Kia Soul EV winter weather.

[phillsky]

I don't know if this has been covered before, I could not find the answer i was looking for. I live in the north part of Sweden, about 3 hours south of the arctic circle. So it can be cold here during winter time, most of the time around -15 C (5F). But it dips down to -25 C to -30 C (-13F to -22F), and can stay there for a week or two. Every one up here has some sort of heating system installed to heat the engine, and the inside of the car. I use an electric heating system for my Kia Niro PHEV, works perfectly. I can heat the car at home, and at work. I am now thinking of going full EV, and the Soul is in the running. But from what i have found you will only be able to preheat the car when your plugged in to a charger. That's fine when I am at home, but i can't plug in and charge at work. Well, I can plug in. But it's an 230V 10A outlet, and it's not on all the time. It's one of those things where you set a departure time, and it will turn on depending on the outside temperature. My question is, any of you face the same problem? And what do you do to preheat your car off charge?

 

[notfred]

I'm in Ottawa, Canada and have a similar setup where I can preheat at home with my home charger but we have no charging facilities at all at work. The Soul EV works fine in these conditions, it warms up a lot faster than a car with an ICE, but you do lose range - up to 1/3 on the very coldest days.

 

[phillsky]

Kind of sucks that you can't preheat unless your charging.

 

[CanadianLurker]

I'm in Ottawa, Canada and have a similar setup where I can preheat at home with my home charger but we have no charging facilities at all at work. The Soul EV works fine in these conditions, it warms up a lot faster than a car with an ICE, but you do lose range - up to 1/3 on the very coldest days.

Now that it's getting cold in the morning down here in the GTA I've set up the climate timer to come on 30 minutes before setting off on the daily commute. So far so good, it's pretty cozy having things warmed up prior to leaving.

This morning though, there was some light frosting that was on the windshield and rear window that resisted melting without the aid of turning on the front & the rear defrost functions manually once in the car.

Question - can we also set things up so that either front and/or rear defrost kick in 30 minutes before departure too? Or are we only able to set the timer and the temperature? Manual isn't very clear and I suspect that the answer is no - but I'm hoping there's something I missed that would allow this!

 

[CanadianLurker]

Kind of sucks that you can't preheat unless your charging.

Indeed. I can see it being a big battery drain for somebody like OP, but would be nice to have the option.

I was looking at a M-B GLE 550e and battery permitting it would let the timer pre-heat even if not charged. But it's also a hybrid so you can still start and go even if the pre-heat sucked the battery dry.

Another feature that it has is that it can be set up to fire up the heated seats and the climate control when you remotely unlock it using the key fob. Handy to be able to unlock and begin pre-conditioning as you approach the vehicle, then you can just grab your snow brush/scraper and clean off the vehicle and by the time you're done the heated seats will be toasty warm.

With the Soul EV you'd have to get in and turn it on first in order to get the same result while you clean the car off, and you'd miss that extra time pre-conditioning while you walk up to the vehicle.....wish list items for future...

 

[notfred]

Question - can we also set things up so that either front and/or rear defrost kick in 30 minutes before departure too? Or are we only able to set the timer and the temperature? Manual isn't very clear and I suspect that the answer is no - but I'm hoping there's something I missed that would allow this!

On my 2016 you can set the front defrost - on the screen where you program the temperature and time for preheat there is an icon that looks like the front defrost button that selects it.

No way of setting the rear defrost that I'm aware of.

 

[CanadianLurker]

Question - can we also set things up so that either front and/or rear defrost kick in 30 minutes before departure too? Or are we only able to set the timer and the temperature? Manual isn't very clear and I suspect that the answer is no - but I'm hoping there's something I missed that would allow this!

On my 2016 you can set the front defrost - on the screen where you program the temperature and time for preheat there is an icon that looks like the front defrost button that selects it.

No way of setting the rear defrost that I'm aware of.

Thanks! Will have to take a closer look on the weekend and play around with it some more.

 

[CanadianLurker]

Question - can we also set things up so that either front and/or rear defrost kick in 30 minutes before departure too? Or are we only able to set the timer and the temperature? Manual isn't very clear and I suspect that the answer is no - but I'm hoping there's something I missed that would allow this!

On my 2016 you can set the front defrost - on the screen where you program the temperature and time for preheat there is an icon that looks like the front defrost button that selects it.

No way of setting the rear defrost that I'm aware of.

Thanks! Will have to take a closer look on the weekend and play around with it some more.

Thanks again. Confirmed that the front defrost is indeed there as an option. Can't believe I missed it!