In the depths of winter, I certainly
understand why people want to install/use remote starters in their cars & trucks. (A couple of independent mechanics in town even time their newspaper ads to capitalize on the cold snaps by pushing these things on the shivering commuters & parents doing school runs.)
Still, I despise remote starters. They drive me nuts. And my smug, efficiency-wired brain says "LAZY BUFFOON!" every time I hear a car start up remotely.
But I don't want to shiver in a cold car any more than the next buffoon. I may be lazy, but I'm not
that smug!
Which is why I use a coolant heater. (OK, I also use it because it saves fuel, oh and it's better for the engine than a cold start, remote or otherwise.)
First I installed a 300w block heater in the Firefy,
then an 800w coolant heater (I even
compared their performance). On top of that I will also run a heater in the cabin as well.
Latest mod ... a "remote starter" for my coolant + cabin heaters:
It's an indoor/outdoor model with a 1560 watt (resistive) rating -
just enough for the coolant heater + a hair dryer running on the medium setting in the cabin.
This one's a Heath/Zenith model SL6139-D and cost about 20 bucks.
I love it!
But it has drawbacks:
- no LED on the receiver, so you have no visual indication when it's on/off
- only a 50 ft range on the transmitter, which may not work for everyone
- no on/off switch on the receiver
- single outlet, so I had to add an adapter to plug in my two power cords
Of course, this doesn't help much if you've parked somewhere you can't plug in. But even then I couldn't bring myself to idle the engine.