Hi Guys,

I have read the book, learned some from family but still a bit confused regarding the ac controls in my 2005 530i.

I can tell by looking at the dash I have 2 temperature knobs and one that controls the fan speed.

But in idrive I have how much air I want to be blown to upper/face/ chest/ feet. Is that the distribution of the amount that I set from the dash?

Also via idrive there is a temperature control, does that override the dash temperature control?

How well does the vent feature to cool the car before I come to it work? Someone mentioned it can drain your battery. is that true?

Also what is the auto setting in idrive for ventilation about? I never use it.

 

I am engineer. I appreciate the temp dials, the adjustment of air for face/chest/foot. For the life of me, I don't know what the designers were thinking with the temp adjustment inside the iDrive screen. Bottom line...if you are too cold in the summer, make the temp dial what you want and have less blue bars. If too hot...more blue bars. Similar for heat.

 

So if you have the idrive set to blue, and the dial set to 90, what is the air going to be like,.

 

It will be hot, but not real hot.

 

"auto" overrides all the iDrive settings except for the (internal) temperature adjustment. The temperature adjustment inside iDrive controls what comes out of the dash grilles. If you are calling for cabin heat, and have the temp setting well into the blue, you will get cool air out of the dash vents. The IHKA will still keep the cabin temperature at the setting selected with each dial control.

The intent is to keep cool air blowing on the face of the driver to fight sleepiness.

 

I'm glad someone else finally asked lol I havent been able to figure it out either. Terribly designed system.

 

you shouldn't have to read a manual to operate an auto climate control system.

I don't like how there's no way to sync the 2 zones or an off button.

 

If you put it on auto with both knobs at the same setting then they are sync'd. The off button is on the knob.

 

There are several things about idrive, and other parts of this car, that are unnecessarily complicated, but the climate control is the MOST annoying to me. I agree...set on Auto, set the temp, and be patient. Otherwise this thing drives you CRAZY. However, I do have to say I like the seat heater variability a lot.

 

That is an example of software engineer gone haywire with the memory and processing power given to them by hardware engineers. They implement crap.