Car warms up very slowly

[Krishna_AbKing]

I have 2014 Altima 2.5, with 88k miles. Have had the car since New, and have always babied it. I have changed the engine coolant two times, drain and fill.
I don't drive this car much, 5-6k miles a year.

I live in Boston (cold winters), and over last ~5 year (as far back as I remember), this car warms up very slowly. Takes good 4 miles of local driving in cold weather before I get heat from vents, and coolant to say 180F. My other cars - Camry and Acura MDX, both warm up much quicker.
The coolant temperature gauge is always lil shy of half way (it stays the same at 160F or 200F), always stays lil below the half way.
I use OBD scanner to track CVT and coolant temperature.

BTW car is always garaged, and garage is at 40-45F. I fi leave the car outside, it literally takes forever to warm up.

This is an inconvenience, but there are other symptoms. Because of engine warming up slowly, CVT also warms up slowly.. literally takes 7-8 miles of local driving to get to 100F.

I have done two radiator drain and fills for coolant, over last 2 years and made sure there are no air pockets.. and car is not overheating, so air pockets should not be an issue.
But, to put things in context.. after every drain and fill, I couldn't get the fan's to come on even after 40 mins of idling.

MPG is great, in summer and okay in winter. I am light footed.
On long downhill slopes, with heat running, car engine starts cooling off.. I can see this on OBD scanner, and feel it on the vents.

Car is not overheating
Coolant is not low, and there is no leak.

Questions:
- Is it normal for Altima's to take forever to warm up, as compared to other cars ?
- I know the obvious suspect is thermostat being stuck open, but won't that affect MPG ? on highway drives in winter I am getting over 35 mpg, and 38 mpg in summer.
- I don't want to put in work to replace the the thermostat, for no reason - lets just say I am lazy (especially when it's cold outside)

This car has been super reliable, only thing that has ever gone bad is the front spring broke (rust by snow/salt), so had to replace front strut assemblies.

[VStar650CL]

- Is it normal for Altima's to take forever to warm up, as compared to other cars ?

No.

- I know the obvious suspect is thermostat being stuck open, but won't that affect MPG ? on highway drives in winter I am getting over 35 mpg, and 38 mpg in summer.

Very little, but I think you are seeing some. The 3 mpg spread winter/summer is higher than normal unless you do a lot of 4-down driving. The A/C working hard in summer generally limits the improvement seen from warmer intake air temps. The wife's '13 generally sees that kind of improvement only in spring and fall when the ambient temps are up but the A/C isn't working very hard. In deep summer where the A/C really has to work for a living, we only see about 1 mpg improvement.

[Krishna_AbKing]

Thank you for the inputs VStar.

Here is the data of Engine temperatures from few long drives in winter months, its recorded with OBD scanner/Car Scanner app.

Interestingly looking at them, car is clearly keeping Coolant between 185 and 195F. Looks like thermostat opens at 195F to bring the temp down to 185F, and then closes.

This data seems to be showing that thermostat is opening and closing at the right Temperatures, aka no problem with Thermostat.

What else can be causing Slow heating ? am I missing something.

And I cross checked my mpg history (I have recorded fuel/mpg since car was new).. I get up to 36-37 Cruising on highway in winters and 37-39 in Summers. Mind it, car is primarily seeing short trips/local driving.

[VStar650CL]

If the engine is reaching the right temperature (which it is, "crack" temperature on the 'stat is 180F) and your primary complaint is slow heat from the vents, that sounds like a heater or HVAC problem and not an engine problem. The CVT not getting warm fast is pretty much normal for gen5's, there's a separate thermostat on the beehive which doesn't even start heating until the cylinder head is up to temp. There's no good fix for that, removing the 'stat will help in cold weather but make a mess in hot weather. I'd start by doing a touch-and-feel on the heater hoses. Compare them with the temperature of the Throttle Body hoses, they should be more or less similar. If the heater hoses are much cooler than the TB then chances are you have a blockage or air bubble in the heater loop. If that checks normal, then you may have an issue with the mix door or mix servo in the HVAC box.

[Krishna_AbKing]

Thank you for pointers VStar!