De-ice the car properly!

Well, I can only speak from decade of personal experience using hot water from my tap. Never ever had a problem in 45 years of driving.

Tim

With electric heating (squirrel cage blower, toaster element), you can have zero thermal mass heating. And you can clear a windshield in around 60 seconds. With a combustion heater, you need isolation between the combustion side and the output side, and the resulting thermal mass takes time to heat up.

And if you've ever ridden in VWs (bug or camper van), you know what combustion heating smells like. I rode in a car once, I was sure we were going to be asphyxiated :-/ There was that much leakage.

Paul

As long as a windshield is bedded in sealant and is not touching any rusty metal framework underneath the windshield, it won't crack. That sealant is amazing stuff, as it handles all the thermal coefficient of expansion and smooths out the stresses.

If a windshield glass rests on a "rusty lump", you can have a windshield failure with only lukewarm water. I've seen that happen with my own eyes. Once you grind down the window frame with an angle grinder, and put fresh paint on, then the sealant bedding, that windshield will be as good as new.

Most "chain store" windshield repair stops, they will not even tell the customer there is rust present, and unless the rust is repaired, the windshield will only crack again. And being slimy bastards, the windshield places know

How did I study this topic ? Why, *five* failed windshields. This is one topic I didn't learn by Googling. This one cost me money.

Paul

There was a design some years ago (never used in a production vehicle AFAIK) that ran the engine very rich on start-up and had an additional spark-plug at the catalytic converter to provide almost immediate heating of the catalyst).

That doesn't seem to stop diesel heaters being fitted for immediate warmth, and to defrost the windscreen.

Perhaps the Australian emission requirements are different.

You do know this is uk.d-i-y?

I have very frequently stayed away from home overnight. Haven't you?

Fine.

You've run into them, or they've run into you?

Quite often when I was working. The van would be parked outdoors in sub-zero temperatures for a couple of hours. Sometimes it rained or snowed. It used to be a regular problem, especially when I was covering Penistone and such places.

Bill

The van does not allow you to rev it's knackers off. I tried this morning.

I can still remember going to my car parked at TV Centre to find it under a few inches of snow. This was at about 2am, I'd been supervising some work which could only be done after closedown.

In the last year, never! ;-)

Of course I may do at some point in the future but with a bit of planning it?s hardly an insuperable problem. Last time I did it I just plugged my car into a 13 amp socket.

I?m not pretending than an EV is a transport solution suitable for everyone yet, but it very definitely is a viable solution for many people. As the battery charging times improve and the charging infrastructure improves that number will increase.

It may never be viable for some folk though.

Tim

"I".

You may well have 'got away with it' for 30 years but I wouldn't do it.

"I".

You may well have 'got away with it' for a decade, but I wouldn't do it.

Last time I was in Finland (which is a while ago) all the cars outside the office were plugged in to stop them freezing up during the day.

An electric engine heater is a standard fitting out there.

Andy

OK, just FTAOD, I promise not to come round and pour tepid water on YOUR car :-)

Fine. Just pointing out that you?re probably being way over cautious.

Tim

So would you rely on de-icer, a scraper and the car heater left on for ages? My diesel car would probably *never* get hot enough to give out warm air for demisting/de-icing if left idling: I have to be driving (eg engine at 1500 rpm or more) for about 5 mins before the temperature needle starts to move and the air feels vaguely warm. I did try once leaving it idling for about

Of course my car may have a faulty thermostat which always sends water through the radiator even when the water is stone cold... But I don't remember the heater warming up till I'd been driving a while even when the car was new. It gets very hot (if I turn the dial up to max) once the car is moving, so it's not just a crap heater. Whereas my petrol-engined cars got hot very quickly even while idling. I put it down to diesels being more efficient that petrols.

I've found that in a hard frost when there's really thick ice, de-icer simply doesn't melt it enough for a scraper to remove it: the scraper just glides over the top of the ice.

Is tepid water more or less of a thermal shock to glass than hot air from the heater?

Hot water is much better. It warms the glass to the point where mist on the inside evaporates more quickly.

Tim

And come to think about it, what about the thermal shock from an electric rear-window heater, or the wires-buried-in-the-front-window heater on some cars eg Fords?

Boiling water, no way. Tepid or hand-hot water - I'd have thought that was less damaging on an icy windscreen than an electrically heated window. I'd go for quantity rather than temperature.

Of course the ideal solution is to keep the car in the garage, but not all of us have a garage - or if we have a garage, it's being used as overflow loft space or it's too narrow to take even a small car ;-) The only time I got my car into the garage at my old house was to keep it secure after the windscreen had shattered due to a botched chip repair by Autoglass - and I had to climb out of the car through the boot!