I'm looking for some help/guidance on how the climate control system should work. I have a 2008 US model LR2 with the 3.2ltr petrol engine. The car has approx. 120K miles and I've owned it since new. The car is fitted with the dual zone climate control system and since new, the cabin temperature, or air coming out of the vents has borne little resemblance the values on the rotary temperature setting dials. For example, tonight the ambient air temp was 90 deg. F and the interior of the car was also at 86 deg. measured with a separate temperature gauge. With the system on "Auto" and the dials set to 60, the system was pushing 56 deg. cold air out of the center vents but not at a very high fan setting, approximately half speed. I left the car running for about 10 minutes like this and the cabin temp only dropped down to 80 deg. and the vents were still blowing cold at the same rate. In Auto mode, with both dials set to 60 deg. I would have thought that the system set a higher fan speed (and possibly colder air) as it attempted to cool the cabin down to 60 deg.

I checked the system by setting the dials to full cold, fan to max and recirc on, RPM at approx. 1500-1800 and after about 10 minutes the air temperature coming out the vents is down to low 40s so I know it's able to generate cold air. There just doesn't seem to be an correlation between the temperatures on the dials and the temperature/volume of cold air the system produces when in Auto. I then removed the cabin temperature sensor and that seems to be working (fan spins) and when I sprayed some freeze spray over the sensor the system immediately started pumping hot air out of the foot well vents. At this stage I'm stuck on what to do next so I want to confirm correct operation of the system. I can set the fan speed manually and the cabin cools down nicely when the fan is set to the higher speeds but I thought that Auto setting was supposed to take care of this. Can anyone tell me how your climate control responds to the temperature settings when in auto mode?

Thanks in advance.

Half fan speed sounds about right - auto mode doesn't seem to use the highest speeds, you need to switch to manual for that.

It could be that your cooling (aircon) system is not working at full efficiency - it seldom gets as hot as 90F up here, but the system seems pretty effective at cooling the car even if it's been soaking in the sun for a time. You might need a re-gas, also worth checking that the aircon radiator isn't blocked.

I can't say with authority... it's not something I've paid close attention to...

But here in Queensland Australia the thing blows harder at first when the car is hot... it does seem responsive to conditions. Having said that... on really hot days we go full throttle manual until a bit of comfort achieved then throttle it back until finally allowing auto to take over.

So in my mind when it's pretty hot the climate control doesn't try aggressively enough for me to bring it down fast.

So I think that might explain your speed setting.... but the air it puts out is cold, whereas yours sounds like it's not cold enough. My first bet would be on yours needing a gas top up.

You guys should move to England in all the years I've had mine I haven't used climate control or air con once.

I've never been a fan (pardon the pun) of the auto setting, I always go manual at the coolest setting and highest fan speed then adjust accordingly when the temperature is more comfortable. FL2 SD4 Metropolis Auto Santorini Black / ivory completely stock.

It's true that light travels faster than sound, some people look quite intelligent until you hear them speak.


Stop global winging.

I use manual & adjust as needed, summer and winter. Also close the outside air every time I start the car. Procrastination, mankind's greatest labour saving device!

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