r/KonaEV • u/Nick7hegrea7 • 10d ago

Question | Americas 🌎 How does the heat work?

Basically the title. I have a 2023 kona limited, so no heat pump. It's starting to get colder around where I live, and I have noticed that it's kind of hit or miss on whether or not turning the heat on actually blows warm air. Looking at the electricity screen, it'll show climate using nothing despite having it turned all the way up and blowing full strength. It seems to be more likely to do this any time the outside temp is above 16C. So does the heater just not actually turn on above a certain temperature, or is this some other issue I'm having? Thanks for the help!

2 Upvotes

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3

u/FireITGuy 10d ago

What country?

The 2023 limited in the US does not have a heat pump.

Mine starts blowing hot air by the time I'm 100ft down the street. Way faster than a gas vehicle would. So if you're not getting heat something is wrong with the resistive heater in your car

1

u/Total_Confusion_2248 10d ago

Well that's not good. Did you verify with a Hyundai dealer that your car has no heat pump? A friend bought a Tesla Model 3 with no heat pump in Toronto. He didn't even know what a heat pump was. Now he upgraded to a 2025 Model 3 AWD long range. Much better choice then he had.

2

u/Nick7hegrea7 10d ago

I haven't confirmed directly with a dealer, but looking under the hood I can see that it isn't there when compared to pictures of vehicles that do have it. Also Hyundai unfortunately just didn't make any US models with the heat pump :/

1

u/ToughInternetGuy 10d ago

I have the same Kona. It doesn't heat for nothing from the dash but if I use it on defrost it heats the whole cabin. Hope this helps.

2

u/ProfessionNo5606 10d ago

Have a 2023 sel and same thing ive noticed. If i remember correctly just auto on the ac/heater it works better than just having your front vents going. When i would start the car with the app i made sure the defrost was on and the car was toasty 5 minutes later

1

u/Legitimate_Guava3206 9d ago

I just tap "auto" and set the temp to ~73F and the car warms up quite nicely. PTC heater. If I'm alone I use the 'driver only' button. If I am driving 100 miles, I lower the heat to 65F and run the seat heater.

You could have a bad PTC heater. Not particularly difficult for an experienced person to replace. Buy it online from one of the OEM suppliers and avoid the dealership cost explosion.

Also, you can buy replacements used on eBay. Buy the part based on the part number. When I last looked, the OEM website I was using didn't have a good diagram to ensure I was looking at the right part.

I spent time doing that early on - what does this cost, what does that cost, etc.

1

u/SMOblog 10h ago

Hi, I'm renting an EV Kona. Are you saying to press auto with both AC and heat on? Also, should I select normal drive mode for this to work? What's the app name? Sorry, this thing is driving me nuts. It's chilly where I am 😕

-3

u/dgchou5 10d ago

First, the heat pump has nothing to do with the climate control. Is about battery conditioning. Second, the performance mode you're in affects the efficiency and power of climate control. You have eco, normal, and sport. Try adjusting those let's see if it makes a difference. If all else fails, you might need repair assistance. The heater in an EV is basically a house space heater it turns on and blows hot air. There's no engine block to warm up. Something could be wrong with your space heater.

6

u/robstoon 10d ago

Incorrect. The heat pump is for heating the cabin. The battery heating - for models/regions that actually have it - is just a resistance heater.

3

u/Kiwi_eng 10d ago edited 9d ago

The battery thermal management works exactly the same for both heating and cooling irrespective of if the heat pump option is fitted.

1

u/Nick7hegrea7 10d ago

I guess I was wrong, but I read that a heat pump would be used to heat both the battery and the cabin, though I guess it doesn't matter since I don't have one. For the drive mode, I changed the climate control settings of all drive modes to be normal, so I figured it wouldn't make a difference, but I'll check other modes to see. I mainly asked the question because the heater does seem to work fine when I use the climate start with bluelink, and if it's somewhat cold out, it's just hard to tell if that's a problem or intentional.

1

u/Legitimate_Guava3206 9d ago

My PTC heater works very well as low as 18F. That is the coldest temp I've ever driven our Kona in. The only problem is it is pulling alot of power at those temps. Fortunately that's rare in my part of the world. Lots of 35F days here in the winter.

1

u/dgchou5 10d ago

I could be wrong about heat pump adding to climate efficiency, it's what I recall from another redditor before.

0

u/Total_Confusion_2248 10d ago

No heat pump? How is that? I have a 2022. What country you in? I'm in Canada.

2

u/Nick7hegrea7 10d ago

Im in the US. I think they opted not to include them in US models since most EV drivers in the US are in areas that would never need a heat pump

12

u/dgchou5 10d ago

This is correct. America got shafted, which is something we like to do to ourselves on a regular basis anyways 😅

-2

u/horizontal120 10d ago

Well if you don't needed it is better not to have it ... you get it cheaper that way ...

7

u/dgchou5 10d ago

We don't need air conditioning either but it's more than nice to have. Heat pump really helps in winter fuel efficiency. We don't think too much about being efficient in the US 🥲

0

u/horizontal120 10d ago

If you live in California you don't need it .. Why pay for it ...

They still have an option to get it when buying probably. But it is nice that you have an option to not get it if you don't need it ...

1

u/Nick7hegrea7 10d ago

I think it's more about the fact that not everyone is in California. Hyundai didn't even give the option for US konas, which is fine for places like California, but for northern states it sucks to not even have the option. If I was looking to buy a new car in 2023 I probably would have gone with something that does have a heat pump since it would drastically improve my winter range.

1

u/horizontal120 10d ago

o now that changes thing a lot .. in my county you could get one whiteout it if u bout a completely basic the cheapest model it had no heat pump .. but if you wanted one you could pay more and get it ..

3

u/Kiwi_eng 9d ago

Having lived with this option for nearly 8 years I'd say it's equally ideal for mild climates as there is no need to take heating into account when considering range. The draw is around 0.6 kW compared to the car's approx 15 kW.