VW 2012 Climatic (automatic) climate control in Manual mode adjusts fan speed still.

Darren MB

I just recently got my 2012 Golf Wagon TDI. Its loaded. Nice car. Had 3 TDI's out of 4 VWs total over time.
The one thing that is driving me completely insane though is the Automatic climate controls.
I never use them, I turn them off. I like to have the fan on low all the time so I get a small breeze inmy face when I drive. Keep the AC off and the heat setting to low. If I get too cool I turn up the heat setting slightly.

That being said it seems VW Engineers are getting stupid. For some reason when you turn off the automatic climate control it doesn't turn off the fan speed adjustment completely. almost every time you adjust the tempurature setting the fan speed changes. it goes up 90% of the time, usually to a very high setting. So now when you nudge the temurature setting up 1 degree, and your fan is set to 2 out of 7, it often cranks the fan speed up to 6 or 7 and you get a "hair dryer" effect in your face.

This may seem like a stupid thing to complain about, maybe I'm just getting too anal about it. It is VERY annoying to have to manually change the speed each time back to where you had it. Partially because it's a digital interface, you have to press the button 5 times to turn it from 7 (max) back to 2.

VW Dealer says this is "Intentional Design" (?)
Does anyone agree with me that this fan speed should not change under any scerario when it is set to manual? VW will not admit this is an issue but nobody can explain what the "design" idea is or why it does it. I personally think it is bad quality control testing on the climate control software.

I cannot figure out how any interpretation of "manual" can include something automatically adjusting anything (especailly without any descernable logic, Imean sometimes the fan speed goes up by 1 sometimes it ramps up to 7, and even when you adjust it up 1, down 1 it ends up different)

I'm posting this mainly because if I had known about it I would have ensured I got the manual Climate controls in the car I ordered. I also registered this as an official complaint to VW Canada, though I suspect I will have to deal with it for the next 8-10 years of my life.

Anan1

Darren MB wrote: »

Does anyone agree with me that this fan speed should not change under any scerario when it is set to manual? VW will not admit this is an issue but nobody can explain what the "design" idea is or why it does it.

I do. My car has climate, but with rotary knobs. The fan control has an 'off' position, followed by 'auto', followed by manual adjustment in increments from min to max. Simple & effective.

EPM

In a similar car with the same system it only ever adjusts by one notch when I put it up 3-4 degrees. If I go to one of the extremes (fully hot or cold) it kicks it up a good bit. There may be a way to disconnect the interior ambient sensors possibly? Or swap the controls?

Not a real problem tbh for me as I just leave it in auto.

pajo1981

Why not just close the vents to reduce the amount of air in your face.

Anan1

pajo1981 wrote: »

Why not just close the vents to reduce the amount of air in your face.

That's no easier than turning the fan back down, and it still leaves the fan running faster than the OP wants.

pajo1981

Anan1 wrote: »

That's no easier than turning the fan back down, and it still leaves the fan running faster than the OP wants.

Well assuming there's not a problem with fan noise, partially shutting the vent will allow the OP to run the CC in auto (like it was designed to) and not be bothered by air blowing in his face.

Anan1

pajo1981 wrote: »

Well assuming there's not a problem with fan noise, partially shutting the vent will allow the OP to run the CC in auto (like it was designed to be) and not be bothered by air blowing in his face.

But there will be a problem with fan noise, higher speeds are always louder. Additionally, the OP might want a little air coming from the vents. If it was a used car I might second your advice, but on a new car that would really annoy me.

Darren MB

Anan1 wrote: »

That's no easier than turning the fan back down, and it still leaves the fan running faster than the OP wants.

Exactly, I like a low fan blowing on me, keeps me from feeling closterphobic in traffic plus the fan on the top 2 settings (like most cars) is quite noisy, I really don't ever want to use those settings usless it's a stupid temperature outside just to get the heat down.

VW did call me back to tell me there is no way to change the climate control to the "dial" version without replacing practically everything related to the HVAC system. The older system still uses cables, this version is fully electronic.

I would think this should be considered a software patch/fix, I have found several other people complaining about something similar in other cars, primarily Audi (same Co.) and BMW.

fletch

This does my head in too! I like the fan on speed 1, max 2 and only use the higher speeds for clearing the screen.
Auto also wrecks my head as it also always seems to choose a very fast fan speed. To be honest I wish I hadn't paid the extra for Climatronic, the basic Climatic would have done just fine.

pajo1981

Anyway, the fan should only go up a notch or so when coming to temperature. The OP says it going up to a 'very high setting' when the temp is changed. I would say that this is unusual.

Dardania

maybe it's slightly blocked? perhaps something that should have been removed pre delivery is still here...

The reason it's ramps up so much is because you have a setpoint on the system, and the actual cabin temperature is way off, so a proportional controller kicks in to close the gap. If you set the setpoint to say 21 degrees (a very standard temperature for people to be comfortable in) it'll maintain the temperature with low fan speed thereafter...

Darren MB

pajo1981 wrote: »

Anyway, the fan should only go up a notch or so when coming to temperature. The OP says it going up to a 'very high setting' when the temp is changed. I would say that this is unusual.

Amount change seems random. but usually goes up each time you move the temperature. sometimes only 1 point, sometimes to max sometimes to the middle. but almost never down. So your alwasy having to drop the speed. It also seems to matter if the car is moving or not, seems if your moving it does not adjust as drastically.

Someone obviously spent way too much time trying to anticipate what the fan should be doing based on far too many parameters except the only one that should not have been left out; the "off" switch for the Automatic setting. for the record I have only put ~400 Km on this car and it feels like I've adjusted the fan at least 50 times.

I have had "Automatic" climate controls in the past 3 cars I've owned and all of them turned "off" the automatic control when you turned them off.

pajo1981

Darren MB wrote: »

Amount change seems random. but usually goes up each time you move the temperature. sometimes only 1 point, sometimes to max sometimes to the middle. but almost never down.

Well you'd expect it to go in proportion to the change in temp - to keep the 'time to temp' consistent.

FWIW,. my own car goes up about a notch for every 3 degree of difference dialed in.

Darren MB

Dardania wrote: »

maybe it's slightly blocked? perhaps something that should have been removed pre delivery is still here...

The reason it's ramps up so much is because you have a setpoint on the system, and the actual cabin temperature is way off, so a proportional controller kicks in to close the gap. If you set the setpoint to say 21 degrees (a very standard temperature for people to be comfortable in) it'll maintain the temperature with low fan speed thereafter...

I agree with you 100% IF the system was set to automatically manage the climate. But it's not. it's set to Manual control. I just want the outside air comming into the car without any A/C or heating at a low speed. I think the controller logic is dead on except they missed this off switch in the programming.

Dardania

Darren MB wrote: »

I agree with you 100% IF the system was set to automatically manage the climate. But it's not. it's set to Manual control. I just want the outside air comming into the car without any A/C or heating at a low speed. I think the controller logic is dead on except they missed this off switch in the programming.

Ah, I didn't read your post correctly. First time that's happened in boards history

You should be able to set a constant air volume... I wonder did they program it that the vents would output a particular temperature of air in manual mode (rather than modulating air speed & temperature to meet a setpoint in auto mode) and when the vents are outputting a set temperature the fan speed is linked to that temperature? Or is it that when you change the setpoint in manual mode, it pushes it back to auto mode (and so tries to track the setpoint proportionally)

As pajo1981 mentions - the time to temp (I think the term in system interval? Trying to remember my control & automation classes...) might be quite short...

Dardania

By The Way, I think the Renault Laguna 3 climate interface seems the best to achieve what you want:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/amcgore/2739241880/

You can modulate the rate at which it meets the setpoint through the soft & fast buttons, whilst in auto mode. That would be the best of both worlds.

The reality is that in a car, drivers don't care whether the cabin is 20 degrees or 21 degrees - all they care is whether it is too hot or too cold, and that they have fresh air...