Back seat air conditioning

aren't they under the seats?

 

There are vents under there. I haven't tested them for AC output. Maybe I'll go do that.

 

The vents under the seat are active only when a floor-directed output choice is chosen. Otherwise, they don't work regardless of eco or S-Flow mode.

 

Yes.

The vents in front do reach the back, depending on where you point them.

 

It also works on split floor and upper vents. But the back has only floor vents. It works with A/C, heat and fans. But you have to turn off driver only venting.

 

it would be complicated to separate heat from a/c, i think. and more expensive to put vents in the ceiling.

 

On my '16 Prius, I have a LITTLE air coming out of those under-seat vents. I always use the high/low setting, and always turn off that S-Flow gadget. Hopefully, a bit of cool air is reaching that $4.000 battery under the back seat. It's been close to 100 degrees every day, and the interior temp must be 115? (Parked in mostly sun all day).

But I would hate to be a passenger in the backseat. It's small, cramped, and gets very little cold air back there. I blast my AC every day. I don't care if I lose 5 or 10 mpg! My comfort is more important.

 

are you tinted and using window screens when parked?

 

Yes. But I'm surprised it doesn't help as much as I hoped. Expensive tint that reflects 99% of the UV rays, but the heat still builds up. And a front & rear Heatshield too. (Bought from the Prius Chat shop.) I would sure hate to be in this kind of heat with NO tint. (It's not as dark as appears in the photo). I don't know how those guys can tolerate a BLACK Prius!

I was visiting my sister recently, who lives about 80 miles east of LA. Near the desert. 108 degrees out there. My car baked. (This photo was taken nearer to the coast. Only 95° that day.

 

My black Prius isn't actually that hot inside with the windshield sunshades and tinting. My red Prius is worse. Probably because of the lack of insulation. It also doesn't cool down as fast, which is weird because it has fabric, not SofTex.

 

Your black Prius looks great. Just out of curiosity, I will put a thermometer inside mine and see what the temp is. 90 is cool, compared to what those folks in Phoenix are going through. I wonder how a Prius performs in 115 degrees?

My vehicles have always been parked in the sun, full time. Thankfully, I've never had much heat-related damage done. The only thing I recall, was way back in 1978, my Honda Accord started to develop a crack in the dashboard. But no other problems since then. The paint was usually always fine. I apply wax fairly often.
The dark tint is great when driving. I can't see out at night, but who cares, I don't drive much at night.

 

What I have noticed in my 2016 Three Touring is that the airflow out the upper vents increases in volume without changing the fan setting or the recirc setting whenever I switch from front-only to front+rear setting. In other words, without changing any other setting, the airflow increases simply by selecting all rows instead of front only. It takes a few seconds to occur, so not instantaneous, but a definite increase in air volume at any fan setting. My feeling is this is how the engineers accommodate rear seat passengers rather than having extra cold air vents for the rear seat.

 

Thanks! I've been in 120º heat a lot with my gen 2 and once or twice with my gen 4. Nothing bad happened. The AC ran perfectly fine. Of course there's no engine temp gauge, which would be helpful sometimes.

 

I respectfully disagree. I run the HVAC in Manual Mode, so it is not adjusting the fan speed to maintain a temp setting, and the behavior is repeatable at any time by simply changing the Front Row or All Rows selection. Now, I do believe that the Front Row/All Row settings are there to conserve energy when only the front seats are occupied, but if one is not satisfied with the cooling airflow available even at max fan setting with front row only selected, then I suggest they try selecting all rows and appreciate the additional cooling airflow available. And the boost in airflow also occurs when Recirc is selected, which by itself boosts airflow.

 

Yes, I always put "Recirc On." And turn off "S-Flow." I felt under the back seats today, and the AC comes out (slowly) from those tubes when the vent selector is set to defrost/low, high/low, and low.

I drove for quite a while with the vent set to defrost/low. It was high-noon, and hot, driving right into the sun, and I just wanted to see if that setting would possibly help to cool the front windshield more (and me). I believe it actually helped a bit, but I had to jack up the fan speed quite a lot. My AC doesn't seem to get as cold as I had hoped, even on the lowest temp setting.