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As we have about 1/8th+ of an inch of ice on everything today, I started our vehicles to get the ice somewhat chipped/cleaned off. Our Rav4 thawed out in about third of the time it took my Buick. Has anyone had a vehicle that warmed up very quickly, much quicker than others that they have had? We had a Honda years ago that warmed up really fast, maybe faster than the Rav4. Which vehicle have you had that warmed up the fastest? Which vehicle is the slowest?
The winter package on most Subaru's these days includes a front windshield defroster in the wiper area to get things started quickly and prevents them re-icing while driving. Was a great feature on mine and fastest defrost I encountered.
Slowest was my old Mazda 626 with a bad heater core as a poor college student. Had a plug in electric heater that I would stuff inside my jacket to keep warm.
I don't think there is a lot of data on this, besides the poster above mentioned where a car has special options for cold winters.
Make sure your thermostats are still good because when they fail, they fail open, so instead of your car overheating it'll not likely get up to proper operating temperature when it is cold.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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I have had just about every make, and the ones that seem to be the coldest blooded are Fords. I still have 3 of them, but at least one has to stay outside and it can take 10 minutes before I can see well enough to take off when frosted up. Just this morning it was 27F, and I noticed that I had gone 4 miles before the needle even moved off of C.
My experience is that the smaller cars - all things being equal - warm up the fastest. I had a stickshift Tercel with winter package - heavy-duty battery & rear window defrost. I notice it heated up fast, & because we didn't have a garage - this was in South Bend, IN - I did buy a magnetic oil pan heater. Attach it, plug it in, the car turned over like a charm next morning, & the windshield defrost came on like a champ.
Toyota Camry Hybrid. I can almost bet any other car. Maybe not Prius or Avalon Hybrid. It takes less than a mile to reach full operational temperature. At 35mph.
Car has a PTC heater paired with heater core. it's electrical piezo ceramic heater. It kicks in first, then slowly weans itself away as heater core warms up. Super nice winter time.
Both our 12 Highlander Hybrid and 11 RX350 have additional wiper blade heating elements in the windshield. Turn car on, hit the button, et voila.
Small sports cars with turbos warm up very quickly. My Cayenne warms up really quickly for an SUV, it has their "Cold Weather" package, but I'm not sure what all that entails. All I know is that if the exterior/interior temp get below like 50 degrees, the steering wheel heater comes on and keeps the wheel warm, and the door lock mechanism heats up too. Takes less than two miles to be up to operating temperature.
My side mirrors quickly defrost on my Buick. I could warm my hands on them, but the windshield remains completely iced over for quite some time. We used to have a Nissan Pathfinder and it was very slow to warm up. Would be great if the PTC heaters were used more frequently.
I had an F-150 with a 4.6 that was useless at idle for warming up. 20 minutes and the air was lukewarm and the ice on the windshield barely scathed. Going down the road no heating / defrosting problems at all. All of my older Volvos seem to be quick to get up to operating temps.
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No worries
