Why though?

"Spanfeller is a twat" (theaspiringengineer) 01/13/2018 at 12:59 • Filed to: None

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Why would I want to start my car 152m away from it!

it seems like too much

Bman76 (hates WS6 hoods, is on his phone and has 4 burners now) > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:05

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Cold and or heat.

Bman76 (hates WS6 hoods, is on his phone and has 4 burners now) > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:05

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Cold and or heat.

farscythe - makin da cawfee! > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:09

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no idea why you’d want it... but my aunt just got one of those kias.... its a surprisingly nice car

course... she traded in one of these for it.. so im still a lil bit annoyed at her

(she ran the math... apparently its cheaper to lease a new kia than it is to own an aging alfa)

Mercedes Streeter > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:11

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It’s apparently a wonderful thing to have in the winter. Start your car from the office and have it already warm by the time you reach it!

MM54 > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:12

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Why is her fridge wearing socks?

lone_liberal > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:12

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Let’s say it’s 0F and your car is parked in the driveway. It’s a lot nicer to hit your fob to start it and warm it up than to get all bundled up and trudge outside to start it. The distance mostly means that it will work better going through walls.

Neil drives a beetle and a fancy beetle > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:13

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Start it as your bus/train is pulling up to the park and ride lot and your car is starting to get warm when you get to it.

Textured Soy Protein > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:16

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Here in Wisconsin right now it is 6°F (-14°C for you non-MURRICANS).

Spanfeller is a twat > lone_liberal 01/13/2018 at 13:17

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yeah, but 152 meters is a lot, let me put it this way, if you have enough land as such that your room is 500 feet away from your driveway either you’re rich enough to give the car a proper garage were it won’t become as cold, or you can park it closer to the bedroom.

my issue isn’t with the tech itself, its with the capabilities.

Spanfeller is a twat > Mercedes Streeter 01/13/2018 at 13:17

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I get it, but... 500 feet?!?

Spanfeller is a twat > Neil drives a beetle and a fancy beetle 01/13/2018 at 13:18

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I did not think of that...

Spanfeller is a twat > farscythe - makin da cawfee! 01/13/2018 at 13:19

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If I could get a Brera I wouldn’t really be getting a Kia in the first place!

Spanfeller is a twat > Textured Soy Protein 01/13/2018 at 13:20

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I get the tech! I’ve actually used it to cool my jeep from a distance! The issue I have is with the range which seems excessive.

TheRealBicycleBuck > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:22

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My uncle was complaining about having to walk nearly 1/4 of a mile to get to his car. That’s 1,320 feet. He’d love to be able to start his truck from that far away.

lone_liberal > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:23

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I think it’s mostly saying that it’s got a strong enough signal to go through walls, or maybe if you have a detached garage?

farscythe - makin da cawfee! > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:24

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i definitely prefered it over the kia... but as my aunt isnt really a car person i guess i cant give her too much crap for being smart with her money....

(but damnit that brera was nice)

Urambo Tauro > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:25

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Because you live on the top floor of an apartment building?

Tekamul > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:26

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When my coworker leaves, she starts her car in the garage across the street from the window

jimz > Textured Soy Protein 01/13/2018 at 13:27

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which is why I’m glad my truck has one of these.

Spanfeller is a twat > lone_liberal 01/13/2018 at 13:31

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but the disclaimer on the video said that it shouldn’t be used indoors

Spanfeller is a twat > Urambo Tauro 01/13/2018 at 13:33

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but then wouldn’t the car be underground?

I don’t think a car should be left unattended for such a long time (such a large distance) Whenever I use remote start I make sure I can see the car and not to use it for more than 5 minutes, for safety!

Spanfeller is a twat > TheRealBicycleBuck 01/13/2018 at 13:34

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Should a vehicle that is 1300 feet away be left unattended during that time, lets call it 5 to 15 minutes if he’s still chilling by the kitchen drinking coffee?

I might seem a little bit antiquated by this thought but... cars shouldn’t be left unattended and turned on for such long period.

Lawyer_Applegate > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:37

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498.688 feet is rather a lot. Maybe it’s to give the interior time to heat up as you trudge perilously across a wind-swept, slush-strewn mall parking lot.

XJDano > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:37

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Also height + distance. Like an office building.

Urambo Tauro > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:37

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I don’t remember if I saw it on Oppo or somewhere else, but somebody was taking great pleasure in being able to start their car from far away when they looked out the window and saw some yahoo sitting on their fender.

Frenchlicker > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:38

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That is that you shouldn’t use it to start your vehicle if it is indoors. Garages help control the car climate but are far from perfect and people will want to try and start their car inside without thinking about it. That disclaimer is mainly to help with litigation.

Spanfeller is a twat > Urambo Tauro 01/13/2018 at 13:41

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it was me, hehe...

it was street parked... but I followed my rule... of not leaving it unattended for more than 5 minutes...

Spanfeller is a twat > Urambo Tauro 01/13/2018 at 13:42

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plus in reality the car was probably, at most, 50 feet away, not 500!

Spanfeller is a twat > XJDano 01/13/2018 at 13:42

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oh the good old pythagorean theory at work! but then should you really leave a car turned on unattended for such a long time?

Spanfeller is a twat > MM54 01/13/2018 at 13:43

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Why is life?

Such great questions

Urambo Tauro > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:49

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Oh that was you ! Haha, what are the odds. You don’t happen to have a top floor apartment, do you? ’Cause I was just saying that hypothetically. I don’t remember the details, but I sure got a kick out of that story and it’s the first thing that came to mind.

Spanfeller is a twat > Urambo Tauro 01/13/2018 at 13:53

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Yes!  

I don’t have penthouse, and either way buildings don’t tend to be very tall unless you go to Santa Fe or Reforma Ave.

More than anything its about emissions and safety, if the car is too far away you can also not make sure of someone messed with it or if someone is near it. I know I enjoyed messing with the yahoo but it doesn’t make it right! I

TheRealBicycleBuck > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:54

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I know you are young, so I can attribute some of your concerns to a lack of experience. Leaving a car locked and running for 10-15 minutes really is not a big deal. They are made to run for hours and hours at speed without failing. Idling for 10 minutes while some poor working man hikes his way to the parking lot shouldn’t be an issue. Hell, even warming up by idling in the driveway while the occupants prepare to brave the cold isn’t a big deal.

A lady at my office accidentally left her car idling in the parking garage in the summer heat for an entire day. It was no worse for wear.

Any car that can’t idle for half an hour or more without overheating or bursting into flames or whatever shouldn’t be allowed on the road, much less make a long trip. Think about the engine conditions when they are at speed. My car is at 3,000 rpm when cruising at 65 mph and it can do that all day long.

lone_liberal > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 13:58

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That brings up something I’ve been pondering. I see the same disclaimer on garage heaters, but if a garage door is open is it still indoors? After all at that point a wall is gone leaving it open to the elements.

Spanfeller is a twat > lone_liberal 01/13/2018 at 14:00

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but what is the point of the garage as a building if you’re going to leave it open to the elements?

Spanfeller is a twat > TheRealBicycleBuck 01/13/2018 at 14:26

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Yeah, but not all cars are perfect.

My jeep had a check engine light and even then remote start worked... I know the light was for a slightly unplugged sensor, nothing big really, but it still turned on. Imagine if the car had a real fault and the system just kept cranking the car until something bad happened? I see how factory systems might avoid this but what about aftermarket systems?

Additionally it does cause unnecessary wear; leaving a car to heat up slowly at idle is not great because it spends a longer time heating up, it messes with some fluids viscosity and atomization ah, he explains it better . If its a very cold day, running the car 30 seconds before setting off for the cylinder walls to be impregnated in oil is more than enough, then just run it gently until it gets to operating temperature and it will take less time to achieve said temperature thus wear less. If the day is absolutely too cold for that to work, then you really need a block heater!

It is a big waste of gasoline in my perspective, and I understand why someone would want the car to be heated up before they entered but there are other solutions like aux heaters that run on separate batteries ( to the best of my knowledge these are more common in European cars )

AddictedToM3s - Drives a GC > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 15:20

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That kitchen looks like the set of an adult video I’ve seen before. That is all.

Spanfeller is a twat > AddictedToM3s - Drives a GC 01/13/2018 at 15:26

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but does it have socks on the refrigerator?

TheRealBicycleBuck > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 15:36

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It appears that the sky is falling all around you all the time. Do you realize that there are lots of engines that run all the time without a single soul within miles ? How do you think oil and gas is collected after they finish the original well? The engines that run those systems go for weeks or even months without anyone around.

Everything is a compromise. The minuscule risk that my car might burst into flames as it warms up would be well worth it if I have a nice warm car to get into after a 1/4 mile hike in freezing temps. I might have taken your perspective when I was younger, but as I get older, I realize that these things are really, really nice to have. The “wear and tear” on the engine is negligible. So what if it reduces the life of the engine by a few thousand miles/ operating hours ? Most people get rid of their cars long before then. As for the supposed damage to the environment, that’s still up for debate.

Consider this:

The average engine burns 0.6l/hr per liter of displacement while idling (that’s 0.159gal/hr per liter of displacement)

The average Canadian warms their car for 3.7 minutes per day ( source )

What’s the average engine size? Beats me, but we’ll use 3.0l just for the hell of it. Given the above stats, the average idler burns 0.03 gallons of fuel warming their car.

With an average commute of 15 miles, a car getting 22 mpg will burn about 0.68 gallons of fuel getting to work.

So, the amount of fuel burned while warming up the car is approximately 4.4% of the total amount burned from the time the car was started to the time it was turned off.

Four percent? Yeah, that’s within the error bars when making these kinds of rough calculations.

Warming up the car isn’t dangerous and doesn’t cause any significant damage to the engine or the environment, especially when compared to the damage done during normal operation. Getting all riled up over nothing is a waste of time and energy. If I ever move north again, I’ll warm up my car as I see fit and you can freeze your ass off as you see fit.

Problem solved.

Spanfeller is a twat > TheRealBicycleBuck 01/13/2018 at 16:16

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I think perhaps I did not word my comment correctly. The conclusion I wanted to achieve wasn’t that someone should freeze their ass after finishing a 400 m hike, but that aux heaters are better at the job than remote start of the engine when it comes to heating up the cabin because of the avoided risks.

If we were to explain and expand our counterpoints we would arrive at the same conclusion that these risks are small and don’t really put a dent on the life of someone with a frozen ass after a hike. But if you are wanting to design a complex mechanical system, like a car is, wouldn’t it be better to focus on the best mechanism to solve this issue? I know for a fact that people in Europe suffer from cold weather too, but very few European cars have remote start systems, instead they have auxiliary heaters. The results might be quite similar, but dammit if you’re gonna do something do it right from the beginning!

I must add that as I research this, I realize that in many countries in Europe (including most US States, but in the US I think it specifies that the car can be running if the doors are locked? ) its illegal to leave a car unattended with the engine turned on. This is why remote start requires you to keep the doors locked, as to avoid conflicts with the men and women in blue! Perhaps laws in Europe are more strict and engineers had to look at a solution that is, albeit a bit more complex, but also in the end a better design.

I don’t think these waste my time though, we take this subject focusing literally on us sitting and looking at products and figuring out what is wrong with them, basically complain about technicalities that would make a normal human go nuts at how annoying we were!

Because this is a car forum and I am studying to become an engineer; I like focusing on small details that in the grand scheme of things might result minimal but do give gains. The argument isn’t “If something ain’t broke, don’t fix it” its rather “If something works better than something else: use it!”

AddictedToM3s - Drives a GC > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 16:55

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Can’t remember. Although I do know she was not wearing socks.

I will sort through my library to find out...for science of course.

Spanfeller is a twat > AddictedToM3s - Drives a GC 01/13/2018 at 16:59

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it would be hillarious if it was thew same kitchen!

AddictedToM3s - Drives a GC > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 17:10

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Yeah it would. But I could never tell anyone in real life because they’d be more curious how I knew it was an adult movie kitchen than the fact that it’s an adult movie kitchen.

Spanfeller is a twat > AddictedToM3s - Drives a GC 01/13/2018 at 17:18

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that’s why you have the internet....

AddictedToM3s - Drives a GC > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 17:20

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You, sir, make very good points.

Frenchlicker > lone_liberal 01/13/2018 at 17:23

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It would depend on how well you garage holds gases with the door open. Either make a way to guarantee the exhaust gases flow out or pull it out.

FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 18:15

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I would absolutely love this coming out of the big grocery stores here in the summer when it is 100 F our and my car is parked 500 feet away. In the 2-3 minutes it takes me to push a car to the car the A/C system can cool it down quite a bit. I agree with your point about the not being a good idea if you’re indoors and can’t see the car. But if I see it at the other end of a huge parking lot and want to start cooking it off while I walk towards it, knowing I can kill the motor if the car starts smoking or something, I don’t think that’s a very big deal.

Spanfeller is a twat > FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com 01/13/2018 at 18:37

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Responsible usage of remote start right there!

FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 18:42

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Honestly I think it makes more sense for cooling a car than heating it. For heat the engine (or coolant anyway) needs to get up to temp before it does any real warming of the interior and that can take awhile. The A/C can start working almost instantly.

Spanfeller is a twat > FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com 01/13/2018 at 18:55

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I still think that the answer here is aux ventilation.

it’l become more common as cars start shipping with 48v systems for the electric sway bars and the autopilot features that need more current, I think....

Sampsonite24-Earth's Least Likeliest Hero > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 19:16

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I’d love it. Means I’d be able to start my truck from my desk at work. Right now the range is about 10-15 feet

FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 19:34

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If I’m not mistaken there are a few cars out there that have a solar panel on the roof that can run the ventilation systems when the car is off. (Prius and Leaf maybe?)

Spanfeller is a twat > FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com 01/13/2018 at 19:46

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yes, also fisker karma and past gen Audi A8

merged-5876237249235911857-hrw8uc > Spanfeller is a twat 01/13/2018 at 22:50

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Yeah, but the Audi system just runs the blower motor. And it doesn’t seem to make much difference in the heat. Just burns up the blower quicker.

Spanfeller is a twat > merged-5876237249235911857-hrw8uc 01/13/2018 at 23:00

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by keeping air circulating it sort of cheats the green house effect of the glass. Yes, its not as impactful has having the compressor on, but it does dent on the heat of the car in a very efficient way!

merged-5876237249235911857-hrw8uc > Spanfeller is a twat 01/14/2018 at 09:06

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Gotcha. Mine doesn’t get too much exercise as I normally am parked in the garage at home and a parking garage at work, but I’ll have to toggle the system this next summer and see what difference it makes. I really need to get the windows tinted too, that with a sunshade do wonders for interior temps.

I also need to replace my blower motor. It sounds like I have a little bird stuck in my air vents. So yeah, I think that system trashes the blower too. Mine was a Florida car for its first 50k, so no suprise the blower was running a lot over the years.

Jobjoris > FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com 01/14/2018 at 12:31

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There’s other solutions for this than starting the car. I have a block heater/cooler that get’s all in the car (even the oil/coolant in the engine) the right temperature at a scheduled time or 10 minutes after telling it to do so by an app on my phone. Available on every single Volvo. And I can’t imagine it’s just Volvo offering this?