Outdoor Temp Gauge
 

Is it normal for the outside temperature gauge to take so long to change? For example, when I park the car in my garage where the temperature is about 15 degrees cooler than outdoors, it takes the gauge 20 minutes of highway driving to move up to the approximate outdoor temp. I had the car at the dealer a few weeks ago where they had it in their air conditioned shop so the gauge read about over 30 degrees less than the outdoor air and the auto a/c would barely run the fan for the first 20 minutes of driving. I had a similar situation on my last car (a Mazda), but it didn't take anywhere near that long to get up to the real temp.

Not sure which year you have, but the outside temp changes within 5-10 minutes of me driving out of my garage...and usually quicker than that.

I have a 2020 ES.

Yeah thats not normal

I experienced the same thing today, after my 15k check: after 20 minutes of driving, OAT reading went from 79 to 85. Actual OAT is ~ 95.
I’ll be taking it back to the dealer tomorrow for a diagnostic test.

I have already asked my dealer about the temp gauge taking so long to adjust to proper temps. I was told it only changes by something like 1 degree for every 2-3 minutes of driving. Please let me know if your dealer says something similar. I take my car in for a 6 month check up in the next few weeks and I don't know if I want to bring this issue up again.

My display always seems to be several degress HIGHER than the actual outside temp during the non-winter months. Same with every car I've owned in last many years. Picks up some engine heat I presume.

Last night when I pulled out of my garage I decided to keep track of how long it took to show the correct temperature:

Display temperature when starting the vehicle: 82°F
Actual temperature: 70°F
Time to display the correct temperature: 3 minutes 20 seconds

Living in Southern California it's either sunny, cloudy, or raining, not much use to know the current temperature. :cool:

So I took my car in this morning for the diagnostic test, and all systems checked perfectly. The service tech explained that when going from a relatively cool place (say, ~ 72-75 degrees in a garage or service bay) to a very much hotter environment (say, the weather this week in South Carolina: ~ 95 degrees), the system can take several minutes to show the correct OAT. He wouldn't/couldn't quantify "several", but my experience yesterday (72-95) would lead me to believe it'd be not less than 20 minutes. That I noticed this immediately after a service check (15k) made me suspicious, but if I'm being completely honest, it may in fact be a case of my never having paid very close attention to this cold-to-hot gauge lag.

Going from hot to cold is a different case. I've noticed on a few occasions going from ~ 90 to ~ 75 after driving into a thunderstorm the OAT gauge change occurs within 2 or 3 minutes. So....assuming what I've been told is legitimate, probably no need for you to mention this at your six month check.

Thanks for the info. I have a friend with an Acura that has the same issue from the cooler garage to extreme heat. We both live in the Phoenix area where the temps can exceed 115 so the issue is even more exaggerated here. Even though the dealer says it's "normal", I still wonder why it works that way. Seems to me that any kind of temperature sending/recording device would change more quickly.

I decided to test this myself today. I left the garage at 1:00 PM and the thermometer read 75 degrees - probably pretty close to correct garage temp at that hour. Drove to an appointment across town, stopping to buy a package of sharpies en route. Read 85 at 2:00pm. Actual temp was 95 according to Apple Watch (which I believe receives data from Weather Channel). After leaving and driving for about 30 minutes, it read 87 degrees (Apple Watch now showing 102). After being parked for 30 minutes on surface lot, and driving for another 20 minutes, car was now reading 95. Finally hit 98 about the time I returned to garage, 3 hours later. Outdoor household thermometer showed 98 so it was probably (finally) pretty close to correct by this time - although Apple Watch still showing 102.

CONCLUSION: The external thermometer literally takes several hours to catch up on my car. I’m not surprised that others are also seeing this. I will discuss with dealer on my next visit...if I remember :sad: