that engine hours are important as they determine the condition of the motor. However, that’s not entirely true. Even though they can give us some information about the car, they can’t reveal the full picture. Examining only the motor hours won’t help you understand whether a specific vehicle is worth your money or not.

Consequently, it’s not unreasonable to figure out what motor hours are, how to calculate them, and how they affect the performance of a vehicle.

What are engine hours?

Engine hours indicate how long your engine has been active since day one. It counts hours as soon as the manufacturers release the vehicle. When someone starts driving the car, motor hours will start adding up along with the mileage on the instrument cluster.

To understand this concept a bit better, let’s look at the example. Let’s say you’re mainly driving in the city. The chances are you’re idling a lot in traffic jams and during quick stops. During these scenarios, the engine is still running even though the car isn’t in motion. As a result, motor hours continue adding up regardless of the fact that the mileage doesn’t increase.

If you drive for 6 hours in the city, you might cover around 240 miles. 6 hours will be added to your motor hours and 240 miles to the odometer. But if you’re on the highway with little to no traffic for 6 hours, you can easily cover 600 miles.

In this example, you can see clearly that motor hours can be similar for different mileages. That’s why it’s unreasonable to rely on this factor while selling or purchasing a used vehicle. Instead of that, it’s better to research and clarify how many miles on used car is too much.

With that being said, motor hours might have more importance with specialty vehicles, such as trucks. These bad boys spend a lot of time idling regardless of their location. Examining motor hours in such vehicles could potentially help us determine a better maintenance schedule. But still, that doesn’t mean that engine hours affect the life expectancy of a car.

How to convert engine hours to miles?

We can convert engine hours to miles with a specific formula: engine hours x 60. The result will be the mileage equivalent of the motor hours. This equation is based on the understanding that a vehicle covers one mile per minute. That’s 60 miles per hour (mph). Thus, we need to multiply motor hours by 60. For example, if the motor hours of your car are 3,500, then the conversion will look like this: 3,500×60=210,000.

As you can see, you don’t need a specific engine hours to miles calculator to convert those numbers correctly. However, for that equation to work, we should know motor hours. Ordinary vehicles don’t display motor hours anywhere (certain trucks and specialty vehicles might have this indicator). Consequently, we have to evaluate the approximate motor hours ourselves.

Miles to Engine Hours calculator

You can be engine hours calculator yourself and here’s what you’ll need to do (according to ItStillRuns):

Step 1. Reset a trip meter to zero at the beginning of the week

Don’t mix the odometer and the trip meter, though. The latter measures the distance during a specific trip. To use calculate motor hours, you should reset the trip meter at the beginning of your typical week. During those 7 days, it will record the distance you traveled.

Also, get a stopwatch that can count time for at least 20 hours. Activate it daily every time you start the engine, be it idling or driving. Don’t forget to pause it each time you turn the engine off.

Step 2. Record total mileage and motor hours

At the end of the week, write down total mileage and total motor hours. Don’t forget to convert minutes to hours by dividing them by 60. For example: 45/60=0.75, i.e. 45 minutes are equal to 0.75 miles.

Step 3. Determine the average travel speed for the week

You’ll also need to divide the total mileage by the hours to figure out the average speed. If you traveled 425 miles during a week and kept the engine running for 20 hours, the equation will look like this: 425/20=21.25 mph.

Step 4. Calculate approximate motor hours

To finalize the engine hours calculator, you’ll need to check the odometer (not the trip meter) for total mileage. Then you’ll need to divide that number by the average speed. For instance: 48,000/21.25=2,258.8 motor hours.

Don’t forget that it’s impossible to calculate the motor hours accurately. These are just estimates. The real numbers might be (and will probably be) quite different from our calculations.

Do motor hours affect the performance of a car?

Motor hours don’t affect the performance of passenger cars. They might play a role in determining the maintenance schedule for trucks and other specialty vehicles, but they don’t reflect the condition of ordinary vehicles.

Mileage is a more important factor in the auto industry when it comes to evaluating the wear and tear of a car. You can try converting engine hours to miles if you want to, but that will be a waste of time. Passenger vehicles don’t idle that much, keeping their motor hours at a low level.

Even if it weren’t so, there’s no such thing as high or low motor hours. If this factor was truly important, we’d certainly know the limits. When it comes to mileage, for example, we can easily say that 200,000 miles count as high mileage. But we don’t have similar measurements for motor hours.

Moreover, exact motor hours are difficult to measure. Even a tachometer gauge doesn’t reveal how long the engine has been running. Yes, you can use the engine hours to miles calculator and evaluate those numbers, yet you won’t be able to get accurate results.

Consequently, motor hours don’t reflect how abused a vehicle is. Mileage is a more reliable source of information in that case.

Why do people use engine hours to miles calculator?

Some people convert engine hours to miles religiously as they believe that it affects the resale value of the car. They check those numbers and try to lower them manually. However, reducing the motor hours is impossible, even with various tools and modules.

As mentioned above, motor hours don’t affect the value of the car. You won’t find a single customer who will ask you how long your engine has been running. But almost every customer will ask questions about the mileage and examine the condition of the car.

Can mileage blocker stop recording motor hours?

Mileage blocker can’t stop recording motor hours and none of the existing modules can. Since those numbers don’t make any difference, this module concentrates on a different purpose. It aims to help you test the performance of the engine.

You could try converting engine hours to miles, but it’s more efficient to spend that time with a km stopper. It’s software that stops recording mileage in every control unit. It operates perfectly regardless of the type of vehicle. In other words, it works with Diesel, Hybrid, Plug-in-Hybrid, and Electric cars. You can get further support and service if you need it after purchasing the module. 

It’s important to remember that manufacturers designed the mileage blocker only for testing purposes. However, people still use it unethically. They install this computer and activate it while driving. Since it doesn’t leave any trace, certain sellers get the chance to lie about the actual mileage. Such usage is never recommended.

Final Takeaway

Currently, nobody uses engine hours to determine the condition of the car. Other factors, such as mileage, history, and condition can reveal more accurate information. It’s better to rely on those parameters while choosing your next vehicle.