Heater does not come on if temperature set to 16

[Hartleaf]

Found something interesting today. Correct me if I have got it wrong.
This morning left home and outside temp was 5centigrade. Set climate control to auto and temp to 16centigrade. No heat from vents and climate control usage soon dropped from 3kw to negligible in a few minutes. About 100 watts I'd say. Kept a nice condensation free interior.
Anyone else seen this behaviour as it seems to me the heater does not come on at 16centigrade setting.

 

[Nubo]

Since you're using centigrade, I'm assuming you're not in the USA, so maybe the cars are different. But mine will definitely throw heat when the cabin temp is below the set point.

That may be key for your example. If the car was stored in a garage, the cabin temp could have been well above ambient. Your body heat contributes some to cabin heating. And any sunshine streaming in can keep the interior warmer than ambient. So the short answer may be that your cabin reached 16C and didn't need heat anymore.

 

[FairwoodRed]

I’ve think I’ve found that when I set my temp to the lowest setting (60f/16c), that my heater does not heat either. I haven’t driven more than a few minutes that way to confirm that it never comes on, but it seems to work that way. Maybe I’ll try that later this winter to be sure.

 

[RegGuheert]

There is some discussion of this topic in an old thread: Is the near zero A/C power consumption trick real?

 

[smkettner]

So it was 41F and you set the heat to 60F for those of us that still measure in feet and slugs.

It sounds fairly normal depending on actual cabin temperature. The heat did come on as you saw 3kW initial draw. Then it tapers off only using the minimum to maintain cabin temperature. LEAF does throttle back energy use fairly efficiently using either the heat or cooling.

 

[Hartleaf]

Car was freezing cold when i observed this behaviour as it is left overnight under porch and outside temp was 5C. So I increased the temperature to 16.5 and heater came on and energy meter shows 3kw usage. Turn down to 16 and it falls to nearly zero . Not sure what is happening as this was not how the climate control worked last winter.

Taking on board the comments, I will do my usual 70 mile commute tomorrow with the cc on at 16C. seems the energy usage meters cannot be trusted. A freezing cold me will report back tomorrow after my fingers have thawed out as the temperature forecast is 6C (43F )

 

[LEAFer]

Hartleaf, where are you located ?

( Suggestion: in your User Control Panel, update your profile. )

 

[smkettner]

Why freeze? Use the preheat timer. Set it to 17 for the return.

 

[Hartleaf]

Can't use preheat on way home as work has no charge points. So just have to put up with the cold.

Did my 72 mile round trip to work. Climate control on all the time, ac off, temp 16c (61f), outside temp 8c (46f) morning and 11c (52f) in evening. Lost the 10th bar 4 miles earlier than usual. Got home with 16 miles range showing instead of the usual 20 miles.

So used 4 miles of range over two hours driving to keep cold fresh air blowing into the car. Trust me it was cold air all the time and no way the inside of the car was anywhere near 16c. What a waste.

But it was fun anyway. Will keep cc off in future as at 55mph enough air is blown in when set to external air to keep windows clear. Reverting back to last winters modification of taping over the footwell vents to keep feet warm.

I wish Nissan would sort this out.

 

[palmermd]

sounds like perhaps the circulation pump is not working. The element heated the water near itself, but because the water was not circulated to the heater box in the cabin you never got any benefit from it. Sounds like its time for a trip to the service center.

 

[stevewa]

My car has always turned off the heat when I set the temperature to the lowest level possible (60F). I consider this a desirable feature as there are times when I do not want the heat to come on. If I want some heat I just bump it up a degree.

 

[GetOffYourGas]

My car has always turned off the heat when I set the temperature to the lowest level possible (60F). I consider this a desirable feature as there are times when I do not want the heat to come on. If I want some heat I just bump it up a degree.

Absolutely not the case for me. I had it set to the lowest yesterday, and noticed that it was pulling darn near 6kW for the climate control :shock:

For reference, it was 38F outside, and the car had been "soaking" in sub-40F temperatures all night.

 

[mynameisjim]

It's 20F outside and my car blows full cold air when set to 60F and heated air when set to 61. Has anyone else seen the same or should I call my dealer?

I'm not sure if anyone will see this but I don't want to start a new thread unless I have to.

 

[kolmstead]

My car behaves the same way. If set to 60F, it will pull 3KW for a couple of minutes, and then it drops to 250-500 Watts and the car gets very cold. If set to 61F, it starts out the same way, but cycles and maintains a comfortable temp all the way to work. It has behaved that way since new, and this is its third winter. I use preheat every winter morning. 27 degrees here this morning.......

-Karl

 

[vrwl]

My issue is similar. We went out tonight for a quick trip into town, round trip 26 miles. It was 42 degrees outside, so I set the CC to 70 degrees. At that setting, the CC energy consumption never rose above ~2kW and essentially, the car was blowing cool air on us. So I bump up the temp setting to 90. At that point, the car finally starts to produce some warm air and the CC energy consumption got up to around 4-5kW. I doubt that the interior of the car was near 70 degrees when we first started out on our trip, so I'm not understanding why we didn't get some warm air being produced at that setting and it wasn't until we cranked it up all the way until we started to feel the warm air blowing.

 

[GetOffYourGas]

Now that I've had more time with the car in the cold, I've noticed something similar. When set to 60F, the air coming out of the vent is cold. If I bump it up to 61F, the air coming out is appropriately warm.

But if you look at the energy display, the heater is pulling lots of power in either case (5-6kW at first, dropping down to 1.5-2kW steady state). :evil:

 

[garygid]

So, the software detects 16 C as a special heater-off temperature.

When using F instead of C, the lowest number is 60 (15.555... C).
Neither of these numbers is 16, so the heater stays on when using F,
but apparently can be turned off when using C?

I will try to remember to change my car to Degrees C, and see
if setting to 15 degrees C will keep the heater off.

If the experiment works, then there is a simple software bug,
which could easily be fixed by Nissan.

 

[planet4ever]

With our Mediterranean climate I haven't experienced this, but I have to wonder. If the energy pie charts are showing CC energy being used, then either they are lying or the heat is going somewhere. Surely the car isn't venting the heat outside to try to warm the earth. :shock: Are you sure this isn't just impatience? Unless you have preheated you will definitely get cold air until the heating element has had time to warm up the half gallon reservoir.

Let's see, 1 calorie will raise 1 ml of water 1°C, right? A kilowatt hour is 860 kilocalories, so to raise half a gallon of water 50°F when applying 2kW should take [mumble, mumble] about four minutes allowing for a bit of loss, if my mental math hasn't failed me.

Ray

 

[September]

It would be terrible if they fixed that, as that is only way to keep ventilation on but without associated heater consumption. In Irish climate that feature makes it possible for me to use LEAF all year for longer distances.

 

[garygid]

Apparently, using C, the setting 16 = heater Off, but settings
17 C (and higher) allow the heater to come on normally.

Using F, if setting 60 = heater Off, then settings 61 and
higher should continue to do defrost of the windscreen.