Any way to get air conditioning while charging?

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JSK

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Aug 28, 2013
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4
So I've had the car for a week and this weekend it has been hot up here in the Bay Area. My 3 year old falls asleep in the back seat and I figure I'll park and charge while he sleeps. But for the life of me, I can't seem to get the AC to blow cold while charging. I turn on the accessory functions and it looks like the AC is on and the fan blows but it soon becomes clear that it's not blowing cold. I got the bright idea to turn on the pre climate feature with entune but that didn't work either. Any ideas?
 
My 4 year old daughter does the same thing. I just leave the car on with the AC running - pull into the parking space, set Park and hand brake and don't touch the Power button, leaving it at READY. I've never been so desperate for a charge that I felt I had to plug in at the same time.

We know that some of the high voltage components like the DC/DC converter (produces +12V for accessories and lead acid battery charging) don't get power when the charge cable is connected. The AC compressor also uses high voltage from the traction battery, so it may be the same.

Did you shut down the car completely, start charging, then start the pre-climate?
 
miimura said:
Did you shut down the car completely, start charging, then start the pre-climate?

First I left the car running and tried plugging in. It didn't like that. So I shut down completely (risky because he wakes up when the fan stops blowing!), plugged in,the made sure it started charging, then got back in the car and pressed start until we got back to the fan blowing. I thought that worked until I realized I was sweating about 5 minutes later. So I tried just telling the preclimate to turn on but it said "cannot turn preclimate on. Check your display" or something to that effect. I gave up at that point and just unplugged and turned the car back on. Which was fine. We kept cool that way. But it would be nice to gather some charge if we're parked out in the world! I'm kind of surprised this isn't possible.

Most importantly though...even with all my in and out and fan off and on, he didn't wake up from his nap! :)

miracles never cease.
 
I learned that yesterday installing my leather seat. I just unplugged the car and let the ac run. Too hot to be working inside a car with no ac
 
All right, I'm a sucker. I went down to my garage and tried this. It works.

1. Shut off the car with it set to Charge Immediately and the climate control set with the desired settings.
2. Plug in the charge cable and wait for charging to start.
3. Get in the car and shut all the doors.
4. Open the Entune app on your phone and start Pre-Climate.
5. In a minute or so Pre-Climate will start and the image below will show on the dash.

RAV_Pre_Climate_Dash.jpg


In this mode you cannot turn on the car to listen to the radio or open the door. Pre-Climate will be immediately terminated if you do those things. It is designed to only be used when the car is vacant. There are warnings in the manual not to leave pets or children in the car when Pre-Climate is on. However, if an adult is in the car to monitor the temperature, I don't see the harm.

In my test the AC was definitely working and immediately blowing cold air. I could also hear the AC compressor running.
 
I think that pre-climate only works for 15 minutes, or at least that's what the app says when I've used it. I mainly use it to cool the car off at work before I drive home, so I'm not sure if it's different when the car is plugged in. If I'm home, I usually just get in and start the car before I'm ready to go (so of course the car is unplugged at this point).
 
In the LEAF, with the climate control turned on with the onboard timer (that the Rav4 does not have) or with the telematics (Nissan CarWings is like Toyota Entune), it will run the cabin climate control for 15 minutes unplugged and 2 hours plugged in. I have no idea how long it might work on the Rav4.

I don't think the LEAF has the "door open" issue; I know that I've gotten in the car in the morning with the timed heater still working on a LEAF.

The LEAF must be above about 20% SOC (and about 50% on the Rav4).
 
miimura said:
In this mode you cannot turn on the car to listen to the radio or open the door. Pre-Climate will be immediately terminated if you do those things. It is designed to only be used when the car is vacant. There are warnings in the manual not to leave pets or children in the car when Pre-Climate is on. However, if an adult is in the car to monitor the temperature, I don't see the harm.

In my test the AC was definitely working and immediately blowing cold air. I could also hear the AC compressor running.

So, we need a switch to override the car door signal or some masking tape over the door switch.
 
Miimura - thanks for taking it to the next level. Even if it only lasts 15 minutes, that's better than nothing. I imagine I could reactivate it at that point.

And Tony, thanks for the masking tape idea.

Truth is, I'll probably do what Miimura does - park and forget trying to charge unless it's absolutely necessary. When I posed the question, I was half expecting someone on this forum to have a simple answer that hadn't occurred to me. But clearly it requires a work around and some effort!
 
miimura said:
All right, I'm a sucker. I went down to my garage and tried this. It works.

1. Shut off the car with it set to Charge Immediately and the climate control set with the desired settings.
2. Plug in the charge cable and wait for charging to start.
3. Get in the car and shut all the doors.
4. Open the Entune app on your phone and start Pre-Climate.
5. In a minute or so Pre-Climate will start and the image below will show on the dash.

RAVPre-ClimateDash_zps4a06f206.jpg


In this mode you cannot turn on the car to listen to the radio or open the door. Pre-Climate will be immediately terminated if you do those things. It is designed to only be used when the car is vacant. There are warnings in the manual not to leave pets or children in the car when Pre-Climate is on. However, if an adult is in the car to monitor the temperature, I don't see the harm.

In my test the AC was definitely working and immediately blowing cold air. I could also hear the AC compressor running.

Thank you for such clear and concise instructions. It worked just as you said!

In addition to your great instructions, I would like to post:
1. It works even with the 120V charging cable (EVSE) (not just the Level-2 EVSE)
2. It will power the air conditioning in all modes (AUTO, ECO LO, ECO HI) even with only the 120V EVSE
3. The display on the smart phone will show what the temperature in the vehicle is using a "white band" the the smart phone's temperature display. You can actually see the temperature go down on the smart phone's display each time it updates (appears to update each minute)
4. It appears the maximum Pre-Climate time is 15 minutes. You can start again once the 15 minute period times out

Once again, thanks for the great instructions. I had been very frustrated when I tried to do this on my own and failed to get it to work until I followed your instructions.

I love the idea of cooling the EV down before my afternoon commute using "shore power" instead of the EV's battery. One never knows when a few extra miles will be a life saver. It certainly prevents unnecessary stress on long, close the the range limit, trips.
 
With JdeMO, the car can only charge while "on" so you can have AC or heater or NAV or apps or anything at all you want running while charging. With L2, the car must be off so the other techniques mentioned must be used.

One more nice reason to get the L3 option from QCP!
 
I realize this is an old thread but...

I live in Houston TX. My Entune subscription expired and I am undecided about renewing. $140 a year seems like a lot to remotely manage the charging and climate.

In any case I would like to know if anyone found a way to turn the AC on while charging without the Entune app? I would like to be able to cool the car at times while plugged in.

Thanks,

Todd
 
toddh said:
My Entune subscription expired and I am undecided about renewing. $140 a year seems like a lot to remotely manage the charging and climate.

In any case I would like to know if anyone found a way to turn the AC on while charging without the Entune app? I would like to be able to cool the car at times while plugged in.

I have the same question.
 
It will require frequent button pushing, but you could schedule it on the center screen in the car. That is the only other way to activate the pre-climate function without SafetyConnect and Entune service working. It will only give you one 15 minute climate session per event.
 
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