by "Takuro Spirit" (takurospirit)
Published 02/03/2017 at 14:00
by "Takuro Spirit" (takurospirit)
Published 02/03/2017 at 14:00
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STARS: 1
Is it just us plebs with old cars, or cheaper new ones that have to freeze in the winter until our coolant comes up to temp? Do more expensive cars... or for that matter ELECTRIC cars have a ceramic heater built in for immediate heat, right away?
I’m too lazy to Google beyond this image search I did, but since my space heater and electric fireplace at home have INSTA-HEAT when first turned on, I was thinking how beneficial it would be to have one in the car, built in, so heat would be IMMEDIATE.
Instead of waiting for the coolant to get warm.
"Junkrat aka Rick Sanchez: Fury Road Edition" (realasabass)
02/03/2017 at 14:06, STARS: 1
That’s what heated seats and steering wheels are for. You could see a secondary electric heater in some cars once 48v electrical systems get more prevalent. A heater like that is probably just a little too much for a 12v system. Some of the old air-cooled VW’s had an in cabin kerosene heater.
"Eric @ opposite-lock.com" (theyrerolling)
02/03/2017 at 14:07, STARS: 0
You wouldn’t want it because you’d need a much beefier battery to provide it. I’m sure electric cars have some form, though, as they do heat the interiors and have batteries that could handle it (at the expense of range).
That said, my newest car starts putting out heat pretty fast as my cars have gone (not instant, and it rarely experiences sub-freezing temperatures, but fast enough that you’re not uncomfortable for more than a couple minutes, tops, while the seat and steering wheel heaters help almost instantly). I’m not sure how it gets heat out of the vents so fast.
"Takuro Spirit" (takurospirit)
02/03/2017 at 14:10, STARS: 0
Well I did mention plebs.... especially plebs in the back seats, as most cars only have heated fronts.
"bhtooefr" (bhtooefr)
02/03/2017 at 14:20, STARS: 0
So, there’s a few strategies for electric heat (beyond things like heated steering wheels and seats) that accelerate cabin warm-up, that automakers use.
Volkswagen has used coolant glow plugs on some diesels, to try to help warm up the coolant, in the past - at least since 1996, but it probably dates back to 1990. They didn’t help much. (The high thermal efficiency of the TDI is why supplementary heat is so necessary.) It took me about 5 miles to get any heat in my old TDI.
Priuses have had a resistive cabin heater since model year 1998, to supplement the engine’s waste heat. On a hybrid, higher average engine thermal efficiency, as well as the engine simply not running part of the time, means there’s less waste heat available, so the resistive heater helps reduce the need to run the engine purely to reheat the coolant. (It sadly doesn’t eliminate it, though, based on my 2016.) And, Gen 3 and 4 Priuses have a heat exchanger in the exhaust, immediately after the cat, to try to harvest some more heat for the cabin. I get acceptable heat within about three miles. (Compare to acceptable heat in a mile in my Miata, freaking inefficient old engine...)
Also, Volkswagen ended up going to resistive cabin heaters on some TDIs starting in 2005.5. (Amusingly, the Touareg V10 TDI actually has a diesel-fired cabin heater... of a model that’s usually used to heat a car in a few minutes before you start the engine, but they just left off the remote control unit, and tie its control to the HVAC system I believe.)
Plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles use a few different strategies to get cabin heating.
The cheapest is a resistive heater, which works in all conditions, but you end up using a lot of energy to get heat that way.
Next up is a heat pump, which can be extremely efficient... but doesn’t work well at all below a certain temperature, meaning you have to supplement it in some conditions. In an electric car, your only option is to also have a full-power resistive heater... but in a plug-in hybrid, you’ve got waste heat from the engine to help with all of this, so you can actually leave off the resistive heater, and just run the engine more if it’s bitterly cold.
"jimz" (jimz)
02/03/2017 at 14:21, STARS: 0
in Ford trucks with the diesel, there’s an optional Rapid Heat auxiliary heater
"Jcarr" (jcarr)
02/03/2017 at 14:25, STARS: 1
I know some VWs that are sold in extreme cold environments (i.e. Canada, etc.) have auxiliary electric heaters that heat the cabin until the engine is up to temp.
http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?t=401449
"vicali" (vicali)
02/03/2017 at 14:34, STARS: 0
Eberspacher!
Because a Type2 won’t just catch fire by itself..
wait.
Actually to be helpful in Northern BC and AB where cars are still expected to start and warm up down below -40C a lot of people actually have ceramic heaters like your pic that are wired up beside the block heater plug. They both get plugged in and run overnight to keep your car happy and toasty.
"crowmolly" (crowmolly)
02/03/2017 at 14:42, STARS: 0
Mine is not an extreme cold car and it has ‘em
"Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)" (rduncan5678)
02/03/2017 at 14:43, STARS: 1
Acceptable heat in the Miata in a mile, liquid lava hell in about ten miles, and literally fire after about a half hour of driving along. Having the top down and still having to turn the heat down because it’s too hot is the best feeling ever.
"Jcarr" (jcarr)
02/03/2017 at 14:53, STARS: 0
Mine didn’t :(
And I live where it routinely gets into the teens below zero in the winter.
"If only EssExTee could be so grossly incandescent" (essextee)
02/03/2017 at 16:09, STARS: 0
By the time heated seats warm up, the main heat has come on already.
"MyJeepGetsStuckInTheSnow" (myjeepgetsstuckinthesnow)
02/03/2017 at 19:05, STARS: 0
I just bought a $23k Jeep with one of these heaters. It is fantastic. I don’t think it is limited to expensive cars but you do have to check the options packages.
With small displacement enigines becoming more popular I think the electric heaters will be more common because there are regulations that govern the minimum amount of time required to clear an icy windshield.