intermittent loss of heat...??

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55jwb

Member
Joined
Jan 10, 2016
Messages
9
my wifes car so I am not driving very regularly, have notice it will preheat as part of the conditioning cycle set but then driving along the heating can just stop completely even with full charge... booked into the dealer but wondered if anyone else experienced or heard of this in case I can give the dealer a steer as to what to look for??

Jason
 
We are also having this problem. This is ironic because I recently complained that I couldn't run the fan without the heat while driving 75 MPH. Preconditioning heats the cabin, and the seat heaters turn on while driving as long as the car isn't in Eco Pro Plus. But with below-freezing outside temperatures, the i3 in Comfort mode, and the thermostat set to 80 the vents were blowing cold air this morning. Is there some setting I missed?

We have the November 2015 software upgrade.
 
Did the air ever heat up? It does take it a moment or two. The BEV will (I think) try to run the heat pump, and if that can't produce enough, turn on the resistance heaters...the REx does not have a heat pump, and will use resistance heaters all of the time, and it might be a bit faster.
 
We both have the REx (per our signatures). The air never heated up this morning over the course of a 27 mile trip. Good thing the car was pre-conditioned. On the trip home this evening the heat worked fine.
 
Never noticed this problem on my REX but then over here I rarely use the cabin heater as opposed to the heated seats.
 
we have a Rex, when it happens, and its not all the time, it is in all modes, comfort, Eco and Eco+

pre-heat conditioning seems to work but then no heat when driving, "sometimes" frustrating as its not logical, I cant pin it to certain outside temp conditions, SOC, modes or method of driving :roll:
 
I suspect you all are experiencing a feature, not a fault. When the i3 launched, I recall BMW's press materials calling out the automatic bi-level climate control. Once the set temperature is reached, the system routes cool air to the dash vents and warm to the floor. The idea being that cooler air in your face keeps you alert while your feet stay warm. If you precondition, the cabin will be at your set temperature when you start off so it's logical that the automatic bi-level feature would come into play immediately. Personally I don't bother with preconditioning since I drive such short distances. I have noted that when temperatures are colder, I get warm air from the dash vents initially then the system will switch to cool. If you don't like the effect, you can switch to manual and force the system to send air only to the floor vents.
 
next time it happens I will check the airflow coming out of the lower vents then... sounds very plausible..

many thanks

Jason
 
Well, this has just happened to me today on the way home from work. No heat, thank whomever, we had a heat wave of -1 but I was still cold. If it had been any other day of -20 I'd have froze.

Just FYI, I always precondition based on departure time and it has always given me a warm cabin with heating all the way home. But this afternoon the departure temp never happened.
 
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