Automatic Air Conditioning
8 June 2006, 60,006
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he learning process with the 9-3 has started. The TiD isn’t dripping with equipment
but it has a number of features missing from the Ka and Accord. One is Saab’s automatic air
conditioning system, which is Saab’s name for climate control. Almost all climate control systems can be
used as a “set it and forget it” for almost all of the time. You set the temperature and leave it up to
the car. The disadvantage with a system
like this is that sometimes we prefer it warmer, sometimes we prefer it cooler
and of course, it’s tempting to fiddle with it
anyway. Perhaps that’s
just me.
It’s June, it’s hot. During my morning commute to work I would traditionally enjoy some fresh air from the
ventilation system: no heat, no air conditioning,
just air from the vents. The automatic
air conditioning doesn’t do this; first it heats the
interior and then it cools it down. In
the evening, well it punts the air conditioning on so as to
cool the interior.
One
of the most useful aspects about the 9-3’s automatic air
conditioning is how quickly it can cool the interior of the car. It might not sound like much of a benefit,
especially if you have a garage, but if your car sits in sun for nine hours of
the day you notice the difference between those cars
that are hot and those that are not. The
Accord was particularly bad in this respect because its black plastic dashboard
absorbed a lot of heat and radiated it for twenty minutes or more after getting
in. The Ka’s cream coloured interior didn’t radiate heat in quite the same way but stayed warm
for a lot longer.
The Saab has two secret weapons.
One, Saab use heat reflective glass and the second is that the air conditioning system is ruthlessly effective. Most air conditioning systems go into the “effective”
box, they work well enough such that you have no
complaint. A few are inadequate – some
Alfa Romeos and Subarus fit into this category.
And some are just very, very effective, like
the Chrysler / Dodge Neon and as it happens, my new friend, the Saab 9-3.
It’s not that the Saab produces
the coldest of air. Sure, it’s at the necessary temperature, but it’s not as icy cold
as a Neon. It’s
that the ventilation system is very effective at putting the cooling air right
where it needs to go. I’m
led to believe that the heater is just as effective, I’ll find out in four
months time. I don’t
know if the Swedish design their cars around a ventilation system but it
certainly seems that way. If I want to
be kept cold I can certainly make that happen!
It isn’t perfect, though, I’m struggling a
little with the Automatic Air Conditioning.
The 9-3’s system uses at least one sun sensor, mounted in the usual spot
on the dashboard and a cabin temperature sensor. The system has the usual controls, you have full
Auto whereby the air conditioning compressor is engaged (if the temperature is above either 0°C or 13°C, depending on the set up),
or Econ mode, where the compressor is disabled.
Of course you can manually direct the flow of
air, the fan speed and air recirculation or you can have the system do it for
you.
Having spent years controlling the flow of air myself, trusting the car
to know what to do takes some doing.
Like many other cars I’ve driven, the 9-3’s
climate control changes where the air flows depending on what the system is
doing. When it is warming the air, it
diverts the flow of air to the footwell or to the windscreen, depending on the outside and cabin temperature and where the sun is. When dark, warm air is put
to the footwell and cool air to the face, presumably to keep drivers awake at
night!
One of the overrides that you can set it for maximum
heating or cooling.
For maximum cooling, the system puts the fan speed up to maximum,
diverts the air to the face level vents and uses air recirculation. This works very, very well! For maximum heating
the system puts the fan speed up to maximum and varies where the air goes,
typically to a blend of the footwell and windscreen.
During my
summer morning ride to work on those cars with push button manual air
conditioning, I have gotten used to selecting a low fan speed and leaving the
air conditioning system shut down, but letting the car gradually warm up during
the drive to work. Say, if it’s 14°C
outside, if you set the temperature to the usual (somewhere between 19°C and 21°C) and put it in automatic mode (Econ mode or otherwise), the car gets
the temperature up to this level reasonably quickly. But during the drive
it pumps more and more cool air into the car so as to keep the temperature down. It all seems so over the top,
wouldn’t it just be easier to manually set up the system to simply provide air
to the cabin at outside temperature and live with it warming up en route to
work? It seems to overcool the interior. It’s possible that a
sensor isn’t in perfect condition.
Of course, either solution is fine but Saab would have you use the air
conditioning system which allows for a finer control
of the cabin temperature when the air temperature is around 14°C or higher.
On a related note, one of the things that the Accord did well was mask
the change in engine power when the air conditioning compressor cycling in or
out. The only time you’d
feel it is when the engine is at an overrun
condition, or occasionally in the lower gears when trickling around the
city. With the Saab one
does occasionally feel (and hear) the
system cycling in or out, on or off the power, but it’s more a click or a relay
rather than a whirr or hum. Off the
power, yes you do notice when the compressor because you decelerate rather
quicker!
My experience of the 9-3’s Automatic Air Conditioning is comparable to
several other machines I’ve driven that have a similar
system. They work absolutely fine in
warm conditions but it’s during cooler weather when
you notice it can do things you’d rather it didn’t.