calgranoff

Just bought the 2.0 Premium Plus model, and all the documentation talks about "automatic climate control", and there is an actual temperature setting for each side. However, it appears that it isn't really automatic; you have to manually engage the air conditioning or it only blows uncooled air.

I'm assuming I missed something in the documentation that discusses this, but in any event it's very dissatisfying; either the A/C is on all the time, including heating, or I have to engage it manually as necessary.

Is this what is supposed to happen?

ex-quattro PETE

What you describe sounds about right.

When you press the "Auto" button, the A/C button should light up. And in this case, the car will use A/C because the A/C has two functions: cooling and dehumidifying. Even if it's not cooling, you still want it to dehumidify so that your windows don't fog up. Also, when it's really cold outside, the A/C will automatically turn itself off to protect the compressor.

The A/C button is there so that you can manually override the system and shut off the compressor.

Auto climate control systems of other manufacturers (MB, BMW) work the same.

calgranoff

Thanks; I guess I'm not used to it, as my old A6 doesn't need anything more than the Auto button; I'm not even sure there is an option to turn off the AC, other than the Econ mode.

It's not a huge deal, but (for me) makes the "automatic" in climate control somewhat confusing.

idale

With the automatic climate control, it's not so much that A/C is "on" or "off", but "allowed" or "disallowed". For the climate system to do everything it needs to do, you need to allow it to run the A/C when it needs to. If you don't want the A/C to be able to run then you're overriding it and it's no longer truly automatic.

ex-quattro PETE

"Econ" button does exactly the same thing as the AC button - it turns AC off. The only difference was that when "Econ" was lit up, A/C was off. And now when AC button is lit up, A/C is on.

I think Audi decided to rename that button in recent history, possibly because people weren't exactly sure what "Econ" was/did.

stash64

I actually think Audi got it perfect for the Q5. You can run it in Auto with or without AC. I don't like running the AC unless it is absolutely needed, whether it be winter or summer.