Blowing cold??

My heater takes a 9 mile drive before starting to blow warm?
I have a 10 mile trip to work and back everyday so its starting to annoy me now.
Any advice where to start looking?
Does the heat come from the engine itself or is there a heater on the fan?

muff yer rad mate

You have a problem if it's a 300 series V8 disco as they start to blow warm after a mile or so.

Your thermostat could be jamed open but that will depend on the year of your disco, a later disco with air blending system is not dependant on a thermostat for heat well it's not on a V8.

Diesels run cool I believe as as above Rad Muff.

Yep its a diesel 1994 300 tdi
Just looked on the rave manual could be heater matrix??
Might just disconnect the viscous fan for the winter lol

You could try a new thermostat for a start.

Is the viscous fan supposed to be constantly turning with the engine?
Mine starts spinning as soon as engine starts and continues to run all the time
is this normal or not????

Yes that's the way they work mate, overkill really for day to day driving designed for dessert rally etc, either remove the fan or fit an electric one

Ok cheers for that
So if I removed it would the car warm up quicker?
Or is that down to the heater matrix???

Maybe just buy a good quality coat for the winter lol

Hi mate I put a new stat in mine and didn't make any diffrence realy so I have a piece of thick cardboard in front of the rad to block of half the rad which helps it warm up a bit quicker but it's just the way these tdi are I have read on here people have takern the fan of and runs fine through summer and winter but I have allways kept mine on. time to buy a decent coat and hat if like me and have eaily start lol

had similar problems last year with my tdi but a new stat sorted it and didnt take long to warm up, for about £3 its worth doing anyway.

I'm in the process of dumping the viscous fan on my 300TDI in favor of an electric fan.

Not so worried about being cold, the main problem I have is that I can't demist the windscreen and therefore cannot see where I'm going

take the fan off..you wont need it in the winter, sounds like its knackered anywas as it shouldn't be turning it the engine's cold.. took mine off a year ago

aston108 said:

as it shouldn't be turning it the engine's cold..

Click to expand...

oh yes it should/will

I thought they were only meant to cut in when the engines got hot..ot they'll be cooling and alreday cold radiator

aston108 said:

I thought they were only meant to cut in when the engines got hot..ot they'll be cooling and alreday cold radiator

Click to expand...

Yes they cool an already cool radiator
It's a viscous coupling meaning they turn all the time relatively slowly but as the engine/viscous coupling gets hotter they turn faster. Or something LOL
Electric ones cut in and out.

aston108 said:

I thought they were only meant to cut in when the engines got hot..ot they'll be cooling and alreday cold radiator

Click to expand...

Fan clutch - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"partially disengages the engine's mechanically-driven"

I had a similar problem to the OP. I have a 94 200tdi which I fitted with a new rad during summer and noted that the temp gauge hardly moved at all. Yesterday I fitted a new stat and completely covered over the front of the radiator, removed the fan and took it out for a good run. Massive difference in heating up the car. Cabin was warm within 5 min and temp gauge registered half way which in most cars is normal. I have probably overdone it with removing the fan so I will replace that over next few days. If I was going on a long run I wouldn't be comfortable with no fan. I reckon covering the radiator has done a good enough job for my original problem of the cabin taking ages to heat up.