Stop the recirculate control from automatically shutting off?

[OnTheFence]

Hi doesn't anyone know of a way to over ride the, to me, incredibly annoying tendency for the recirculate interior cabin air from shutting itself off?

 

I guess Ford thinks drivers are too dumb to understand what to do when fog begins to develop on the windows, even though until recently every car made didn't override your settings.

 

I have a 40 min commute and sometimes 2 to 3 times during it the recirculate light will go off on the my ford touch system. I usually find this out when the car fills with cigarette, dead animal, or diesel stink, which is of course too late to avoid the smell. I do not have the system set to AUTO, just air coming through vents. I'm probably doing something wrong though.

 

Also I believe the system should be set to remember that I left it on recirculate instead of making me turn it on at the beginning of every car ride. This is one of the few frustrating things I've found with the Edge in so far a very quality car. Well that and "Battery Saver - System Off" crap but I'm hoping that will be solved with an update and master reset.

 

Thanks.

 

 

 

 

 

[carbonedge+]

This is from my 2007 manual:

6. Recirculated air: Press to activate/deactive air recirculation in the vehicle. Recirculated air may reduce the amount of time needed to cool down the interior of the vehicle and may also help reduce undesired odors from reaching the interior of the vehicle. Recirculation can be engaged manually in any airflow selection except defrost. Recirculation may turn off automatically in some airflow modes to reduce fog potential.

 

I'm guessing your 2013 will have something similar. I've noticed it's only in the cooler months running the heat that it disengages. When I have the AC on during the warmer months, it seems to stay engaged. It is one of the small nuances that I've learned to deal with. I find myself glancing down every so often to see if its turned itself off and hitting the button if it did. I'm pre-sync, so I have buttons and the other thing that would have been nice is for the buttons for recirc and AC to be in the same order as the display; the AC icon is right of the recirc, but the AC button is left of the recirc...(just one of my OCD issues).

[omar302]

I think it is because you have the system on Auto (for the air flow direction) so it might be that the system sometimes transfers the air flow to "Defrost" or "Defrost+Floor" & hence the recirculation turning off. Next time, try setting the air flow manualy to your preferred setting and test to see if recirculation turns off.

[Symbasys]

I think car manufacturers are doing this now as a reaction to the problem of smelly A/C systems when they are left in recirc mode all the time. My 2010 Dodge Journey did the same thing. It's a way to make sure that fresh air gets circulated over the evaporator so that mold doesn't get a chance to build up. Just my 2 cents.

[Haz]

The 2013 Edge Owner's Guide on page 486 says Recirculated Air "May turn off in all airflow modes except MAX A/C to reduce fog potential."

 

My 2012 MKX Owner's Guide adds the word "automatically" after the above words "May turn off..."

 

You are doing nothing wrong. What you are experiencing is the Recirculated Air function deactivating itself, by design.

 

Ford doesn't presume we're all dummies, but there really are drivers out there who would not figure out why their windows are fogging up if Recirculated Air did not automatically deactivate.

 

The Climate system's inability to consistently remember the previous ignition cycle's Climate system settings is a frustration to many of us. Hopefully, a future SYNC update may fix that.

 

If you are running SYNC version 3.5.1, your "Battery Saver - System Off" symptom is usually the result of a disconnected battery cable and it typically goes away after driving a minimum of 10 miles and performing a few ignition cycles and/or after the vehicle sets unused overnight. This has been my experience.

 

Good luck!

Edited February 27, 2013 by Haz

[OnTheFence]

Thanks, everyone. Yeah I did read that "Recirculation may turn off automatically in some airflow modes to reduce fog potential" in the manual but thought there might be some trick. Guess I'll just have to live with it.

 

 

I won't thread jack myself with the battery saver thing but it's being quite the pain in the azz recently, but at least I'm not as bad as this guy.

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=iaa_vPQ7OCs

 

[Nate Edwards]

I'm worried that watching these videos will jinx me. Stop!

[freebird]

This drives me nuts too - no fog potential at all and the recirculated air button turns itself off. I would think if there was a fog potential
(I guess the Ford engineers think the window may fog up) then recirculated air would, indeed, be better because the moisture is being removed when defrost on, right?

[akirby]

I don't know why you'd want to leave it in recirculate all the time unless you live near chicken houses. My eyes start to dry out if I leave it there too long.

[WWWPerfA_ZN0W]

I use the recirc mode primarily in areas of emissions-heavy traffic or when initially warming up the car on a cold day (cooling on hot day).

[akirby]

Right - but not all the time. Modern cars are too tight for that. You need fresh air.