Steamy Windows
 

All it takes is literally one drop fo rain to hit my car and the whole thing steams up within seconds, and the only way i seem to be able to get rid of it is to turn the air con on which makes the car freezing.

I was just wondering if anyone else has this problem, as i would say its miles worse on my scoob than any other car i have owned. Is this a problem generally with impreza's or is it just with mine? In either case any ideas whats causing it / how to get rid of it other than using the air con as its doing my head in at the moment?

I've only ever had that happen with cars equipped with air-con for some reason.

If its an older scoob, you could check that the door foils are still sealed.
Some people cut them up to fit speakers, and it lets moisture in.




But then my new age does it as well.:cry:

Never had the problem.
You can have the aircon on hot and it should still dry the car out.

Did have a car that steamed up but that was all the time and the heater heat exchanger had sprung a leak.

Make sure the button to re-circulate the cabin air is off and you are drawing air in from outside.

its an MY03 so its not that old.

its been like this since i got it when it had done about 8k miles, and since then i have fitted speakers but its not gone any worse. i mean even now as its getting dark and cooling down the 4 other cars on the drive are fine but mines starting to steam up, its well annoying.

Is there any way of getting rid of it do u think? cos having the air con on all the time it happens would be a pain cos it wastes petrol doesn't it?

my 04 will steam up in the rain but only after the a/c has been on and turned off. Having said that this seems to apply to all cars as i often have hire cars that do the same

There's stuff made by Rainex which you can buy from Halfords called anti-fog. Simply put this on the inside of your windows and you'll never steam up again (well at least for a year). Works a treat and no need for the Aircon.

Hi Joek.

Whether a car is old or modern, rain or high humidity can cause glass to mist up very quickly. It's odd though because some folk have more problems than others even when the cars are pretty much similar. My wife's always complaining about fogging... whereas I have relatively no problems.

First off, my internal fan is always set to the lowest setting -- and draws air from the outside. Whether air is directed to the windscreen vents or the facial ones, the idea is the same -- fresh air always being brought into the cabin. In contrast, every time I get into my wife's Impreza the fan is always off.

Unless using the air-con, always draw air in from outside. Re-circ simply recycles the air from inside the cabin, which gets saturated with moisture and will help cause fogging. Re-circ with air-con is fine because a bi-product of the process is moisture removal. If you're also recycling cold air, the system has less work to do.

Using air-con doesn't mean it needs to be chilly. You can still use heat and the system will still remove the moisture for you.

It's already been suggested... Rain-X Anti-fog. I've tried it, hated it, binned it. Not only was it annoying to apply (left swirls no matter how hard I tried) but it seemed to encourage dirt to build up quicker and was stubborn to remove without using a glass cutting solution. Good at fighting off fogging though..? Pass, given that I don't normally have issues anyway.

Hope this helps. If you're having real bad problems with fogging and you've adopted a similar approach to me, the heater matrix (behind the dash) may have a slight leak and therefore dumping moisture into the cabin. Perhaps have a feel of your carpets to see if they're damp.

Jonts.

Hand on carpet under each floor matt, front and rear how damp are they?

Cheers, i'll have a feel round the car when i get home for any moisture.

When i was messing about with some speakers a few weeks ago i did notice some wet around that area when i took the door card off, dunno if it should be getting in there.

I'll have a look at rome of that rain-x stuff too

I get the exact same thing on my 05 STI. Real pain in the @rse, as sticking the air-con on, drinks petrol.
I can sometimes get away with just turning the fan up high, and putting the vent setting to windscreen without air-con. Only sometimes though :Suspiciou