Monday 4th March 2002

Useful Hot Air

Remote control heater from Kia warms your car before you reach it.

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[IPAddis]

One has to ask why a "value brand" Kia came up with this before the luxury marques.

[shayes]

My 1986 5 series has this option documented in the manual and it is described as operating exactly the same - you can preset the time the heater will come on though rather than by a wireless means.

Unfortunately my car didn't have the option installed :-(

[ap_smith]

I believe this sort of option has been available on cars in colder places like Canada for some years?

You can also start some Canadian cars remotely with the doors locked etc, so that the engine warms and the ice on the car melts before you get in later.

Useful if you live in a silly country where it gets to -30. More useful to sell the car and house, move to a warmer country and buy a softtop

[atg]

An s owner mentioned on another forum how he has fitted a pre-heater to the coolant system. It includes an impellor to circulate the coolant so that (a) your engine is already warmed up when you start it which should reduce engine wear and (b) you get hot air straight away from the blower. Struck me as a bloody good idea on both counts.

[Fatboy]

I've fitted on of those to my girlfriends Renault 5 - it's called a kenlowe Hotstart (www.kenlowe.com) and it's brilliant. I didn't go for the interior heating option, just the engine block heater (mainly coz the R5's battery isn't up to it ), still give lovely hot air right from startup + no starting problems Needs to be plugged into the mains though. As for remote start, a lot of aftermarket alarms have this facility.



>> Edited by Fatboy on Monday 4th March 14:02

[JMGS4]

Sorry to put the dampener on this "new" kit. I had one of these in a 1964 VW bus!!! As usual the far east copying what we all did centuries ago!!! It has been an acessory in Volvo and Saab and VW fo at least 20 years................... Since when did Korea lead the world?

[johnnystorm]

Well good for KIA, their styling, performance and handling departments haven't got off their collective backsides for ages but at least the 'Novelty gadgets' dept are taking some of the pain out of KIA ownership!!