Graggs

Hi Guys,
I've had a couple of A6 Avants, both Petrol, the last one a 3.0T .... both these cars seemed to warm up in a reasonable length of time, by warm up I mean the cabin heater started to become effective (in cold weather) after a shortish length of time. My new A7 3.0 BiTDi, on the other hand, is useless! The engine takes about 6 miles to get to full temperature. after 3 miles it's still on 50*C. The cabin heaters don't even start to work until 4 or 5 miles into the journey. Not good, since my commute is 6 miles and it's freezing at the moment!

So, is this normal for the Bi Turbo Derv engine to take so long to warm up?

fkaufman

Mine is the standard 3.0 TDI and yes, it takes about 10 minutes for the temperature to come up to normal. I usually let it idle for 5 minutes or so in cold weather before I get in and drive away.

Graggs

Thanks for the reply @fkaufman ... seems crazy! The poor people in the colder parts of the world!!

Glisse

They do (did in the case of the C7 A7) offer an auxiliary heating system, which was particularly beneficial for the diesels. But not offered in all markets.

These are quite expensive as an option, maybe £1200 or so. So buying all the components and retrofitting could be painful in cost terms. Even then, there may be packaging issues with RHD if it was not offered as an option in any of those markets. Can't think of any other alternatives for a short trip in a cold diesel. Apart from a warm coat and gloves


Source: Audi Germany C7 A6 options (machine translated)

Graggs

Thanks @Glisse ... the heater option makes a lot more sense and based on the cost of this car new - I can't understand why someone wouldn't just go for it!

fkaufman

This brings back memories of the 1960-s VW Beetle gas heater.