Subaru Air Conditioning - Stupid Algorithm to Improve Gas Mileage

Jun 05, 2014 3 Replies
R

Our 2011 Outback Premium has the dumbest air conditioning due to a useless effort by Subaru to improve gasoline mileage. The air conditioning runs nominally for the first few minutes then throttles back so the air-conditioning only cools to ~55-60 degrees F. It is not nearly enough to cool the car in warm weather.



I contacted Subaru who acknowledged the A/C methodology but stated there was no way to override this "feature". So when driving the car, you toggle the A/C switch off, then on to reset it and hope it was off long enough to begin cooling again. What a frustrating effort. Now for any trip to hotter locales, we just take our old Acura TL which has a far-better A/C.



By the way, the Limited Outback version A/C works normally as it has climate control.


- Russ in SB



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Y

Just open the windows. ;-)

It doesn't get immensely hot here, but I rarely bother with the air conditioning in my car. Occasionally I briefly use it when first getting in the car if it's been parked in the summer sun for while, but otherwise I always drive with the windows open (even in winter unless it's pouring with rain) and the sunroof open in summer - the car soon cools down, even in fairly slow city traffic.

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D

ACs getting progressively worse over time. Impreza 1993 was blowing ice-cold air within few minutes (was it still on Freon?), Forester 2002 was barely adequate and Forester 2013 simply cannot deal with the heat after being parked in the sun on a > 95F day.

Pretty stupid indeed.

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G

My 2005 Forester has the same trick pulled in the battery charging algorithm. If you run without heater fan or sidelights you pretty soon get a flat battery. (The mpg tests are done with fan and lights off).

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