Knock when cold is more a tuning issue and has nothing to do with the engine oil. Engine oil and coolant temp does not reflect the heat in the combustion chamber. The closest you can to measuring combustion is through the exhaust gas. If your friends car knocks when cold, that is more of a tuning issue than oil.

During cold starts the ECU will ignore most of the sensors and rely on a fixed fuel mapping. That is part was most probably tuned wrong. Your question should not be "How the hell does one tune a car to run only at a certain temperature range".. it should be "How did they get cold start tuning wrong."