Precondition at Departure vs Activate Comfort Climate

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KiloWatts

Member
Joined
Jul 10, 2014
Messages
18
Not sure if these do different things?

I thought precondition at departure setting preconditions the cabin. When set, it lights up a icon on the temperature setting dial.

Is the activate comfort climate something different? The set departure time instructions are right below it in the climate settings screen.
 
I'm still figuring things out, but I bought an Android tablet to use from home to activate the climate control prior to leaving. I do not leave on a regular schedule, so setting it up in the car doesn't make sense.

One strange thing with activating it from the app is that if the vehicle is already fully charged, it does not appear to turn on the charging circuit to draw power from the mains - rather it takes it from the batteries. This is not as useful as setting a charging time and departure time where it would all be done while still charging, and the batteries not be drained at all. Also, there must be a timer on it, and if you don't get to the car within a certain time after activating it, it can have stopped, letting the cabin return to whatever ambient temperature it is sitting in. Last time I did this, I got waylaid a bit, and when I went out to the car, I could see that it had been running (condensate was on the driveway), but it was no longer cool, and the cabin had warmed back up again.

My car is at the dealership getting a software update, and when I go back, I'll ask them about it, but wonder if anyone else has any insight on this.
 
I can't say for sure since I do not have my car yet, but I was under the impression that "precondition" activates the battery cooling system to ensure optimum battery temperature when you leave. Being at optimum temperature helps to achieve maximum range. The Climate Comfort would just be an air conditioning thing would it not?

In my Volt, GM incorporates what they call "Remote Start". It preconditions the batteries and cools or heats the cabin accordingly. The timeout is 10 minutes. If the car is connected to external power, it draws from it to minimize using the internal battery charge.
 
Precondition works with preset departure times to heat/cool the battery and interior. It's intended to be used when the vehicle is plugged in. I believe it will draw power from the battery initially then recharging will kick in. I've noticed that my car has shown fully charged on the app about an hour before my scheduled departure. But when I got down to the garage after the preconditioning cycle had run, the charge port light was blue again and the app showed 98-99% SOC. And of course the app allows you to remotely trigger a one-off cycle.

Activate Comfort Climate is a feature that allows interior cooling/heating to continue for up to 30 minutes after you have parked. It's roughly equivalent to the Rest function on ICE vehicles except with the i3 cooling can happen also. The i3's climate control system doesn't need the drive engine running in order to function. If you're parking for short periods of time, such as when running errands, it actually might make sense to use the ACC option. Maintaining the cabin temperature for a few minutes probably takes less energy than letting it heat up or cool down and starting over.

It's also really cool, both figuratively and literally, to come out of a store and get into a car that's been sitting in the sun yet is quite comfortable.
 
1. True, charging only starts after 95% SOC (approx.) to increase effiency (hysteres within charger logic). That is reducing range and is not really clever from customer point of view.
2. Please read the Info page in your App. 30min after departure time the function is turned off.
3. That makes sense thus otherwise you would find your car 20h later with batteries empty.


Best Regards,
Dirk
 
I can see a timer on the preconditioning, but if the car is on the EVSE, it could easily modify that timer. While there is a moderately significant draw, say to heat or cool the cabin and condition the batteries, the vehicle could still ask for enough current to offset that being used...IOW, it wouldn't need enough to recharge the batteries, but enough to maintain them at full capacity, and sort of defeats the advertised ability to leave with a full battery.

These functions may get tweaked over time as more miles are accumulated on the fleet in later s/w updates. I just had mine modified with the software update (a/c and CEL, plus who knows what other minor tweaks were in that build), and one thing that showed up was the range estimation - it initially was 20-miles more than I'd seen any other time since I've owned the car. Basically, just drove it home from the dealers, so will have to monitor that for awhile. I've never, to this point, stressed the batteries - my longest trip was about 60-miles R/T
 
I have found some of this terminology confusing. I have "Precondition for departure time" and "activate auxiliary climate control". I read somewhere that Precondition for departure time was to get the battery to the correct temperature, not to warm/cool the car ready for departure time. However, when I recently left the car parked for a week while away travelling, I found that the battery had used 10% of its power over the week, and it seemed the fan/heating had been setting off before the set "departure time". I didn't have "activate auxiliary climate control" ticked, so can't have been that.
Maybe it is necessary to turn the "set departure time`' off before leaving the car, and ensure the car is set to "Charge immediately" only (it was not plugged in over the week, so unrelated to actual charging sessions.
This set up in the BMW i3 seems very ambiguous, and I could not find anything under the topic "auxiliary climate control" in a printed owners manual nor in the iDrive menu.
Any suggestions welcome, otherwise I guess it will be trial and error
 
Selecting "activate auxiliary climate control" enables cabin climatization under scheduled departure times, but a departure schedule must be set for it to work. If 2 or 3 scheduled departure times are missed, the function will deactivate to conserve battery.

Battery preconditioning will also follow this departure time schedule, and will warm the battery prior to departure, but only if the car is plugged in.

If the car is unplugged, the battery will not be warmed, but if aux climate is selected, the cabin will be heated.

Likewise, if the car is plugged in, and a departure time is set, but aux climate is NOT selected, the battery will be preconditioned, but the cabin will not be climatized.

These terms get thrown about and used interchangeably, but BMW uses Climatize / Climatization to refer to the cabin, and Precondition to refer to the battery.
 
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