How to heat your car up fastest?
 

Hi all -

Time once again to tap into the collective brain power.

You hop into a completely cold car. It's zero out. You need heat, fast. What do you do?

One option. Leave the temperature controls on the automatic settings you always use, set at 74. The car, when ready to deliver heat, kicks in with the highest blower setting and heats until you get to 74.

Second option. Immediately crank the heat to its highest setting and blast the fan at its highest speed.

Does the second option heat the car faster? Or, does it just make noise and blow cold air on the passengers.

Thanks for listening.

I've heard, but don't know if this is true, that the engine heats up faster if the fan is off. So if this is true, the quickest way would be to turn the fan off, and wait for the engine to warm up first.

My advice is to set your controls to blow all the air at your feet and then turn on the recirculate button. Since the recirculation draws in the air from the floorboards, it'll bring in the warmest air in the car and warm it.

Also, your heater core is basically a mini radiator, so if you run the fan on high it could possibly keep the engine running cooler.

I generally run the fan on low with warm air blowing on the windsheild (the defrost option in most cars). Once the heat starts moving I turn the fan up to high to warm up the winsheild first.

Why?

Because I have chips in my wind sheild and by heating it up slowly there is less chance to the glass being "shocked" and the cracks running. If you just blast the cold glass with hot air you could be asking for trouble.

Get a remote control starter for your car.

Start your car from inside...

Wait...

Run to already warm car...

Back when I still owned my old VW 411, I'd just turn the heat on and within seconds the warm air came blasting out.

The 411 and I think also the model 412 were a little weird; they had a heater that burned gasoline from the tank, then an air-to-air heat exchanger would heat the incoming air with the hot combustion gases.

Not only is being blasted with cold air quite unpleasant, that 0 degree air being blown across the heater core prevents it from warming up as quickly.

My car has the same feature where it doesn't turn the heat on until the engine is warm. I've found that I can get some fairlywarm air if I override it about 30 seconds or so before it would normally turn itself on. And when it's 0 degrees out, every second counts!

Get an electric interior heater. That way when you get into your car it will already be warm. If that is not an option put the fan on low until you feel a bit of heat comming from the heater then increase the fan speed. If you crank the fan it just blows cold air initially so you get a bit of windchill on your body.

The best way to get the engine warm, is to put the car in drive and drive slowly. A light load on the engine will do a much better job of heating up than if you just idle your car. Also if you idle the car you can cause other problems (i.e. fuel dilution of your oil as most cars put extra fuel when cold, moisture from the cold in the engine and exhaust, etc.) once the engine is warm (about 2-3 miles) feel free to turn on the heater. You will find 2-3 mins of the cold will all be gone.

right after starting it, i rest my foot on the gas pedal to rev the engine slightly higher than when idling. similar trick to driving it slowly. (you do waste a little more gas though)

I personally have the fan turned off and rev the engine a little bit to about 1500rpm idling then after about a minute turn on the heat on high with low fan recirculating in and blowing at the feet and windshield and then after i start going for a little bit put the fan higher and blow it out the front vents.

Well it would give you hot air quickly but that's quite a waste of gas...

Passengers really hate being in my car, if they're too cold I hand them a blanket from the backseat, or tell them to grab the sleeping back in the wayback. Unless they're female of course.

Do it the easy way install a block, or lower hose heater, plug it in over night and takes no time for your car to warm up...easier starts too. Save a ton of wear and tear on your engine.

The thermostat won't open until the coolant reaches a certain temperature, so the fan/etc. won't affect that. Once it does, it's just another area for the coolant to flow through and disperse heat. The engine heats up more slowly this way.

Isn't there a thermostat bypass on most cars that allows a portion of the coolant to pass through the heater core before the thermostat reaches sufficient temperature to open?

Depends on the car. Most have an vacuum actuated valved that so when you turn it on warm the valve opens up and the car is supplied with water. If yours does have this, turnint the heat and the fan off will help it warm up faster. It's just the reverse if your cars overheating you should turn on the heat.

On all the cars I've encountered, the thermostat only controls flow through the radiator. Coolant always flows thru the heater core. And I can always feel a little bit of heat through the vents before the engine gets up to operating temperature as well.