4 ms·

I agree with boycotting subscription looked down cars, but what is the point of remote start? Defrosting?

by rightbyte 10mo ago

celsius1414 10mo ago
Or the opposite: cooling the interior to a survivable temperature.
- deleted 10mo ago
  [deleted]
- tartoran 10mo ago
  It could be for both defrosting and cooling.
petre 10mo ago
Gasing your neighbours and every living beign on a 100ft radius. I can't stand drivers that idle their cars while they're gone doing other stuff. Remote start should totally be a subscription feature, before it gets banned or regulated. Why? Because it's very annoying.
- Thorrez 10mo ago
  Do you live in an area where it snows frequently?
  - triceratops 10mo ago
    Does it clear your driveway of snow? Otherwise I'm not sure why leaving a running vehicle unattended is useful. If the car is too cold when you get in, put a coat on. Too much ice on the windows? Scrape it off.
    - collingreen 10mo ago
      In MY day we walked to school in the snow, uphill both ways! Turn that light off! Just put a coat on! Get off my lawn!
    - ssl-3 10mo ago
      It warms the engine (and thus the interior) while I clear the driveway of snow, and it does this even if the doors are frozen shut because of a layer of ice. By the time I get back to addressing the car itself, the snow and ice is easier to brush or scrape off and the doors might actually open without ripping the handle off (which is something that I've directly experienced twice so far in my days). This all conspires to mean that it makes my life easier. And it's OK if you don't like the feature and take a very dim view of it. It's also OK that some others may find merit in using it. It's all OK.
      - triceratops 10mo ago
        If you have a driveway and no garage, my sympathies. If you have a garage, and your winters are as severe as you say, why not park in the garage? It's better for your car and tires and you won't spend any time or fuel scraping and warming. It's not the feature I dislike. I find the practice of idling a car to warm it wasteful and polluting.
        ssl-3 10mo ago
        Sure. Even better to move to a place where there isn't regularly any winter weather. Perhaps something below the 35th north parallel, and as close to sea level as can be mustered, would be good. Let's all do this. It will be a Great New Beginning for so many people. And thereafter, we'll burn our money polluting the world by running the aircon while we drive instead of burning it to help pre-emptively warm our cars on wintry days.
        triceratops 10mo ago
        Air-conditioning uses less energy than heating. And places where you need air-conditioning also have abundant solar power. If you park your car in your garage you'll burn less fuel and own less stuff (because you can't store it in your garage). I'm telling you an easy way to save time, money, and your own energy (scraping ice) and you're mocking me. That's nice.
        10mo ago
  - petre 10mo ago
    Sure. I start the engine and then proceed to get the snow off and defrost the windows using a broom and a scraper. Good way to adjust yourself to the cold. Remote start won't help much in anything more than 2" of snow because it would take half an hour to defreeze by itself. My wife prefers the garage, though. Still, we don't live in Alberta or Alaska for the car to freeze shut. We had a hybrid replacement Yaris. It's nice but it still turns on the engine when it's cold. I wasn't complaining abut the noise, but the fumes. Diesels are the worst, regardless of CO2 rating, but gas engines produce a lot more CO even if they stink less. There are places where idling is regulated up to 5 minutes. https://www.wandsworth.gov.uk/environment/pollution/air-quality/car-idling/ https://www.wandsworth.gov.uk/environment/pollution/air-qual...
- willio58 10mo ago
  I’ve never heard of remote start being used as a way to idle your car while doing other stuff. It’s most commonly used to defrost a car in the winter without having to get into it and sit in the freezing car while you’re not moving anyway. There’s a time limit on it on my car, I think about 10 minutes or something pretty sane. If you don’t get into your car by then it turns back off automatically.
  - ssl-3 10mo ago
    I once spent two cold nights standing on my head putting an aftermarket remote start system into an old BMW. And sometimes I did use it to keep the car running while doing other stuff. This function was a design intent of the device. It would work like this: Drive to a destination not so far away on a cold wintry day and put transmission in park like usual. Then, push the start button on the remote and turn the ignition switch off. After that: Remove key, get out, lock doors, go do whatever quick errand it was that had us out to begin with, and return to a car that was finally actually warm inside. The engine and accessories would continue running uninterrupted, like nothing ever happened. After returning: Put key in, turn it to "on", select a gear, on to the next destination. Engine stays running the whole time. When I read about this function, I figured I'd never use it. But it did work very well and my then-wife liked it quite a lot. Also if short, cold runs are bad for things like bearing wear and oil contamination, then keeping it running and letting it get up to operating temperature was perhaps a nicer way to treat that old engine than the alternative of never letting it really get warm might have been. (It would time out and turn off after about 10 or 15 minutes. Otherwise, the engine would cease immediately upon touching the brake pedal if the ignition switch wasn't on.)
- SR2Z 10mo ago
  I have a hybrid. If I remote start it, generally the engine doesn't start - and even if it does, it's extremely quiet because it's an Atkinson-cycle model. I have to be within 10 feet of the car to hear it running in a quiet parking garage, let alone on the street. Sure, it sucks when someone idles a diesel outside your house, but new cars are QUIET.
willio58 10mo ago
Most people in my area don’t have garages and we get well below freezing in the winter. Yes we use it for defrosting and getting the car a little warmed up prior to driving to work in the morning.

I agree with boycotting subscription looked down cars, but what is the point of remote start? Defrosting?

celsius1414 10mo ago

Or the opposite: cooling the interior to a survivable temperature.

deleted 10mo ago
[deleted]
tartoran 10mo ago
It could be for both defrosting and cooling.

petre 10mo ago

Gasing your neighbours and every living beign on a 100ft radius. I can't stand drivers that idle their cars while they're gone doing other stuff. Remote start should totally be a subscription feature, before it gets banned or regulated. Why? Because it's very annoying.

Thorrez 10mo ago
Do you live in an area where it snows frequently?
- triceratops 10mo ago
  Does it clear your driveway of snow? Otherwise I'm not sure why leaving a running vehicle unattended is useful. If the car is too cold when you get in, put a coat on. Too much ice on the windows? Scrape it off.
  - collingreen 10mo ago
    In MY day we walked to school in the snow, uphill both ways! Turn that light off! Just put a coat on! Get off my lawn!
  - ssl-3 10mo ago
    It warms the engine (and thus the interior) while I clear the driveway of snow, and it does this even if the doors are frozen shut because of a layer of ice. By the time I get back to addressing the car itself, the snow and ice is easier to brush or scrape off and the doors might actually open without ripping the handle off (which is something that I've directly experienced twice so far in my days). This all conspires to mean that it makes my life easier. And it's OK if you don't like the feature and take a very dim view of it. It's also OK that some others may find merit in using it. It's all OK.
    - triceratops 10mo ago
      If you have a driveway and no garage, my sympathies. If you have a garage, and your winters are as severe as you say, why not park in the garage? It's better for your car and tires and you won't spend any time or fuel scraping and warming. It's not the feature I dislike. I find the practice of idling a car to warm it wasteful and polluting.
      - ssl-3 10mo ago
        Sure. Even better to move to a place where there isn't regularly any winter weather. Perhaps something below the 35th north parallel, and as close to sea level as can be mustered, would be good. Let's all do this. It will be a Great New Beginning for so many people. And thereafter, we'll burn our money polluting the world by running the aircon while we drive instead of burning it to help pre-emptively warm our cars on wintry days.
        triceratops 10mo ago
        Air-conditioning uses less energy than heating. And places where you need air-conditioning also have abundant solar power. If you park your car in your garage you'll burn less fuel and own less stuff (because you can't store it in your garage). I'm telling you an easy way to save time, money, and your own energy (scraping ice) and you're mocking me. That's nice.
        10mo ago
- petre 10mo ago
  Sure. I start the engine and then proceed to get the snow off and defrost the windows using a broom and a scraper. Good way to adjust yourself to the cold. Remote start won't help much in anything more than 2" of snow because it would take half an hour to defreeze by itself. My wife prefers the garage, though. Still, we don't live in Alberta or Alaska for the car to freeze shut. We had a hybrid replacement Yaris. It's nice but it still turns on the engine when it's cold. I wasn't complaining abut the noise, but the fumes. Diesels are the worst, regardless of CO2 rating, but gas engines produce a lot more CO even if they stink less. There are places where idling is regulated up to 5 minutes. https://www.wandsworth.gov.uk/environment/pollution/air-quality/car-idling/ https://www.wandsworth.gov.uk/environment/pollution/air-qual...
willio58 10mo ago
I’ve never heard of remote start being used as a way to idle your car while doing other stuff. It’s most commonly used to defrost a car in the winter without having to get into it and sit in the freezing car while you’re not moving anyway. There’s a time limit on it on my car, I think about 10 minutes or something pretty sane. If you don’t get into your car by then it turns back off automatically.
- ssl-3 10mo ago
  I once spent two cold nights standing on my head putting an aftermarket remote start system into an old BMW. And sometimes I did use it to keep the car running while doing other stuff. This function was a design intent of the device. It would work like this: Drive to a destination not so far away on a cold wintry day and put transmission in park like usual. Then, push the start button on the remote and turn the ignition switch off. After that: Remove key, get out, lock doors, go do whatever quick errand it was that had us out to begin with, and return to a car that was finally actually warm inside. The engine and accessories would continue running uninterrupted, like nothing ever happened. After returning: Put key in, turn it to "on", select a gear, on to the next destination. Engine stays running the whole time. When I read about this function, I figured I'd never use it. But it did work very well and my then-wife liked it quite a lot. Also if short, cold runs are bad for things like bearing wear and oil contamination, then keeping it running and letting it get up to operating temperature was perhaps a nicer way to treat that old engine than the alternative of never letting it really get warm might have been. (It would time out and turn off after about 10 or 15 minutes. Otherwise, the engine would cease immediately upon touching the brake pedal if the ignition switch wasn't on.)
SR2Z 10mo ago
I have a hybrid. If I remote start it, generally the engine doesn't start - and even if it does, it's extremely quiet because it's an Atkinson-cycle model. I have to be within 10 feet of the car to hear it running in a quiet parking garage, let alone on the street. Sure, it sucks when someone idles a diesel outside your house, but new cars are QUIET.

willio58 10mo ago

Most people in my area don’t have garages and we get well below freezing in the winter. Yes we use it for defrosting and getting the car a little warmed up prior to driving to work in the morning.