I observed the same thing but found that 30 min of preconditioning along with the seat heater allowed the ECON limited heat to be enough to stay warm.I ran in Econ through most of last year, until the weather got really cold in November, or so, and I discovered that the Climate Control System heating runs too weakly in that mode to get and keep the cabin well heated. I turned Econ off through the winter months, to stay comfortable while driving, realizing that I was lowering my EV mileage by doing so.
I observed the same thing but found that 30 min of preconditioning along with the seat heater allowed the ECON limited heat to be enough to stay warm.
I would pay a lot of money for a steering wheel heater!
I ran in Econ through most of last year, until the weather got really cold in November, or so, and I discovered that the Climate Control System heating runs too weakly in that mode to get and keep the cabin well heated.
I did this for the first few months I owned the car, and I did not notice any deficiency in the heat, including times when the temperature was well below zero F. Lately I have been running in "normal" (not ECON; not SPORT) because I see no difference in energy usage and the ACC seems to perform better when not in ECON.I pressed ECON driving home from the dealer and it has been on ECON ever since, below zero or not. When I am on the highway for a trip longer than the guess-o-meter thinks the battery will last, I press HV so that I am driving in ECON/HV. When I am finished with the highway, I just press HV again and go back to plain old ECON only.
I did not find any deficiency in heat at low temperatures either, but then I keep my house at a toasty 63F so it may be that @vicw has higher heat expectations.
It's great that this car can serve two distinct types of driver so well. (Do you feel the urge to start smoking and drinking? I worry that would happen if I tried SPORT Mode.)I used Econ for the first few months then I discovered sport and have never gone back. I put it in sport from the time I start the car.... I have not seen a great difference in mileage, the guess o meter is now at 65 and last summer I got a high of 73. I'm sure there are lots of people on this site that get better mileage than I but the trade off to me in very little.
Good points. I am one of those who would appreciate an EV mode, defined as "Do not start the ICE even if my lead foot goes past the detent."
As for the complexity of HV, yeah, you are right . . . but in general, HV is equivalent to running the ICE. It does rather drive me nuts when I'm in HV and the controller decides to shut down the ICE just for a very short time. Seems silly, but obviously made sense to the engineer who designed that algorithm. And the opposite is true - there are times that the engine runs when HV is not selected and there's plenty of battery left, but at least for me those are pretty rare.
All the ECON mode does is change how the car responds to your inputs and commands. I leave it on all the time.
On #3, I first thought you were referring to the power positioning of the seat, which isn't affected, but then I realized you meant the driver's seat heater turning on automatically under very cold conditions.Econ mode changes/affects:
- Accelerator pedal mapping
- Cruise control responsiveness
- Auto electric drivers seat
- Climate control
- Other?
I commute daily from San Fernando Valley to West LA (40 mile round trip). I charge at work. I always drive on Econ/EV, except for occasional freeway trips. I bought the car on January 21st. Last time I put gas was on February 17, after driving to and from Solvang and to LAX (on HV mode). So, depending on your habits, yes, you can always drive on EV.Hi all!! I just want to ask a basic question about driving just on ECON/EV mode. I have nearly 1400 miles logged in on my 2019 Clarity Touring and use it daily for driving around town. Will sometime drive it into downtown LA of about 50 miles round trip. I am always on ECON and sometime will drain the battery. I still haven't put any gas into the car. I know when summer comes around I will need to just be on EV. Is it normal to use ECON 100% of the time?
You don't see much about NORMAL Mode in the Owners Manual, either. It's mentioned just once in text and once in a diagram that explains the accelerator click point (both on page 12).I don’t see much about normal in the forum. Wouldn’t you think “normal” would be —er — normal for most drivers and most applications, at least in the intentions of the Honda engineers?
... NORMAL Mode is for those who don't care to maximize either efficiency or performance. Honda's engineers valued NORMAL Mode so little that it doesn't have a button or an indicator LED.
The problem is compounded by there being a Normal for the Lane Keeping Assist System, a Normal for the Forward Collision Warning Distance, a Normal for the Road Departure Mitigation Setting, and a Normal setting for the back-up camera.I kind of see the logic, where absence of a symbol where the eco leaf goes is just NORMAL, but probably a "N" somewhere would be helpful. hmm, that might seem like neutral, so maybe just a happy faceor some other symbol for normal. Maybe "HN" for Honda NORMAL!
I am curious . . . if I were to peer into 100 Clarity's, what percentage would be in ECON/normal/SPORT? On the one hand, I think that the vast majority of owners never crack the Owner's Manual so they would be unlikely to push the ECON or SPORT button simply because they don't know what it is. On the other hand, the labels are pretty straightforward, so since the buying audience for this car is people who "want to make a difference" or are looking for low cost of ownership, maybe they tend to push the ECON button just because, obviously, this is A Good Thing. My salesman, who was clueless about virtually every aspect of the car, said "Most people push the ECON button the first time they get in the car and never touch it again." Since ECON is not specific to the Clarity, maybe he was right.Also, Clarity does everything pretty good in NORMAL, so that might be a good mode for new drivers to start in. NORMAL could also be a good mode to casually see if the car is doing anything really weird (as opposed to driving style combined with other modes (even though NORMAL is just one mapping of some other modes)).