Recommend a diesel cars with auxiliary heaters?

[delcbr]

Thinking about getting a comfy quiet diesel for 50mile per day commute and remembered having diesels before how long it took to get warm air through the air vents during winter Approx twice as long as petrol. I changed the thermostat myself thinking that was the issue but made no difference. Diesels being more efficient than petrol produce less heat.

The rover 75 diesel had these as standard it’s a diesel heater and came on below 5 degrees.

Any suggestions on what cars have these auxiliary heaters to heat the cooling system up quicker?
Car is only for commute so cheaper the better.

[Davie]

Cheap (£70) Chinese diesel heater from eBay connected up in the boot? Plenty fitted into vans / tractors etc so no reason you couldn't fit one in the boot of a car? Bit of a bodge, but cheaper than buying something with an auxiliary heater.

[Uncle Meat]

My old X5 (E53 2004) had a Webasto installed. I remember a bit coding was required to get it to appear in the menu but was brilliant.

More recently my last X5M (2017) had one too but that was a very rare option unlike the E53 where I think they all had them (just not switchable on the idrive without fiddling!).

[Decky_Q]

S class and range rover have them available as factory fit options.

[Robertb]

I seem to recall reading somewhere my Mercedes CLS 350d has electric heating assistance after cold start. It seems to produce warm air just as quickly as a petrol car.

[Wills2]

I've never noticed this issue on a modern diesel, they've all blow warm air pretty quickly no different to a petrol, the auxiliary heaters were/are popular in the snow belt of North America but we don't see weather like that.

[Tomo1971]

I had a 2018 Audi A6 S-line on lease (2.0 TDI Ultra) and that had an aux heater - I always assumed that modern emissions standards required that the engine was as hot as quick as possible so any re-use of heat was pumped back into the engine for a long time, hence why the Aux heater was needed in the meantime.

[budgie smuggler]

Wills2 said:

I've never noticed this issue on a modern diesel, they've all blow warm air pretty quickly no different to a petrol, the auxiliary heaters were/are popular in the snow belt of North America but we don't see weather like that.

Maybe they had aux heaters built in? I had a new 18 plate focus with the 1.5 ecoblue diesel. In winter it took more than 10 minutes to get warm air, whereas my petrol cars give pretty hot air in probably 1-2 minutes.

[ZX10R NIN]

delcbr said:

Thinking about getting a comfy quiet diesel for 50mile per day commute and remembered having diesels before how long it took to get warm air through the air vents during winter Approx twice as long as petrol. I changed the thermostat myself thinking that was the issue but made no difference. Diesels being more efficient than petrol produce less heat.

The rover 75 diesel had these as standard it’s a diesel heater and came on below 5 degrees.

Any suggestions on what cars have these auxiliary heaters to heat the cooling system up quicker?
Car is only for commute so cheaper the better.

Modern diesels will have warm air blowing within minutes.

[Deviation]

My G20 320d got warm very quickly :-)

[larrylamb11]

A Jag XJ tdvi would be a very comfy and fuel efficient place for that kind of commute and they have a diesel heater that comes on under 5 degrees.

[Wills2]

budgie smuggler said:

Wills2 said:

I've never noticed this issue on a modern diesel, they've all blow warm air pretty quickly no different to a petrol, the auxiliary heaters were/are popular in the snow belt of North America but we don't see weather like that.

Maybe they had aux heaters built in? I had a new 18 plate focus with the 1.5 ecoblue diesel. In winter it took more than 10 minutes to get warm air, whereas my petrol cars give pretty hot air in probably 1-2 minutes.

Not the type I'm referencing which are separate diesel heaters that you could operate separately to the engine, webasto used to do after market ones, BMW and others used to offer them as factory fit options which is handy if you live places like Canada.

My 7 series would be toasty in no time in UK temps maybe they have some electrical assistance perhaps, I know they have active grilles that are kept closed to help the engine warm up quicker, my e class cabriolet warms up quickly as well that has an air scarf that blows warm air on your neck takes a few mins

Edited by Wills2 on Friday 22 November 18:28

[schedoni]

delcbr said:

Thinking about getting a comfy quiet diesel for 50mile per day commute and remembered having diesels before how long it took to get warm air through the air vents during winter Approx twice as long as petrol. I changed the thermostat myself thinking that was the issue but made no difference. Diesels being more efficient than petrol produce less heat.

The rover 75 diesel had these as standard it’s a diesel heater and came on below 5 degrees.

Any suggestions on what cars have these auxiliary heaters to heat the cooling system up quicker?
Car is only for commute so cheaper the better.

When you say cheap. What’s your budget and what are you driving now?

Presumably you have off street parking in order to be considering an auxillary heater?

[gregpot2000]

Pretty sure these have been standard in modern diesels for years now,

My last cars have been:

2008, 2013, and 2016 Audi A4s (B8, B8.5, B9) and they all had this feature, hot air was blowing in exactly 4minutes. You could even see when it was on in the efficiency menus

I've just bought a diesel 2021 E Class, and this is even quicker I notice warm air after a couple of minutes.

It could even be that the addition of the extra help in the diesels makes them warm up quicker than petrols!


As always though on these heaters, there's always confusion the the two types of Aux heater! There's the the standard one equipped to most diesels, where the ECU turns it on automatically until the coolant is warm, but it wouldn't work with the engine off. Then there is the type which was usually a factory option in much colder climates, these often have their own remote control and allow pre-heating on timers, even with the engine off, similar to what electric cars now have.

Thanks

Thanks

Edited by gregpot2000 on Friday 22 November 20:37

[delcbr]

Thanks for all the comments I didn’t realise modern diesels don’t suffer with taking ages to warm up anymore and that they are likely using a an electric heating element in the cooling system as opposed to using a fuel burning heater such as the factory fitted Webasto that are standard figment on the rover 75 diesel.
It seems the German cars have no problem in heating up in no time.

[delcbr]

schedoni said:

When you say cheap. What’s your budget and what are you driving now?

Presumably you have off street parking in order to be considering an auxillary heater?

I have a 1.0 corsa which is cheap to run and easy to repair and very reliable but fed up driving it 50 miles per day looking for something comfy that returns decent mpg and not too much road tax.

Some diesel cars have the auxiliary heater as standard equipment it’s job is to heat the cooling system upon starting the engine thus bringing in hot air to help defrost windows etc

The rover 75 doesn’t require offstreet parking to function.
https://youtu.be/oewED2JldjU?si=4eczpSq1oRowfdYZ

I don’t want to spend over 5k it’s just for commuting.

[Alex Z]

My Fiat Bravo 1.6JTD Eco used to take an age to warm up in the middle of winter so I just blanked of a couple of the lower radiator grills with bits of foam underlay cut to size and cable tied in place. It was so much better afterwards.

[schedoni]

delcbr said:

schedoni said:

When you say cheap. What’s your budget and what are you driving now?

Presumably you have off street parking in order to be considering an auxillary heater?

I have a 1.0 corsa which is cheap to run and easy to repair and very reliable but fed up driving it 50 miles per day looking for something comfy that returns decent mpg and not too much road tax.

Some diesel cars have the auxiliary heater as standard equipment it’s job is to heat the cooling system upon starting the engine thus bringing in hot air to help defrost windows etc

The rover 75 doesn’t require offstreet parking to function.


I don’t want to spend over 5k it’s just for commuting.

Fair enough, for 5K you’re probably best off with a diesel as you say.

[OldGermanHeaps]

I added a £72 chinese diesel heater under my seat. Remote control for it works from my bedroom. As soon as i wake up, click the button and the thing is defrosted and toasty by the time i have had my coffee.
Pretty much all the cars I have seen in the uk with factory eberspacher/webastos have been thirsty cars, range rovers, x5s merc mls so kind of negates choosing a diesel for economy.

I did see on a forum a while back that someone fitted the thermoplungers from a renault trafic to a diesel golf and rigged up a relay connected to a temperature sensor, that made the heaters function much faster.

Edited by OldGermanHeaps on Friday 22 November 21:20

[delcbr]

Interesting that must be the very device that cars are using

Thermo Plunger is an additional electric heating element that warms up the coolant that passes through the engine and then to the heater core that warms the passenger compartment .

The word thermoplunger derives from the french word thermoplongeur, which means immersion heater. As the name indicates, the device thermoplunger will be immersed in a liquid like oil or water and is used to heat the liquid.