Keep Clear and Carry On...
With the cold mornings creeping up on us, it won’t be long before we’re waking up to completely frozen cars.
We might not get much in the way of severe snow here in the UK, but we definitely get our fair share of frost – freezing and misting up our windscreens.
It might be tempting to make a move as quickly as possible on cold mornings and hope your visibility increases as you crawl down the road, but the most important thing to remember when the temperature drops is to prepare your car before you set off.
If you battle with scrapers, rags and heaters first thing in the mornring our handy tips will help you quickly demist and clear your windscreen and get you off to a safe start...
Outside the car
If there has been a heavy frost or settled snow, don’t use your wipers to remove snow or ice as this can seriously damage them. Make sure you remove this from the outside of your windscreen using a scraper or a soft brush.
Remember not to leave your wipers on ‘auto’ in the cold months – as if there is a frost and your turn your engine on, you could end up with damaged windscreen wipers.
If it’s tough ice or frozen snow, use a de-icing solution to melt the ice before clearing it. Never use hot water as this could crack your windscreen or windows. Warm water is also inadvisable; as soon as the temperature of that water drops it will re-freeze on the windscreen.
Inside the car
Get the engine going to start demisting the inside of your car.
If the windscreen is or has been frozen, get the heaters on to warm up the glass and help to melt the ice.
If it has just misted over, the best option is to flick on the air conditioning and direct the blowers at the windscreen. Misting is caused by water vapour condensing on the windscreen so the air-conditioning helps to dry out the air and remove the moisture from inside the car.
Starting up the car with cool air (even if it’s not the air con) then slowly increasing the temperature will stop you from filling up the car with warm ‘wet’ air and therefore reduce the condensation on the windscreen.
If you have climate control there is likely to be a setting specifically for de-misting the inside of your car. If you don’t have climate control, driving with the windows down for a little while can help keep the screen clear, as the dry cool air from outside will reduce the amount of water vapour inside the car.
Be sure to prepare your car properly before you set off each morning, regardless of the winter weather this year. Make sure you keep your air conditioning in tip top shape as you’ll probably be using it much more than you do in the summer months! [if the British weather is anything to go by]!
Find out more about how your Air Conditioning system works here.
Alternatively find your nearest Setyres branch here and book your air con clean and air con recharge at a time to suit you.
What’s more!? Get £5 off Air Con Top Up with our printable voucher here.
Posted on: 14/11/2014
