I feel like we are currently in an automotive technology era where the lure of what we can do is completely blinding us to what we should do. Yes, just like that Jeff Goldblum/Jurassic Park meme. We can see this happening in a lot of places, like the mad rush to shove every control onto a touch screen, for example, or the thing I want to talk about today, the current industry-spanning absurdity of electronic, motorized, complex door handles. This one is far more important because it directly affects one’s ability to enter or exit a car, which I think is a pretty big deal when it comes to cars. I also think it’s a big deal to this Ford Mach-E owner who claims to have had his nine-month-old baby trapped in the car thanks to overly complex door handles.
Just to assuage any worries, eventually, a window was smashed and the baby was removed from the car and is just fine. But the point is, of course, it is absolutely absurd that this is even able to happen at all in a modern car, especially because of something as stupid as a door handle.
Here’s the Threads, uh, thread(?) that got me thinking about this again:
First, I’m cold where I am, so the idea of 80° heat right now is weirdly appealing. But, more importantly, a baby trapped in a car in that heat would very likely disagree. To go over the facts, someone says on Threads says they parked a Mach-E with 25% battery left next to a charger, got out to plug it in, then discovered they couldn’t get back into their car, where their baby was trapped. AAA comes and was unable to open the car.
The car’s 12V battery seems to be the culprit here, which isn’t too surprising, as the old-school 12V batteries are often the issue with many EV issues like this. The fact the doors had no way of being opened mechanically is a huge problem here.
This is, frankly, appalling. And fundamentally stupid, because car door handles should be very much a solved problem. It’s not just Ford who is guilty here; most major automakers have been experimenting with more complex motorized, electronic door handles, especially on their flagship electric cars, and problems with them have been disturbingly common.
It’s not even just the cars’ owners that are the victims here; in some cases it’s bad enough that the companies themselves have been getting blowback. Volkswagen is a perfect example of this, since they recently had to do a full stop-sale and recall of almost 100,000 ID.4 cars because their advanced electronic door handles aren’t water resistant enough, and moisture could get in and cause shorts on the internal circuit board that could cause malfunctions that make the doors open at unwanted times.
Now, the very fact that door handles even have a circuit board at all should have been the first warning that the world was heading out of balance. What exactly are the benefits of the ID.4’s complex door handle? Well, here, you can watch this little video showing the three ways to open an ID.4 door and have your question answered!
After watching that, I think your question should be well answered, and that answer is fuck-all. That’s what the benefits are to the complex electronic door handle of the VW ID.4: fuck-all. Nothing. You can, what, open it with a little button instead of pulling up on the handle? Which, as you see, you can also do, because the stupid electronic button needs a whole secondary backup system to open the door.
Who is impressed by pushing the little button instead of just lifting the handle? Who thinks this is cool? Who is impressed by this, and if they are, why are they allowed to drive at all? Because that’s a person who will cross four lanes of traffic because they thought they saw something shiny.
VW has solved door handles, years ago. Decades ago. I have a 2010 VW Tiguan I’ve complained about here because it’s such a steaming pile, but you know what hasn’t given me an ounce of trouble in all the years I’ve had that pile of shit? The door handles. They work every single time I touch them. They have remote locking and unlocking, they can be locked/unlocked with a key if needed, they work if the car has a dead battery, they may even have a little light in there? I don’t remember exactly, because I never fucking have to think about them, because they just work.
If the ID.4 had the identical door handles as my 2010 Tiguan, you know how that would have affected the car? VW wouldn’t have had to recall 100,000 of them, that’s how. And everyone who owned one would get in and out of them just fine and never think about it. Like hashem intended.
Do you remember a while back when my neighbor’s Tesla Model Y had a similar 12V power problem and its door handles refused to work as well? Using the emergency door release resulted in this:
The stupid car cracked its own window. Because it had inane power door handles that introduce a lot of complex electronics and motors and bullshit, all to accomplish the same damn thing my 1973 Beetle accomplishes with its crude, mechanical door handles. Opening the damn door.
We are in a time of crisis. The idea that modern cars need door handles that “present” themselves, like a baboon in heat, is one of the most insipid developments in automotive culture. I was looking for a little video that showed an example of the Tesla Model S’s door handles presenting themselves, but all I found were videos complaining about the handles not working, like this one:
Look at what an ass-pain that is. And for what? The door handle pops out when you approach it? Who gives a shit? If this sort of thing is important to you, maybe it’s time to sit down and really re-evaluate who you are and what you have become. This is a staggering amount of complexity for zero actual benefits [Ed note: I did attempt to explain to Jason that there’s reduced drag from flush door handles, which is an aerodynamic improvement. He was not impressed and suggested people just design regular door handles that are more aero friendly – MH]. It actually uses power, costs more money to build, and when it breaks it’s far more expensive to repair, it has the potential to trap people and pets and babies in cars, and for what? You feel like a big shot because your car curtseys when you approach it? That’s fucking sad.
Lexus had these, too, and again, I’ve never been able to figure out why they exist:
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They’re sure not easier to use. Look at this, Ford has a whole page about how to use their stupid Mach-E door handles–there’s a video, too:
This is a design failure, full stop. If you have to explain how to use an essential, basic control that people have been using for decades, you have failed as a designer. Did Ford ever need informational bulletins about how to use the door handles on their cars at any other time in history? No, they didn’t because door handles didn’t use to be so deeply, embarrassingly stupid.
Nobody was asking for this. There was no outcry for door handles that were more complex in every way and had the potential to lock our kids in cars, helplessly. Nobody was dreaming of needing a fucking jumpstart to open a car door. Nobody had visions of cars in junkyards with unopenable doors or emergency door releases that break windows or having to wait for some little motor to reveal the damn door handle.
Nobody wants this, nobody cares. People just want simple door handles that work, regardless of whether or not the car has power or is running or anything. Remote locking and unlocking is fine, but that’s it.
Do you hear me, carmakers? I’m giving you fair warning: no more of this bullshit. Knock it off. Give us good, normal, unpowered door handles again or so help me, I’ll form some kind of lobbying group and we’ll put these trapped babies’ pictures on the internet and some CEOs will go to fucking jail, I mean it.
Enough already. You’ve had your fun, now knock it off.
My Neighbor’s Tesla Model Y Shattered Its Window Because Of A Bafflingly Bad Design
Does Anyone Actually Like Power Interior Door Handles?
What A Tesla Model 3 Has In Common With A 1969 Pontiac Grand Prix And A 1947 Cisitalia 202
It’s something how needlessly complex some things have gotten, it makes me wonder if some makers really are penny wise and pound stupid. Not like I have numbers, but it feels like they do things that result in higher complexity and you would think higher cost when a cheaper, simpler solution would work. It’s one thing if it’s a luxury brand, but it’s trickled down. Again, it may be cheaper and I just don’t know the overall cost picture.
Actual Mach-E owner here: I can count on one hand the number of times people haven’t intuitively figured out to press the glowing white button to open the door without ever having been in a Mach-E before. Even my 5-year-old knew what to do, and a small side benefit of door poppers is she can actually open the door by herself since it pops out the door enough for her to swing open. She’s not strong enough to open the similarly sized doors on my wife’s car with standard door handles.
Also, all the door handles inside operate both mechanically and electrically on all four doors. Same lever does both. There’s no sill-less windows like the Teslas where mechanically opening the doors can damage the seals.
I will say the car did lock me out once, but nobody was inside, and the issue was down to my “phone-as-a-key” app not handshaking properly with the car, not the 12V system. Ford does have fail safes for this by punching in the number code on the door to get in, then literally typing in a login password on the infotainment to start the car. My problem was I hadn’t had the car long enough to memorize the passwords and forgot them. My wife brought the actual key and everything was fine.
The original post never mentioned trying the keypad on the door. If the 12V battery really was dead, that wouldn’t have helped, but it’s a more physical way to get into the car if the wireless key and phone apps aren’t working.
I agree that door handles are getting weird, but the Mach-E doesn’t have door handles period, just buttons.
Current era of automative features makes me think we’ve run out of features worth adding-and this is one of the more egregious examples since it’s a safety problem. I truly can’t think of one piece of modern tech beyond apple/android maps integration and blind spot warnings that actually felt like they improved my driving experience and safety.
Given the argument that NHTSA is already overly granular in much of their regulation how have they left this one alone?
In general all this “smart” device tech seems like it’s adding teeny tiny bits of convenience for a huge tradeoff in lost reliability-my spouse (an architect) was just telling me a story she heard from a general contractor of a high end house with smart lights that were stuck on due to either a hardware or software bug.
The ‘paddle’ style door handles like on late 70’s/ early 80’s AMC’s would work well with minimal aerodynamic penalties. I always thought those looked cool
I hate this general trend towards the electrification of items that have no business being electronic.. I’m looking at you again HVAC vents!
I heard that one of the reasons electronic door handles are becoming a thing is.. wait for it.. safety?!? Apparently some manufacturers are designing their ultrasonic sensors and blind spot monitoring system to disable a door release if it detects a car is approaching from behind (for example if you are parallel parked and there is a car approaching quickly from behind in the adjacent lane of traffic). In that scenario, it would prevent an occupant from opening the door into the path of an oncoming car/cyclist.
Somehow this seems like a terrible “solution” to a problem that rarely exists. The tangential problems that arise from this solution seem to far outweigh the small benefit.
Another note about the electrification crap: When we got our Toyota Crown luxury car a year ago, we only received one key, because there was a chip shortage, and “These keys have the computing power of a cell phone!” (It did become available three months later.)
What does this personalized key remember? The seat position and side mirrors. Does it remember that my partner uses full seat and steering wheel heat when I only want one level (or none) of each? Does it remember that I set the thermostat lower? Does it remember to turn off the radio when my wife is in the car, but return to my station when I’m in the driver’s seat? No. No. No.
It does want to interrupt access to the music on my phone to update my phone’s communication with the car. (Translation: Upload my data.)
Thanks, Toyota. Nice use of all that damn computing power!!!
I love it when salespeople talk out their ass… all the computing power of a cell phone from 2002 maybe.
Chevy Equinox EV has “auto presenting” door handles that I feel will fail given enough time. However, they at least have normal door handles on the inside and have a keyed way to get in should all else fail. There is no way I would buy a vehicle that you cannot get in with a key, even with a dead battery.
Just over Thanksgiving, my parent got in their Lexus with two guests to go visit us, and the car wouldn’t start. When they tried to get out, their electric door openers didn’t work. They were in the garage with cell signal, so they looked up the location of the manual handles. Not only were the manual handles difficult to reach, you had to pull the manual handle TWICE to get it to open! Programmed from a lifetime of door handles, they kept trying to pull the handle just once. They were stuck for 30 minutes. Three intelligent adults, who are competent and embraced a variety of electronics in their lives.
Good thing it wasn’t an emergency. Drove into a pond? Just look up the user manual online to find out how to get out…..
WHY are dealers not required to go through the manual door release before any vehicle is sold is beyond me!
Edit: The starter (and door) battery access is in the back hatch of their SUV. The tailgate is also electronic, without a manual override, since there are no passengers back there. They can’t get back there to charge the damn thing!
We bought a new 2010 Chevy Malibu years ago. When it was about 2 years old, with low mileage, I couldn’t open the driver’s door from inside by pulling the interior remote handle. Turns out, the interior remote handle mechanism (and I assume exterior handles) were electronic switches intended to activate the door latch. I don’t know if the lack of a mechanical actuator is a more common practice across manufacturers today, but stupid crap like this was happening 15 years ago, and most likely earlier on certain models.
My 2012 Prius v (and similar 3rd gen Priuses) have mechanical door handles…except the trunk, where pushing the button outside toggles an electronic mechanism.
This would be tolerable (still definitely not ideal), except that the 12v battery is in the hatch…which means that if it dies, you have to crawl through the inside with a flathead screwdriver, pry off a small panel, and manually actuate it that way. Hasn’t happened to me yet, but not looking forward to if/when it does.
I recently sold the 2008 Cayenne I bought used a few years ago, and it had an annoying unsolved problem that caused it not to intermittently not start. But to add frustration to an already super annoying problem the “ignition” was just a switch on the dash where you slotted the key and not a physical lock on the ignition column. This meant there was no way to turn the steering wheel if the steering column didn’t receive a signal from the ignition switch. Porsche had built a failsafe safety mechanism to put the trans in neutral inside the shifter console but nothing for the steering and getting it onto a flatbed tow truck without being able to having any steering input was a major PITA, I’m sure that tow truck driver was cursing me inside his head the entire time he fought with it. But, I wonder if this is an issue with any car with keyless start and drive…which is almost all of them now.
Being able to quickly and easily open a car door seems like an essential element of the design. Ya’ know, in case of emergencies and such…
Backup cameras are required safety gear, but exiting your vehicle without power is an afterthought.
I have been saying this for years, and said it on a certain other car enthusiast site, back before it became Listicles R Us:
https://jalopnik.com/comment-of-the-day-buttons-edition-1825059647
And though I was talking about the controls inside the car at the time, electronic-only door latches weren’t such a thing then, and it wasn’t front of mind. I can tell you, it’s pretty damned front of mind now. If something electronic goes kerflooey with your electronic-only door controls, you might have no operable door controls at all. At least with mechanical door controls, you’ve got a got really good chance that some other door control is still in working condition.
This is a failure of too-advanced design. We’ve become too smart for our own good, installing mechanisms that are super-convenient right up until the moment that they are not. It’s time to take a step back. Because in this case, a step back is a step in the right direction.
I enjoy the angry Torch articles
to MH & JT about the flush door handles: It is very easy to just have those flush door handles be aerodynamic while still being mechanical. I mean, they even have the backup of you can push in the one side to pull the tab if it doesn’t present itself.
I think this would be a good compromise, no? So JT’s point about “just make regular door handles more aerodynamic” is very apt.
I don’t remember precisely which model it was; I think it might have been a Fiat or a Corvette, but there were a couple of examples in which the door latch mechanism was a small flap at the trailing edge of the door, with a little indent in the leading edge of the panel behind to give clearance for fingers. Aerodynamically speaking it was essentially nothing, but practically speaking it was functional, minimal, and no less reliable than any other mechanical latch.
Other designs are comparable, like the old rectangular AMC latches, the C3 Corvette that you poked your fingers into the top of the door, a Fiat model with a pull bar but comfortable indent that meant the pull bar barely projected beyond the surface of the panel. They get the job done without unnecessary gimmickry and, importantly, incorporate a lot of independent redundancy by each being its own complete system, easily understood and fixed, and not subject to some centralized failure.
It’s time for a little regulation on this score.
Not with the current, ‘gut all government agencies’ administration.
The Subaru XT had nice, flush, MECHANICAL door handles in the ’80s.
This was solved in 1968. Grand prix had a door lever that was flush and you would push one side with your thumb and the rest would come out of the door enough to grab and open. Both aerodynamic and mechanical. Peugeot and Aston have both used the same tech since then.
Yup. My brother’s 1970 Grand Prix SJ had the same handles. While the area to press was proud to the door surface, that mechanical handle design could easily be redesigned to be completely flush.
I’m in a Prologue in small part because the Hondified Chevy has normal door handles. Ok, it was a very small reason, but in hindsight, it should have been a bigger reason to choose the Chonda.
This was dumb as hell when Tesla did it and its just as dumb when every other auto maker proceeds to lemming their way off the cliff after them. Why is it that we wouldn’t tolerate a store not having adequate emergency exits but we’re just ok with the steel boxes we spend a large chunk of our lives in not?
Partially, probably because a fire/death/etc. in any one of those cars wouldn’t make national news or something the same way a big-box store burning down and taking every life in it would if all the exits were sealed for some reason.
Not saying this shouldn’t be addressed, because it absolutely should–but every individual car incident like this is unlikely to take a comparable number of lives. (The cumulative is a separate matter, but cars are still getting safer on average by other metrics so who knows?)
This seems to be one more reason that just driving a Series 80 Land Cruiser until I die is the best possible automotive decision I can make. Then my kids can keep driving it until they pass it on.
If I were in an accident, I’d still rather be in that Mustang Mach E.
i had the cable snap for the driver’s side front door on my wife’s 2012 Mazda Mazda3. Also, at one point my 05 Legacy had decided that the door latch for the driver’s side door decided to get stuck in closed position, so the door could not be opened. the 92 accord had an issue with the bushing for the interior door handle that caused it to work intermittently.
Also the legacy had a habit of locking itself while running after brushing the snow off the car and putting the brush on the backseat. By the time you go to the front door it just locked itself.
I get the frustration. I’m old enough and have owned enough GMs to remember at some point having to crawl across the passenger seat to open the door. But! A quick trip to parts store, at least back then and you’d have a new part to put in. No computer, cheap, easy.
This truly is a feature that really makes no objective sense to me but adds complexity, cost, and point of failure.
Yes. My Beretta I got when I was 16 promptly had its drivers-side flush pillar-mounted door handle break. I had to crawl through the passenger side for a few days while I waited for an aftermarket one to arrive from 2006-era eBay.
The Mazda and Subaru were dealer only items. Also, none of those cars had the unlock on the passenger door, and the key would only unlock the driver’s door. Luckily the remotes never stopped working at the same time i had the issues
I forgot about that part. Another cost reduction eliminating the passenger lock (ironically the only lock used to be on the passenger side).
Yeah, my ’01 SW2 had a latch that would get stuck open if I pulled it, so I was either climbing in the passenger side or NASCARing my way in through the driver’s side. At least in those cases, though, there were three other doors and a rear hatch I could have climbed in.
We should go back to physical latches, and we should ALSO go back to accessible keyholes on both front doors. A dead battery and a busted latch on the driver’s side means you’re not getting in when there’s no keyhole on the passenger’s side.
Yes, but in those instances, the failure in each of those doors didn’t cause the other doors on the car to also fail.
Clap, clap, clap.
Amen..
The best door handles are no door handles. I used to own a Citroen AX and an Elise, and have no door handles on my Europa. Simple, light, aerodynamic and mechanical.
If you absolutely have to have door handles the Emira has entirely flush mechanical handles.
There is no reason beyond marketing to justify electric handles. But marketing sells cars, so here we are.
I’ve just realised that my 90’s tape deck had electric opening and closing cassette thingies. Similarly pointless, but much harder to kill a baby with.
How do you open a door with no handles?
With the AX you unlatch it with a lever hidden on the rear edge of the door, and then pull on the door. The old Lotuseses have a thumb button to unlatch it and then you pull on the door
But not impossible….
I’m imagining a contraption like a line of dominos but getting larger and more dangerous the closer they loom over the baby.
Press eject on the remote and clatter, clatter, clatter, bang, boom, thud.
I was going to end on squish, but I moved the baby at the last second.
Even if they still make their cars random motorized door handle crap, there should ALWAYS be a manual override that does not need power. I don’t care how high end or reliable it seems to be, there should always be a mechanical backup. Frankly this should be law and not just a good idea.
I am one month into ownership of a brand new Mach-E and do really like the car. But this does give me pause. I was aware of the no door handle of course, but not having little kids I am not as worried about it. I this results in some kind of recall to add a solution.
Even if the 12V dies, there is a spot to attach jumper cables inside the front bumper to apply 12V power. It doesn’t really address the issue of excessively complex door opening, but there is at least a method better than busting out a window.
If you happen to have 12v battery lying around that is.
AAA surely did
How about Ford roadside assistance?
Which is fine as long as you get stranded somewhere with cell service.
I think every vehicle with those stoopid door handles ought to have some sort of access point to recharge the 12V battery or to provide enough juice to open those doors.
The Mach-E has one in the passenger side of the front bumper
I’d prefer that you still have a physical key that you can use to unlock the car and a mechanical door handle to open it. I have a 19 Volvo S90 and while a lot of crap is done by wire, you can still pull out the door handle and stick a key into a lock and unlock it, pull the handle and get in.
I don’t understand why automakers are doing stupid shit like this. It’s become so difficult to just put a modern car into neutral anymore so it can be moved that you need to take some cars apart to do this!
Cars break, electronics fail, batteries die, cars hit things and sometimes things hit them. These are situations that are common and WILL happen. Why are automakers removing the fail-safe means to address these issues? It’s not only that they’re removing them from the hands of typical owners, they’re making them extremely difficult for those who have to perform services to these cars. When you have to crawl underneath and take a bunch of crap apart to just get one into neutral, that’s a problem! Like nobody has ever had their car die in a parking garage where tow trucks can’t fit. Worst of all, they’re all making the procedures for doing simple things different.
This is where there needs to be standards applied. Ford has a jump point behind the rear bumper, where does GM put theirs? Bet it’s not the same place. It needs to be and should become common knowledge.
You sound angry, Jason. Good for you! Everyone whines about government “interfering” with our cars. Pass a law that says all cars have to have mechanical door handles and I’ll stand up and cheer.
*Government proceeds to outlaw mechanical door handles*
Yes to all of of this! I love the fact that in the Model 3 manual it says your suppose to use your fist to “forcefully bump the door handle to break and release the ice buildup” when the door handles freezes (which they always do, especially on the right side of the car that’s exposed to the north wind).
so … punch it.