Aux/ rear heating in a beach

MBowers · Feb 12, 2015

Hi my first post and I'm trying to make sense of my new beach it is an ex demo (2014) and I'm really confused if my beach has auxhailary heating in the rear or not as I have only driven it a few times and today after starting and driving about 200yards and then turning the engine off a fan carried on running for about 2 mins and then smoke started to be blown out from under the drivers wheel arch, called vw assist and he said it was my aux heater
Is this normal and how does it work

WelshGas · Feb 12, 2015

Was it cold today, less than 5c? That was the engine coolant heater to help the engine get to temperature fast. Completely automatic function. Nothing to do with the Auxillary Parking Heater that will heat the vehicle when the engine is off. This is standard on the SE and optional on the Beach.
If you have this facility there will be 2 labels on the drivers side door frame , 1 for each heater.

Hotel California · Feb 13, 2015

Welcome ,
Yet again it seems the dealers seem to fail in explaining what featurers the car has , a handover on is not just giving away two sets of keys...
Seems the same questions keep popping up here...
Enjoy the Cali , you will find the answer to many of your questions here on this forum as you see above...

storma63 · Feb 17, 2015

Hi, my Beach has the coolant heater too, (Webasto)... is it possible to operate this without the engine Running? To warm the rear when on a camp site. My vw dealer said it only operates via the climatronic air con ecu, I don't have a remote.... Should it come with one??

Steve.

motacyclist · Feb 17, 2015

Took me a while to suss this out; it only works automatically, when the temp is below 5C. I understand it can be modified to operate via a remote and costs about £800.

storma63 · Feb 17, 2015

thanks for the reply, I looked on the Webasto Web site, they list a few control modules but I was worried it might screw up the vw ecu? My dealer just wanted to sell me an air heater which is about £700.

motacyclist · Feb 17, 2015

If the air heater is the Eberspacher that VW fit it is well worth the £700, I think plenty on here would agree!

storma63 · Feb 17, 2015

I have used Eberspacher heaters in the past, they are good. It just seems odd to have two heaters?

WelshGas · Feb 17, 2015

2 heaters for 2different purposes. The Webasto is a high output water/coolant heater. Uses a lot of diesel and electricity to heat the engine coolant system quickly in very cold weather. Helps engine to get to operating temp quickly reducing engine wear and emissions as well as fuel economy. The Eberpacher is an air heater. Low fuel usage, lower electricity requirements once upto temp, thermostatically controlled to warm the internal passenger space.
If the Webasto was to be used to heat the vehicle when parked up you would be using the fan of the heating system and warming the engine which is not needed so very inefficient for any period of time, also you would end up with a flat starter battery.

motacyclist · Feb 17, 2015

WelshGas said:
The Webasto is a high output water/coolant heater. Uses a lot of diesel and electricity to heat the engine coolant system quickly in very cold weather.

I wonder if the diesel used is taken account of by the computed MPG information? Reason I am wondering because the last few days have been warmer and the MPG figure on my short commute trip (2.5 miles) seems to have improved on my van ... it actually reached 30mpg trip average yesterday by the time I got to work.

storma63 · Feb 17, 2015

Thanks for the explanation WelshGas, it all makes sense now.

Steve.

WelshGas · Feb 18, 2015

Hi motacyclist. I don't think the diesel used for the heaters is measured for the computed mpg, ( I could be wrong ) as I thing the computed mpg uses info from the odometer and fuel pump/injectors for its calculation. It will show on a tank to tank measurement. Your mpg improvement is more likely related to engine warming quicker and hence getting to most efficent state quicker because of the warmer temps.

estresao · Apr 27, 2015

Is was very interesting to me know how the aux heater, the Webasto one, works. Noboy before.was able to explain me that and I was wondering how to use/set/program/whatever the additional heater.

I'm also investigating how to set several timer for the park heater.... an specific thread here http://vwcaliforniaclub.com/threads/beach-auxiliary-parking-heater-programmer.8741/#post-93346