How to make your car warmer in winter

By the time winter in Australia comes around, the heating system in your car can be a lifesaver to combat the cold.

RELATED: Why isn’t my car’s heater working?

But is there anything you can do to help your car’s interior cabin warm up faster and more efficiently?

To lend a helping hand during the cooler months, Drive asked the experts to find out how to get your car’s heater operating at an optimum level.  

Let the engine warm up for a minute

Letting the engine warm up is the easiest way to warm up your cabin quickly. Leaving your car’s engine idling for a couple of minutes allows the necessary oils and fluids in the car to circulate properly.

“Unfortunately, there’s no secret formula. The heater will work as quickly as you can get [the engine] to warm up,” Ralph Palmiotto, a local mechanic from Sydney, told Drive.

“The engine’s cooling system runs through the radiator and a little heater inside the car and the cabin. You need to get [the system] warmed up. If you want to take off quickly and get the engine revving, it will warm up quickly but [this method] starts to wear out the engine prematurely.

“It’s always best to warm up the engine before you take off, [this] prolongs the life of the car.”

While older cars need a little bit of time to warm up their engines when you turn them on, modern vehicles and oils only require 30 seconds to a minute of idle time before the car’s system operates at optimum temperature.

“You wouldn’t sit there letting a modern car idle, but you also wouldn’t pin the throttle to the floor while it is still cold. The oil still needs time to circulate the engine,” James Boar, a Bentley and Rolls-Royce mechanic, previously told Drive.

“The only time I would need to warm a [modern] car up is if it has been sitting for a week or longer, just to let the oil circulate.”

Coolant is king, ironically

Despite its name, the coolant in your petrol or diesel-powered car is vital to keeping your heating system operating properly.

In simple terms, once the car’s heater is turned on, the hot coolant (warmed up by the engine) circulates to the heater’s core while the blower fan pumps air through it.

As a result of this process, the hot air that’s accumulated is then passed through the car’s vents, heating up the car’s cabin.

A low coolant level could result in the car’s heater blowing out cold air, and if this happens, it’s best to get it professionally topped up by a mechanic.

“If you get the right levels [of coolant] in there, then yes that formula that’s in the engine will be [at] optimum [level]; this will have [the heater] working properly,” Mr Palmiotto told Drive.

However, not all cars are created equally, and Mr Palmiotto said manufacturers have specific requirements for coolant levels to ensure the vehicle’s system is functioning at the right level.

“The manufacturers spend hundreds and thousands of dollars to research to get [the car] to run at an optimum level,” Mr Palmiotto explained.

“Not every manufacturer is the same, so we’ve got to go through our database [to identify] an X amount of coolant [to put into the car] so the system is right. Check with your local dealer for the specifications of your vehicle.”

As coolant poses an environmental risk, Mr Palmiotto advised getting the coolant professionally flushed and topped up, and avoiding refilling it at home as “it’s illegal to drop it [the coolant] down the drain”.

There’s a recirculation button for a reason

“When you’ve got the recirculation button [on], you’re using the air in the cabin itself. You’re recirculating that [hot air] so that’s getting [the cabin] warm very quickly,” Mr Palmiotto told Drive.

“Compared to increasing the heat in the car’s cabin [by using the recirculation function], it’s a much slower process to get the cold air from the outside into your car and [for the system] to try and warm it up before it pushes it [through the vents].”

The red flags to watch out for

Generally speaking, if your heater isn’t blowing hot air into your cabin within 10 or so minutes, it’s a sign there could be something wrong with the heating system.

“If your heater is not warming up the way it should be it could be a blocked valve, it could be the heater itself or [the engine] could be contaminated with sludge and all sorts of things. That does happen quite regularly,” Mr Palmiotto told Drive.

As previously reported by Drive, if there’s no air or if you cannot hear any air coming from the vents, the blower motor could have been damaged.

If there is a green, red, blue or purple liquid leaking from the car, it could be a sign there’s a fault in the heater’s core.

The post How to make your car warmer in winter appeared first on Drive.

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