Remote heating in Winter

[dashnine]

First hard frost of the winter with the Formentor, so (remotely using the app) stuck the Air Con on and the Window Heating and 25 minutes later the frost had gone and so had 25% of the hybrid battery charge! OK, so it's 'only' the UK where it was just below zero (Warwickshire, UK), but I'm thinking I started the heating too early, so....

Any recommendations, do I need both the Air Con (to 22°C) AND Window Heating, does Window Heating run for 5 mins or so then turned off (as it was off when I got in the car), do the heated seats and steering wheel come on with the Air Con or Windows?

 

[Peyton]

I don't have a hybrid so I am just guessing but aren't you able to set your departure time and the car will heat it up as appropriate?

 

[CupraOnForm]

I don't have a hybrid so I am just guessing but aren't you able to set your departure time and the car will heat it up as appropriate?

Yes that’s right. You can set a schedule in the app. Also if you are still plugged in from overnight charging, it draws the power from the mains rather than the battery.


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[dashnine]

I don't have a hybrid so I am just guessing but aren't you able to set your departure time and the car will heat it up as appropriate?

You can and I tried it but the only set times I leave the house are a couple of mornings a week, and if you use a programmed departure time and plug the car in to charge the car, it only gets to recharge to 50% - so if you go out before then you have to unplug, go out, return and plug in again.

The car won't charge to 100% with a programmed departure time active as it saves the last 50% to imminently before the departure time - so I'm not doing that.

So the question above was more about ad-hoc air con / window heating rather than departure dependent timing, but both are done from the app.

 

[Ninjakebab]

Charging the car to 100% just before departure actually makes a lot of sense in the winter months, as it will heat up the battery to a more efficient working temp, netting you more miles per charge.

I've been experimenting a bit with heating etc. in the cold. We're having -5°C ish weather in Denmark currently, and this is what I found:

• Pre-heating will not start steering wheel or seat heating, it's just not possible from the app (actually would love the option).
• Aircon on/off makes no significant difference to heating efficiency or battery consumption, only moisture levels and fog on the windows.
• When running the engine, wait until the coolant temps have reached 90°C for a couple minutes, then turn on heating. This avoids using battery for heating (you can display coolant, oil and gearbox temps in one of the dash screens).
• Seat and steering wheel heating combined uses about 0.2 kW of juice. I use only this to get by when driving in pure electric these months, and it's absolutely possible if you're wearing clothes. My range is only 10% shorter than in summer months this way.
• Electric heating eats roughly 2 kW of power in winter, and shortens my range by about 25%-33%! This will vary depending on your speed of course.
• If you can have the car plugged in when departing, absolutely use pre-heating. The battery never drops below 98%, and it will have heated the battery up a bit, for more efficiency as well.
• No data on window heating but you can see what it eats by having the info selected in the dash, and then flicking things on and off and watching the consumption

 

[oldgitdave]

Well I tend to always set a departure time in mine as it's supposed to be kinder to the battery and as Ninjakebab says it will help electric mileage in this colder weather.
I think switching the a/c on etc. via the app only runs for 30 minutes. Now we're getting the frosts I've been selecting a/c and heating the windows about 20 minutes before I leave and it works great, I'm well impressed so far.
I also found my seat was heated when I got in and still switched on at level 2 which is contrary to the above. I had to switch it straight off as it was too hot for me. It didn't switch on the steering heating though. It would be better if the app had options for pre heating the seats separately tbh, my missus wasn't too impressed that the passenger seat heating didn'tcome on.

 

[CupraOnForm]

You can and I tried it but the only set times I leave the house are a couple of mornings a week, and if you use a programmed departure time and plug the car in to charge the car, it only gets to recharge to 50% - so if you go out before then you have to unplug, go out, return and plug in again.

The car won't charge to 100% with a programmed departure time active as it saves the last 50% to imminently before the departure time - so I'm not doing that.

So the question above was more about ad-hoc air con / window heating rather than departure dependent timing, but both are done from the app.

You don’t need to set charging and heating on the departure timer. You can just do heating, which is what I do.


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[Ninjakebab]

...
I also found my seat was heated when I got in and still switched on at level 2 which is contrary to the above. I had to switch it straight off as it was too hot for me. It didn't switch on the steering heating though. It would be better if the app had options for pre heating the seats separately tbh, my missus wasn't too impressed that the passenger seat heating didn'tcome on.

What on earth? I have to make note of this next time as well. Good info!
And you are correct about the 30 minute auto-off

 

[dashnine]

Well I tend to always set a departure time in mine as it's supposed to be kinder to the battery and as Ninjakebab says it will help electric mileage in this colder weather.
I think switching the a/c on etc. via the app only runs for 30 minutes. Now we're getting the frosts I've been selecting a/c and heating the windows about 20 minutes before I leave and it works great, I'm well impressed so far.
I also found my seat was heated when I got in and still switched on at level 2 which is contrary to the above. I had to switch it straight off as it was too hot for me. It didn't switch on the steering heating though. It would be better if the app had options for pre heating the seats separately tbh, my missus wasn't too impressed that the passenger seat heating didn'tcome on.

I think the heated seats and wheel must be coming on with the Heated Windows setting rather than the AirCon Heating via the manual switch on in the app or Departure time.

Hence you can’t turn the seats and wheel on to heat up automatically via Departure time.

 

[oldgitdave]

I think the heated seats and wheel must be coming on with the Heated Windows setting rather than the AirCon Heating via the manual switch on in the app or Departure time.

Hence you can’t turn the seats and wheel on to heat up automatically via Departure time.

Yes agreed. I didn't mean they come on automatically with departure time, and I've found the car is always fully charged aabout 30 minutes before the set departure time anyway.
I simply set the 'a/c' and 'window heating' manually via the app a few minutes before I get into the car. It's still plugged in at this stage and draws energy from the mains and so doesn't deplete the battery at all. Heated steering wheel does not come on with the app 'window heating' switch unfortunately but the drivers seat does.

 

[dashnine]

Heated steering wheel does not come on with the app 'window heating' switch unfortunately but the drivers seat does.

Bizarre, I was sure my wheel did come on yesterday - some testing required!

 

[CupraOnForm]

Bizarre, I was sure my wheel did come on yesterday - some testing required!

I think the wheel heater coming on depends on outside temperature. Mines been coming on by itself during this weeks cold spell.


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[dashnine]

I think the wheel heater coming on depends on outside temperature. Mines been coming on by itself during this weeks cold spell.


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Ahhh, that'd explain it! It's an utterly woeful manual for these sort of things!

 

[CupForm]

This being the first winter with my PHEV, I'm still discovering features and bugs...
Over the past few days I've came upon a problem, and I'm trying to find out if it is a feature or if there's a problem with my car.
Depending on outside temperature and SoC of the car (or whether it's connected or not to a charging station) I sometimes preheat it a few minutes before departure starting the heating from the App.
On few occasions (including today) the car was unreachable via the App, hence I started the heating from inside the car, with the car still being connected to the charging station. In all such cases, the HV-batt was charging, but the heating was not working - it was only blowing cold air...
So to conclude: the preheating always works if I start it from the App (car connected or not to charging station), but there's no heating if the car is connected and I start the heating from the infotainment.
Any advice on this?

p.s. Once I start the car and go my way the heating will gradually do it's job.

 

[CupraOnForm]

This being the first winter with my PHEV, I'm still discovering features and bugs...
Over the past few days I've came upon a problem, and I'm trying to find out if it is a feature or if there's a problem with my car.
Depending on outside temperature and SoC of the car (or whether it's connected or not to a charging station) I sometimes preheat it a few minutes before departure starting the heating from the App.
On few occasions (including today) the car was unreachable via the App, hence I started the heating from inside the car, with the car still being connected to the charging station. In all such cases, the HV-batt was charging, but the heating was not working - it was only blowing cold air...
So to conclude: the preheating always works if I start it from the App (car connected or not to charging station), but there's no heating if the car is connected and I start the heating from the infotainment.
Any advice on this?

p.s. Once I start the car and go my way the heating will gradually do it's job.

I’ve also experienced that too. It seems that it is not possible to pre heat from within the car (or at least I’ve not figured out how to do it either!).
One solution is to use the schedule feature in the app to pre-heat the car for a certain departure alongside your charging. It won’t do this if it is not connected to a charger (I don’t think).


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[CupForm]

Indeed, I know about the departure-time feature in the App, but in my particular case it is not applicable - complicated story...
The parking that I use overnight and where I charge once I get back home at the end of the day, has some charging stations with a very specific setting: the charging session is automatically stopped after 4h from the start, independent of the car's SoC. Since I usually leave home around 7AM, the charging session initiated the previous evening is obviously stopped. I have the option of remotely starting a new charging session (when I wake up in the morning) via the charging mobile App, but in some cases that specific station will be offline (no communication with the server).

This was also the case this morning, therefore I didn't start the car heating since it would have used my battery. Once I got to my car I was able to connect the cable to a different station, the car started charging, but since Cupra Connect was down I couldn't start the heating from outside the car.
Tried to start the heating from the infotainment, and all I got was cold air from outside blown inside the car - and this is not the first time it happens...

 

[CupraOnForm]

Indeed, I know about the departure-time feature in the App, but in my particular case it is not applicable - complicated story...
The parking that I use overnight and where I charge once I get back home at the end of the day, has some charging stations with a very specific setting: the charging session is automatically stopped after 4h from the start, independent of the car's SoC. Since I usually leave home around 7AM, the charging session initiated the previous evening is obviously stopped. I have the option of remotely starting a new charging session (when I wake up in the morning) via the charging mobile App, but in some cases that specific station will be offline (no communication with the server).

This was also the case this morning, therefore I didn't start the car heating since it would have used my battery. Once I got to my car I was able to connect the cable to a different station, the car started charging, but since Cupra Connect was down I couldn't start the heating from outside the car.
Tried to start the heating from the infotainment, and all I got was cold air from outside blown inside the car - and this is not the first time it happens...

Is it possible to delay the charging so it completes in the morning rather than as soon as you plug in? One way to do this is to use the setting in the app where you specify off peak power. So if that is 4 hours before you leave, then it won’t charge until that point and it should do the air conditioning too. Or does it depend on when you plug in?


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[CupForm]

So if that is 4 hours before you leave, then it won’t charge until that point and it should do the air conditioning too. Or does it depend on when you plug in?

Unfortunately it doesn't work like that.
It's 4h since I initiate the session on the charging station. That's either physically from the station itself using my RFID card, or remotely from the charging App.
Which would mean that I should wake up at 3AM and start the charging session from my phone - assuming the App works fine and that particular station (where my cable was plugged the night before) is accessible. As I mentioned above, yesterday morning the station was offline (no internet connection), even though it was online the previous evening when I connected the car

 

[Jones2020]

Does it need to be plugged in for the heating through connect to work

 

[CupForm]

I'm not sure I understand your question...
If you're asking "if the car needs to be connected to a charging station in order to start the heating via the Cupra Connect App",
the answer is NO.
On the PHEV, the heating can be started through the Cupra Connect App (when the App is working ) in both cases: with the car connected to a charger, or not connected. However, when you start the heating using the HV battery, the SoC goes down quite fast.
For example: I start the heating (with the car unplugged) before leaving my office going to the car, outside temp slightly below 0 deg. Celsius. In 5 minutes I get to the car and it already used 5% of the battery, and the seat and steering wheel heating are also ON (automatically). The car is warm enough that I don't need to keep my jacket on, so it's comfy.