No Heat?

[COACH CHRIS]

As autumn makes its entrance here in the tri-state area, it‘s time to kick on the heat in the early mornings and late evening. The thing is, my heat doesn’t seem to be working past, like, 74º. E-heat doesn’t seem to help (or hurt?) and while the air definitely gets warmer, it seems to peak at “not that warm” (technical term) and stays there.

Has anyone else experienced this? A cursory search didn’t turn up anything actionable and the manual implies it should work as expected.

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[noway]

It seems to be regulating the temperature of the coolant based on outside temperature. It will produce almost no heat with somewhat warm outside temperature (but still enough to heat the cabin), but during cold outside temperature it will allow more heat. Keep in mind that "E-heat" MUST be enabled to have any heating at all!

The heating system does not produce the boiling water temperatures of an ICE vehicle, so it cannot create as hot air as an ICE, but it still will be able to heat the cabin enough. It just will not be able to create the same degree of heat in "HI" mode.

The heating element is 5kW, shared with the battery thermal management. It heats a water coolant loop, it will max out before half way from freezing to boiling water.

 

[COACH CHRIS]

It seems to be regulating the temperature of the coolant based on outside temperature. It will produce almost no heat with somewhat warm outside temperature (but still enough to heat the cabin), but during cold outside temperature it will allow more heat. Keep in mind that "E-heat" MUST be enabled to have any heating at all!

The heating system does not produce the boiling water temperatures of an ICE vehicle, so it cannot create as hot air as an ICE, but it still will be able to heat the cabin enough. It just will not be able to create the same degree of heat in "HI" mode.

The heating element is 5kW, shared with the battery thermal management. It heats a water coolant loop, it will max out before half way from freezing to boiling water.

This makes sense, though I’ll admit to being skeptical as I can’t test higher temps until it gets colder out. Still, the cabin has gotten warm before when I preconditioned once and set it to the warmest setting.

Is there any way to override this?

 

[noway]

In my experience, with temperatures at about freezing, it will produce a lot of heat, but when outside temperature is not far below the requested cabin temperature it will just not want to heat the coolant too much. it has to choose if it need to heat or cool for both the cabin and the battery. It is the same coolant loop that is used for battery cooling and heating. It cannot heat the cabin while cooling the battery unless the battery is hot enough to be used as heater (cooling the battery pack using the cabin air). If it sits around the temperature where it is possible it will probably try to avoid using the heater since it would save a lot of power to just slowly extract heat from the battery pack.

 

[COACH CHRIS]

In my experience, with temperatures at about freezing, it will produce a lot of heat, but when outside temperature is not far below the requested cabin temperature it will just not want to heat the coolant too much. it has to choose if it need to heat or cool for both the cabin and the battery. It is the same coolant loop that is used for battery cooling and heating. It cannot heat the cabin while cooling the battery unless the battery is hot enough to be used as heater (cooling the battery pack using the cabin air). If it sits around the temperature where it is possible it will probably try to avoid using the heater since it would save a lot of power to just slowly extract heat from the battery pack.

This makes a lot of sense. And I suppose is the “price” we pay for not having a heat pump.

Maybe I should find a drive-in freezer or something in a large warehouse to test the system. ?

 

[JSeis]

E-Heat on “1” and 74 degrees is the draftiest excuse for warm I’ve experienced. Oh for excesses of ICE. On the other hand pre-heating the car at WARM means f’ing toasty. Go figure.

 

[Mach-Lee]

As autumn makes its entrance here in the tri-state area, it‘s time to kick on the heat in the early mornings and late evening. The thing is, my heat doesn’t seem to be working past, like, 74º. E-heat doesn’t seem to help (or hurt?) and while the air definitely gets warmer, it seems to peak at “not that warm” (technical term) and stays there.

In my experience, with temperatures at about freezing, it will produce a lot of heat, but when outside temperature is not far below the requested cabin temperature it will just not want to heat the coolant too much. it has to choose if it need to heat or cool for both the cabin and the battery. It is the same coolant loop that is used for battery cooling and heating. It cannot heat the cabin while cooling the battery unless the battery is hot enough to be used as heater (cooling the battery pack using the cabin air). If it sits around the temperature where it is possible it will probably try to avoid using the heater since it would save a lot of power to just slowly extract heat from the battery pack.

Yes, the heater is a positive temperature coefficient (PTC) type which means the heat output will reduce the hotter it gets. It's important to understand this because it won't put out very much heat when it's already warm in the cabin, this is by design. When it is very cold, it will produce more heat to bring the air up to a similar temperature. The system will never produce 140ºF air temps like a ICE vehicle, maybe only 100ºF at best. This is more than enough to heat the cabin though.

74ºF cabin is plenty warm for winter so you shouldn't be concerned. Some owners on the forum have used their Mach-E's in below zero Fahrenheit weather earlier this year and have attested to the heater being sufficient.

The electric heating element heats the coolant going to the cabin heater core, then the leftover heat moves on to the battery. If the battery is warm, that will increase the return coolant temp and the heater won't use as many watts because of the PTC effect. In this way the system is somewhat self-regulating of temperature.

 

[prdude]

As autumn makes its entrance here in the tri-state area, it‘s time to kick on the heat in the early mornings and late evening. The thing is, my heat doesn’t seem to be working past, like, 74º. E-heat doesn’t seem to help (or hurt?) and while the air definitely gets warmer, it seems to peak at “not that warm” (technical term) and stays there.

Has anyone else experienced this? A cursory search didn’t turn up anything actionable and the manual implies it should work as expected.

if you're feeling a bit cold in these autumn temps, you may find using the seat heater gets you comfortable more quickly than using the HVAC system.

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