Condensation

[neversay]

I have just bought a new car (Toyota) and the amount of condensation on the front and rear windows has been awful on occasions over the last couple of weeks. I'm trying to work out if it's just the current weather conditions or if this car is prone to it. Anyone else had problems recently?

N.

[richlist]

If the weather has been particularly cold and wet....as it has been in the last couple of weeks.....I find I often get the same situation. Moisture is carried into the car via shoes, clothes, damp hair etc. It stays on the carpets, mats and interior as ambient temperatures are rarely high enough to disperse it

The fix is to run the air con which has the function of removing moisture from the air rather than recirculating it.

[neversay]

If the weather has been particularly cold and wet....as it has been in the last couple of weeks.....I find I often get the same situation. Moisture is carried into the car via shoes, clothes, damp hair etc. It stays on the carpets, mats and interior as ambient temperatures are rarely high enough to disperse it

The fix is to run the air con which has the function of removing moisture from the air rather than recirculating it.

Many thanks for the quick response @richlist. It's hard to compare but I was hoping it was going to be better on the condensation from than my previous car. Do all cars suffer as bad or are some more prone than others?

One annoyance is it's a plug-in hybrid, but using the aircon uses the ICE rather than the battery. Aside from drying it (and keeping it dry) like you suggest, I'm wondering whether the car demister bags are any use as the reviews are decidedly mixed.

[redsturgeon]

Are you using it regularly or just occasionally and for short journeys?

One of my cars has been suffering badly with condensation this past weeks but it only gets an occasional short run.

I find that using the air con or turning fans to full while driving helps.

John

[bungeejumper]

If it's brand new, it may have been in a dockside car park for quite a while. (Scrub that idea if it was built in Derbyshire, obviously.) It may take a week or three to dry right out. But if it doesn't seem to improve I'd be taking it up with the dealer.

Any car can come with a leaky seal, and you might not find it immediately. (Maybe try a damp meter - we bought four or five from Ebay for about two quid apiece, and they've helped a lot with tracking down damp/cold areas in our house.) Popular places (among all cars/brands) would include a damp carpet on the front passenger side? Or is there water in the spare wheel well? Or (remote possibility) somebody's forgotten to fit the aircon filter in the front bulkhead, or it's been done clumsily.

That said, my Auris does have a particularly enormous windscreen - the result of a very low drag coefficient. And yes, it can hold the condensation for quite a long time (although the demister fan is very good once you work out how to make it work.) Speaking of which, have you perchance got the aircon set to recycle rather than to fresh air intake? That'll mist you up in no time.

Either way, involve your dealer. You've paid him a lot of money to field these sorts of queries.

BJ

[neversay]

@redsturgeon - yes, mostly short journeys mostly on electric power and I'm guilty of not overusing the aircon as that kicks in the ICE.

@bungeejumper - thanks for the great tips, particularly the damp meter (I have an electric one that I can try) and all the associated checks. It's a second-hand Prius and likewise has a big screen, and I use the fresh air intake, but I was hoping the seals and condensation would have been better than my old volvo. That said, the kids did track in some snow last week so I suspect it's just not drying out.

Anyone had any experience of using the condensation bags that you put in the car windows? (I even read elsewhere to try cat litter in socks).

[bungeejumper]

It's a second-hand Prius and likewise has a big screen, and I use the fresh air intake, but I was hoping the seals and condensation would have been better than my old volvo. That said, the kids did track in some snow last week so I suspect it's just not drying out.

No personal axe to grind here (my Auris has been pretty impressive), but this Toyota blog suggests that condensation in the car may indicate that the seals are in excellent nick! Unlike an older car that may be air-leaky and dries out faster.

http://blog.toyota.co.uk/fix-condensation-inside-car

Yeah, I know, it sounds almost Trumpian, doesn't it? Make a virtue out of a problem, why dontcha? But give it a while, and blast the nuts off the (pretty powerful) aircon, and see where it goes.

Finally, an old tip. If you think your door seals may be leaking, sprinkle them with french chalk (or the wife's talcum powder), shut the door and give the car some welly with a hose. Any water ingress will leave a visible track on the rubber seal.

BJ

[neversay]

Thanks again @BJ. You spotted my contradiction that increased condensation can indicate good seals!

I had seen that article and it also mentions the condensation 'balls' although it did get me wondering whether certain brands are more susceptible than others.

Your other tip on using chalk/talcum powder is excellent and, out of interest, I will give that a try this weekend if the 'the best from the east 2.0' doesn't cause a shower.

N.

[supremetwo]

If the weather has been particularly cold and wet....as it has been in the last couple of weeks.....I find I often get the same situation. Moisture is carried into the car via shoes, clothes, damp hair etc. It stays on the carpets, mats and interior as ambient temperatures are rarely high enough to disperse it.

The fix is to run the air con which has the function of removing moisture from the air rather than recirculating it.

I find that air con use makes subsequent car condensation worse, especially after short trips, as the moisture evaporates back into the car from the condenser after it warms up.

Running the heater with a window open a few cm seems to dry out better.

[Howard]

We have a BMW plug-in hybrid which is 18 months old now. I have never experienced condensation in the car.

However, if it is very cold I usually pre-warm the car while it is still plugged in to the mains. This can be done every day using a timer in the car's controls or a few minutes beforehand using a phone or (low tech) pressing a button on the key. As the interior volume of the car is small, the air temperature warms up incredibly quickly inside, say two minutes to get to 20 degrees from - 5 degrees. A few minutes later, seats etc warm up, and the screen is clear.

The electric power required is minimal, according to my measurements, and after driving off, if electric only drive is selected, the car will happily use its battery power to run the aircon which by now is just ticking over, maintaining the internal temperature. Our car's range on electric only is around 15 miles, but this does drop to around 12 miles on a very cold day.

If the car isn't pre-warmed, on a cold day, say less than 2 degrees, the petrol engine will always start until the car is warmed up.

Don't know whether you can do this with a Prius plug-in hybrid, but I would have thought it possible to pre-warm the car?

kind regards

Howard

[ten0rman]

We have a Toyota Avensis estate bought new almost 5 years ago. Right from the start we had a misting problem on the front window under certain conditions so we quickly learned to direct the airflow onto the windscreen as soon as we detected it. On ours, there is a specific button which seems to override the normal heating controls to do this, and we also crank up the fan speed until it is cleared. I have to say that we don't find it much of a problem, maybe because we are now used to it. Also, I do think this is possible the worst car we've ever had for this problem.

Regards,

ten0rman

[Slarti]

I've got an Avensis and find that, in wet weather, it is the 2nd worst car I've ever had for misting up. Especially on the driver's side.

Pressing demist for a few seconds shifts it, but if there is more than me in the car, after turning demist off I have to leave aircon on. Which is something I don't normally feel the need of in this country.

Looking at the front of my car, below the windscreen where the air intake is, there is a design flaw that holds water when the car is static and below the bonnet there is an area that somehow gets leaves in which also hold moisture. I find that cleaning out the leaves as often as possible and certainly before a longer journey reduces the problem.

Slarti

PS, the worst car for the problem was my first 1954 Ford Pop, which had no heating of any kind.

[Slarti]

I find that air con use makes subsequent car condensation worse, especially after short trips, as the moisture evaporates back into the car from the condenser after it warms up.

That is not a problem I've had with the Avensis, so I suppose it depends on where the condenser is located.
I do notice water under the car after using the aircon, so I suppose it dribbles out, somewhere.

Slarti

[bungeejumper]

That is not a problem I've had with the Avensis, so I suppose it depends on where the condenser is located.
I do notice water under the car after using the aircon, so I suppose it dribbles out, somewhere.

As far as I know, all aircon systems have a dribble pipe. It sometimes scares new owners to find puddles of fluid under the car. It certainly worried me! Fortunately, the car in question (a Ford Focus) eventually acquired more than enough other problems to distract my attention from that little matter. And I haven't worried about it since. Gosh, how I don't miss that car.

Tenorman, yes, I've got the same overrides on my Toyota's climate control buttons. It look me quite a while to figure out which buttons override which other functions. But pressing the Auto button seems to "un-override" them again. I daresay a four year old could suss the whole system in five minutes, but after two years I'm still working on it. All I know is that, on a good day, my Auris demists much faster than my wife's Golf.

BJ