Climate control

[Babette]

My new second hand car has an auto setting on the heater, which when I use it to heat the car up it still keeps the air conditioner running, What is the point of having icy cold air coming through at the same time as hot air? I can overide this by operating manually, what I cannot understand is why the manufacturer designed the heater to work with the A/C on too.

[drbsparks]

This is a common mistake made by most people. Air Conditioning does what it says on the tin it conditions the air. It isn't always freezing cold, its just that you tend to use it most in the summer when its very hot hence the air is cold. In my car I have my air con on all year round normally set to about 18-20 degrees. In summer the temp outside is around 30 degrees so the air con is cold. In the winter when temps are in the minuses, the air con is warm yet the settings haven't been changed. It might sound a bit of a luxury to keep it on all the while but the temperature is set at a constant rather than a fan heater which can fluctuate. Hope I haven't confused matters

[Babette]

thanks drbsparks, do you happen to know if having it on all year round means that it will have to be regassed more often and how will I know that the gas has run out?

[Hippy]

I have 12 year old car and regassed it once. I am with Dr.Bsparks here, and leave mine at a medium setting all the time. Maybe it should be called "Climate Control". It does re-use air from the inside of the car, and on long trips I open the fresh air vent at the front dash just a fraction to prevent that dozing-off senesation. I know the instructions say that you shouldn't do this and it is wasteful of the air conditioning, and that a certain amount of fresh is always filtered in anyway, but I like to be on the safe side.

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[Hippy]

Sorry, Babette, I forgot to say that you will know that the gas has gone because the air conditioning stops cooling the car in the hot weather. It happened quite suddenly to me and I took it tho the dealer and they fixed it in a day. It was not expensive and there were no parts required. Maybe some little seal or cap had worked loose.

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