GM Volt Forum banner

Mysterious Switch to "Comfort Mode" plus Comment On Battery Performance

7K views 12 replies 9 participants last post by  ammPilot 
#1 ·
Hi. I took possession of my Volt at the end of January (long story there). Overall, it's performed well and I love to drive it. However, a strange thing has been happening.... although I never set the climate control to "comfort", several times since the Volt arrived the setting has somehow gotten switched from "fan only" to "comfort". I only notice the change when the battery range remaining decreases at a rapid rate. I realize the controls aren't optimally designed and it's fairly easy to hit something by mistake, but I rarely change anything, plus it takes some effort to get into climate mode and then change to "comfort". Any ideas?

The other comment I'd like to make is regarding hills and battery range. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and although it's been cold for us (low 40's to mid-50's), we can't complain. However, hills, even gentle uphill grades, suck up battery range at an alarming rate. To get to my house requires a .8 mile fairly steep uphill climb. Regardless of driving mode, that climb takes a consistent 7 miles of battery power. Going down -you would never want to follow me :) - I can only recapture 4-5 miles even if no one is behind me and therefore I can do it without ever leaving regen. Guess if I never had to go home, I'd be in great shape.

One more observation about battery use - yesterday I went to run errands in a driving rainstorm. The lights, windshield wipers, radio, level 1 heated seat, and front windshield defogger (intermittent use) were on. That trip took an astounding 9 miles more battery range than normal.
 
See less See more
#2 ·
Hi Sharon-- I wonder if your observations relate to the way the Volt estimates remaining range. Your Volt may assume that the rest of your trip will be similar to what it just experienced (e.g., steep uphill or rain/cold/etc). Do you you think that your Volt might not actually have used all that additional electric capacity (but only a portion of it), and it now expects to continue using electiric capacity at a higher rate, due to heavy load? This is where a kW-hr meter on the dashboad might help!!
 
#3 ·
I too have noticed that the Volt will quite often switch to "Comfort" mode on its own. It seems to happen when I increase the fan speed. Have you noticed whether that fan speed change is the cause of change in your other settings? Maybe there is a setting shown in the manual that will stop the change, but I have been too busy to look it up yet, seems easier to just switch it back to fan only. LOL.

Apparently the heater/defroster use does use a lot of power up, have noticed that. And hills are power grabbers also, just getting onto one freeway ramp that goes uphill 30 feet will use a mile of range by the time I get up to 65 in two blocks distance from the stop sign. I have found that leaving the shifter in the "L" mode helps to recover a bigger portion of the lost range though, use that almost all the time, as it saves on brake wear also.

Jerry, #536
 
#4 ·
Yes, if the fan is off and you are in fan mode and you hit the big fan button to turn on the fan it will go into comfort mode. I don't know why. Seems flawed. What I do is go into the Climate panel and hit the fan only button which will turn on the fan and then you can hit the fan button on the screen to increase it.
 
#11 ·
I have the same issue and I am 100% positive that I am not hitting the auto button in the process of hitting the fan button. It is flawed and I am annoyed that I constantly have to activate the climate screen to turn the fan on when just hitting the button on the console should work. Still, all things considered, a relatievly minor annoyance.
 
#5 ·
It is ridiculously easy to get the "auto" button on the console to think it was pressed, especially if you press any soft buttons on the bottom right of the touch screen. And that takes it from fan mode to comfort mode. I had to learn to not rest my hand on the bezel when pressing soft buttons, and to keep ALL my fingers out of the way except the one I was using to press the button.

The auto button seems to be really sensitive. Stay away from it!
 
#6 ·
Thanks for the responses. As for the switch to Comfort Mode, it may very well have to do with increasing the fan speed, perhaps as a result of turning on the defogger? That seems like a clear "bug" to me, and an annoying one. It's also possible I inadvertantly hit "auto" as suggested above, which if so, is another thing to address in the next model. I'll go back to the manual again to see if all this is a "feature" :)

As for estimated battery range, I use "low" except when driving on freeways and have become proficient at hypermiling (as mentioned in my original post, you really don't want to be behind me). I don't know how remaining mile calculations are done, but the real effect is to actually reduce my range by very close to the estimation.
 
#7 ·
Response From Volt Advisor

I sent my Volt advisor a link to this thread (Saturday morning). Almost instantly, I received a response from Donna, Volt Team Lead. She explained someone would look into the switch to comfort mode and get back to me. Just a few minutes ago I received the following:

" I was thinking it would take more time but I found a possible cause. We
did test the fan in the Volt to see if that would cause the climate to
change but it did not. It seems the “Auto” button automatically puts the
Volt in Comfort mode.

The screen is very easily triggered, even if you swipe a finger across the
area while changing a radio station it would change the climate modes. It
is very close to the touch screen, and could be triggered if you were
using the center stack for almost anything.

It is a normal design and function of the vehicle. I hope this answers
your question. If you need anything else give us a call or send an email.

Donna
Volt Team Lead

Here's my response to Donna: "Thank you for the quick response. It may be "normal" design, but it's a
flawed design, don't you think? No button on anything should be so easily
and inadvertantly triggered."
 
#8 ·
It may be "normal" design, but it's a
flawed design, don't you think? No button on anything should be so easily
and inadvertantly triggered.
Completely agree, Sharon. The trend in many newly designed cars is away from panels that can be operated without looking at them (i.e., while looking at the road). It is almost impossible to operate touchscreen controls while focusing on the road; it is very, very difficult to hit most of the climate controls without looking at the panel.

(I gave a quick demo ride to a good friend who works at NASA Ames Research Center on human factors design in aircraft cockpits and air traffic control systems. One of his very first comments about the Volt [after voicing general enthusiasm!] was that the panel had lousy human factors engineering. Fine for a video game or for something requiring a dedicated operator, but not for solo operation. He also commented that the Volt is hardly unique in this arena.)
 
#9 ·
I've gone to using the "pistol finger" method for touching *anything* on the touch screen or control panel. The idea is to get all the other fingers (and thumb) as far out of the way as possible.

It's pretty much eliminated false touches. The auto climate control drove me crazy the first couple thousand miles. But I was eventually able to work around it.

It's also nice enough (sic) to have NO feedback when you inadvertently kick off the climate auto mode. Even when you use the fan buttons on the console there's feedback at the bottom of the touch panel. Going from uber efficient "fan only" mode to electron sucking "full comfort"? Nah, it doesn't think it needs to tell you about that.

Yes, I think there needs to be improvement in the human interface.
 
#10 ·
I got an Android phone at Christmas time in anticipation of the Volt arriving (has not done so yet) and I notice similar issues with its touch screen. I swear that there are times that a press is registered when a finger is no closer than 1/8 inch. Capacitive touch screens can be very annoying. Does not work at all with gloves on.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top