Intermittent cabin heating

[psquare]

On two occasions we now have experienced none or mainly no heating during 30-45 minute journeys and I have booked the car in with my BMW dealer. The first time it happened, there was a problem with a public charger we used (red flashing light on car), which I thought may have had a knock-on effect on my cold journey back home. Stop and immediate start didn't help. I tried preconditioning the cabin on arrival back home, but this also didn't work. I then checked the heating related fuses first, but all looked ok. I then checked all fuses and didn't find any problems.

So I called BMW Mobile Care and they checked the stats the car sent, but couldn't detect any problems from a distance. I was told to switch the car off and leave it off for 20 minutes, with keyfobs placed away from the car, which I did. According to BMW Care, it can take up to 20 minutes for the car's system to fully shut down when the car is locked. This resolved the problem and the heating worked again.

This morning my wife called me and told me the heating wasn't working for the first 30 minutes of her 45 minute journey. Only after whacking the fan to full blast and setting the temperature to the maximum some heat started developing and eventually it fully worked when she arrived at her destination. The cabin precon had actually worked in the morning on its usual off-peak cycle.

I'll report back once the car has been checked by my BMW dealer.

In the meantime: anybody else had similar problems?

 

[louisgrenier]

Three times since a year. And some friends around too. First time, i tried changing from eco pro to comfort. And to Ecopro plus. All different settings of the fan. Putting cold air conditioning and back to heat. No success. The next morning, the heater was working again.

The second time, now being sure that a reboot was able to fix the problem, i removed all the fuses. Put them back. Heater was working again. I still don't know if what i did with the fuses was what had fix it.

Third time, i rebooted the car and it did fix the problem. I had my DVD-in-Motion USB stick with me. So i inserted the stick, waited for the 30 seconds procedure to reboot the car, and bingo the heater was back again.

So it is software related, i am pretty sure. Two times i had the problem was after remotely asking to precondition the car. And not using it at the time i had indicated.

 

[psquare]

interesting. Yes, this does sound similar to our problem.

 

[Brennivin]

This happened to one of our i3's yesterday. No heat during morning commute. During evening commute, check engine light came on when heat was turned on. Stopped at a DCFC and after 10 minutes got a warning message saying "Unable to charge. Note remaining range. Consult service center."

Called BMW Assist and they found out which nearby dealer had a key drop (was after hours). Took it immediately to that dealer and dropped the keys in an overnight box. Will let you know what they say, maybe it'll provide insight for what is happening with yours.

 

[SSi3]

it's happened in my car a couple times... i've read on the FB group that there's a faulty valve on the heater system and its known to BMW.

 

[psquare]

Last week, my local BMW dealer had our i3 in for 2 days to check for any heating related issues, but they couldn't find anything. Only explanation I was given is that it may have been connected to driving in EcoPro mode, which gives you reduced heating performance, but I knew that. I'm sure this wasn't causing the heating cutout on those 2 occasions. However I accepted the car back and promised to try out Comfort mode next time the heating would fail on us, in order to rule out the drive mode as a cause.

Then I had another call from the dealership 2 days ago, asking me to bring the car back in for a software upgrade (it was actually picked up and delivered, incl a replacement i3 for the day, which was nice). Apparently BMW Germany had eventually come back with the advice to upgrade to the latest firmware I001-16-03-501 (March 16), which the car now has.

I shall report back with any observations I make.

 

[Passivate1949]

This is my first post to the forum but i was intrigued by this topic as I have now experienced the heating failing to work on three occasions.

When it first happened, I booked the car in and of course as no fault code was produced, they concluded it must be operator error. Having racked my brains I could not think of what i had done, but having owned the car for a month or so I thought perhaps I had not done something i should have or didn't understand that in certain modes I was supposed to freeze! The BMW tech, with the best intentions, provided me with a video showing the heat output at the vents responding to changing the temperature control on his thermometer. that was great but he then went on to point out how the heating controls work in Eco Pro and pro + which then became a little condescending!

The second time it happened I took the car back, this time I spoke to the star of the video and we agreed that I wasn't a complete idiot but he still could not find a problem, although he took my word for the fact that something was going on (and wasn't the heater!). Subsequently he contacted BMW and they asked some supplementary questions about the circumstances. I have heard nothing since.

Needless to say it happened again three days ago. This time I tried every combination I could think of and eventually ended up putting the electric heated seats on to try and keep warm. The only thing I could think that the three occasions have in common is that each followed charging on a DBT rapid charger at two different motorway services. Upon arriving home I tried the remote pre-conditioning which did not restore matters. However, the following morning I tried again and it responded as usual. Unfortunately, I am back to square one. I will flag it up with the local dealer but i see no point in spending the morning sitting in reception if there is no obvious fault. Shame because otherwise the car is great.

Best regards

Andrew

 

[psquare]

Hi there,

First of all: Welcome to the forum!

As you might guess, we haven't experienced this problem since the last software upgrade (see my previous post in this thread). A few things though:

- Did you have a charging problem (red flashing light) or even a power cut during charging (that's what happened to me on one of those occasions)
- Which drive mode were you in (Comfort, Eco Pro, EcoPro+ - BMW asked me this and I couldn't remember) ?
- did you try and keep the car switched off for ~20mins so it could completely shut down?

 

[Passivate1949]

Hello

I agree when first asked because I wasn't expecting any problems I could not recall the precise status. However, on the third occasion I made a mental note to try a number of different modes. Auto heating, manual, comfort and eco pro drive modes. All had zero effect. The indicators on the controller appeared normal but i steadily froze!

There had been no interruption during charging and as I mentioned I had co-incidentally used two motorway chargers.

When I returned home I left the car for about an hour before trying the remote pre-conditioning. It made no difference, but the following morning all was well. i will go to the dealer in a couple of weeks as I would like them to have a look at the creak from the rear. I will mention the heater again but I am not holding my breath. The firmware was updated about six weeks ago but I am noy sure which version, I just hope and assume that it is the latest version.

I am always slightly skeptical when a major manufacturer suggest that my problem is unique - I think it means they haven't worked out the answer yet.

 

[SSi3]

I too have had occasional no-heat situations over the past year, so I mentioned this to the SA at my first annual service yesterday, they found a fault code and replaced the heater! So it seems to be a known issue to BMW since the part was in stock and according to realoem this part # supersedes an older #.

http://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/sho..._2013_I01_BMW_i_i3&diagId=64_1957#64219363105

 

[Passivate1949]

I have booked the car in for the creaky rear suspension and the cabin heater on 9th May. This will be the third attempt at the heating so I will be interested to see if things have improved this time!