Is it safe to assume that all those having some troubles keeping cool have the shade drawn closed....all the time? How hot does the inside of the shade get after sitting in the 100+ sun for awhile? Is that black shade absorbing alot of the heat and passing it into the car's cab?
Under 85F @53% my A/C works fine although I think too loud... cheap car wud a ya gonna do ?.. over 99F @ 74% it never fully cools on my 22+ min commute to the house up and down mild Texas hills, and I loose a noticeable amount of power just as flywithsean describes ...well sort of. In the cool mornings I can cruise up and down our hills in 5th with more or less throttle and keep constant 70+/-. PM heading home... same hills need down shift to 4th just to maintain speed
Some time in next few months, if I happen to be in the dealers area, I will have it checked out... BUT... I am fairly confident the charge and system is working as designed...it blows cold air... but full on afternoon sun on this all glass car is a solar gain problem I doubt even a larger A/C system could keep up with
There are one or more members looking into various ways to shed some of the solar gain... I am leaning toward cardboard same size as inside of glass top covered in Alcoa foil to see If I can take some of the load off the system
does not help that I got a dark color and Black trim
does not help our parking lot has full on sun from 0700 ~ 1700 hrs
Who was that Dallas feller who argued with me on temp rise inside one of these cars.... I am days away from winning a beer I think
Monday was a warm day 98~99ish... 16:45 leave to head home.. OAT on dash sez 98F.... temp gage in wrist watch sez 124F inside car as I back out of my spot..(the wrist watch gizmo is a close +/- 2F most of the time when I ref it against what radio sez)
PS I have one of them super espensive silver n white custom fit windshield thingies...thanks Paul..it works....price sux
OH before i forget.... those of you who want to compare how your's is by OAT temp need to add Humidity info.... 107f @ 23% is a LOT different then 107f @ 85%
Roger that, fred!! Relative humidity is another key factor - the AC expends much of it's cooling capacity wringing moisture out of the air it is trying to cool.
I just got my car cover, partly to see if it can help reduce the A/C load by keeping the interior from getting too hot in the first place. We just went through the high 90s, but it cooled down to the mid 70s. I'll report back when we start hitting 100 again, which, in Sacramento, should be real soon.
would not the performance drop-off just be a factor of extra-hot air being drawn into the intake manifold? on a 107* day i can't imagine how hot the ambient air right on the tarmac is... hot air is going to perform worse than cold air in the intake right?
Alot of cars when you stomp on the accelerator it disengages the A/C so the power is diverted to the engine. So it will blow warm or hot until it kicks back on.
You are correct... the load on the motor from A/C and cabin fan and radiator fan plus high inlet air temp definitely reduces available power...
On one of the trips in the late afternoon (97F temps), I turned off the A/C and still had noticeably less power then morning commute (71F) over same terrain gears rpms.... When I put A/C back on full blow, the power hit was perceivable but not really a heavy drag...you could feel the power hit and see a 50~100 rpm drop before you added some foot feed to compensate
I am still in break in period so I am not personally concerned with much of these anomolies... trany is tight, motor is tight, tires are new and probably could use 2 or 3 more LBS then on the door, A/C compressor is tight.... all these things add up on a 999cc 70ish HP motor
Because of where I have to park ..I think a silvered car cover is in Farnsworth's future
BTW... while it sounds like I am carping about the poor performance of the A/C unit...I have to be fair and say that while it does not pull the tempo down to where I prefer 75~78F it does do a real good job of drying my eyes out and evaporating all sweat off my bod... and so even at 85~87F cabin temp I am fairly comfortable.
The excessive noise on the other hand is a major annoyance while trying to hear the evening news and traffic reports... This sucker sounds like it has more power int he cabin fan then in the engine compartment ...shrug and a grin
on an unrelated note, i've found the evening news, talk radio and other programming sounds a whole lot better on HD Radio (over the air HD, not sat radio).. i put a JVC HD Radio head into my open-top jeep and even with top down the fidelity is much improved, especially for talk-type radio over standard FM or even AM broadcasts. AM sounds like FM, FM sounds like CD.
on an unrelated note, i've found the evening news, talk radio and other programming sounds a whole lot better on HD Radio (over the air HD, not sat radio).. i put a JVC HD Radio head into my open-top jeep and even with top down the fidelity is much improved, especially for talk-type radio over standard FM or even AM broadcasts. AM sounds like FM, FM sounds like CD.
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