Normal HVAC behavior?

[godfodder0901]

I can 100% confirm the seat heaters and ventilated seats work with my HVAC off. That is also how every other vehicle I've owned has worked.

Can you double-check yours?

100% misread the post. I thought he was saying they didn't work without HVAC on...

Sponsored

 

[CommodoreAmiga]

100% misread the post. I thought he was saying they didn't work without HVAC on...

Whew. It happens.

 

[Dark-Fx]

I only noticed this once behaving weird, and it was in the last week. If I leave it set at 72 F I don't think I've noticed it being weird, but I had it set lower and that's when the weird behavior happened.

 

[Ngkgb]

I think everyone may have a magic number and once you find it and set it to auto, it by function halfway decently. Mine seems to be 73.

 

[CommodoreAmiga]

I think everyone may have a magic number and once you find it and set it to auto, it by function halfway decently. Mine seems to be 73.

I haven't found one. Sometimes 70 blows A/C when it's 40 degrees outside and I have to increase to 72 to get some heat. But then it makes me uncomfortable to leave it there so I have to go back down to 70 or 68.

 

[NY_Rob]

I haven't found one. Sometimes 70 blows A/C when it's 40 degrees outside and I have to increase to 72 to get some heat. But then it makes me uncomfortable to leave it there so I have to go back down to 70 or 68.

Unfortunately, mine (VIN 17xxxx) works exactly the same.. it's not very relaxing to have to constantly work the system on longer drives. In our other EV's and ICE vehicle you simply set the system at 68deg and the cabin gets up to 68deg and stays there without any additional driver input.

Rivian could solve this embarrassing issue so easily they probably can't see it... put a dedicated screen icon for "HEAT" and one for "A/C" ... done! Old school easy

 

[NY_Rob]

FWIW- I got my 30 day R1T ownership survey yesterday. Where it asked "what would you change?" my first two items were:
-Fix wonky HVAC behavior (I then outlined the setpoint issue)
-Fix vampire drain range loss of 5-10 mi/day across the fleet

 

[JohnB R1T]

I haven't found one. Sometimes 70 blows A/C when it's 40 degrees outside and I have to increase to 72 to get some heat. But then it makes me uncomfortable to leave it there so I have to go back down to 70 or 68.

I have found that it always blows cold at 70. Like you, 72 is too warm (70 is too warm for heat for me). I've thought of setting the heat to 72, turning Auto off and setting the fans to low, then using the seat coolers.

 

[Dark-Fx]

So I had my truck suddenly start blowing cool air on my lunch break, it was after I turned south into the sun. Most of my driving is east/west during winter and consistently in the dark (or at least not mid day) in the winter time. Maybe that's what other people are experiencing?

 

[elektrode]

I think everyone may have a magic number and once you find it and set it to auto, it by function halfway decently. Mine seems to be 73.

I agree. Let’s say the magic number resides in the range of 68-73.

Problem is, Rivian’s HVAC currently has a mind of its own in the 69-72 range and doesn’t do what every other car’s auto setting does in that range.

72 isn’t 72.

72 is the “blow cold air on the passenger” setting not the “blow slightly less warm air on the passenger than 73” setting.

Also Auto setting now seems to be “make a bunch of unnecessary fan noise” setting.

 

[zefram47]

“The Rivian HVAC system is currently setup to provide resistive heat when the temp is set over 72 degrees. The truck will run the compressor and blow cold air when the temp is set below 66 degrees. Between 66 and 72 degrees, the HVAC will just blow ambient air.”

If this is true, it's the single dumbest thing I've heard in awhile. Why the hell would they have an auto mode and a temperature set point if it wasn't actually going to try and maintain that temperature on its own!?! Might as well just have a mix dial cold-to-hot with no temperature showing like we're in a car from 1990.

 

[zefram47]

Found out today that seat heating and cooling is available when then HVAC is set to off. That’s funny.

Why's that funny? Every vehicle I've been in with seat heat it's independent of the HVAC, as it should be...and especially in an EV. What's more baffling are cheaper EVs that don't include seat heaters as standard equipment.

 

[mroe]

I honestly just want three options:
- COLD (coldest A/C)
- HOT (hottest heat)
- AIR (ambient air)

 

[goldburger]

Why's that funny? Every vehicle I've been in with seat heat it's independent of the HVAC, as it should be...and especially in an EV. What's more baffling are cheaper EVs that don't include seat heaters as standard equipment.

Because i hit it by accident and all of a sudden my ass was hot and I didn’t understand why. This is my first car with heated seats ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[SSteveEV]

I'm not an HVAC specialist but I think the issue they have is balancing efficiency while using a resistive heater. There no low setting on a heater it just cycles on/off, so to have warm vs hot air running the resistive heater would have to be on 100% of the time mixing with cabin/outside air. Whereas in an ICE they can grab as much/little engine heat anytime. Granted, this is an issue for any EV without a heat pump and Tesla still seems able to hold a setpoint so... hopefully they fix that.

As I write this my cabin temp has dropped 7 degrees in 3 minutes while charging and I assume it is also a poorly placed cabin sensor that is overly sensitive. (now another 4* in 2 min) This just has to be the sensor cooling off after the heat was turned off but that is a very quick drop.

If there are any bored people out there, please do the math on how terribly inefficient it would be to plug a space heater into our 120v

Sponsored