ADUK Archive

Many newer vehicles on the market now have features that let you lock the vehicle when your inside and travelling, some even will self lock when in motion, presumably to prevent hijacking.

However I have a concern about this, that if you have an accident, or fire and all your passengers are not able to unlock the doors then a third party, ie witness cannot gain access to the vehicle to administer 1st aid or get the passengers out in a fire until the fire service have come to cut them out.

So what are peoples thoughts about this?

Can / Should a vehicle automatically unlock the car when there is an accident (ie deployment of the airbags)

If it is to prevent hijacking, should the vehicle doors be unlocked for motorway or rural driving where the risks of this are reduced / removed and locked only for urban driving 30mph or below.

'Who cares?' would be my first thought.

It's very marginal. You need an accident where the car is sufficiently damaged that the electronics are dead, insufficiently deformed that the doors stay shut, all the occupants are incapacitated and someone is about to help.

To take it slightly more seriously, the doors are part of the structure of the car, and having them shut in a crash is important to safety. Having them locked is probably a minor contributor to keeping them shut during the forces of an accident. This is probably a better motivator than preventing hijacking.

Finally, I believe some do unlock after an accident.

IIRC they are set to unlock automatically if there is an accident / airbags going off.

Dom

I must say, having doors that lock automatically over a certain speed would be handy to prevent those mistaken door openings whilst in motion.

This exact thing happened to a friend of mine, as their car was a 2006 Peugeot 807 with electric sliding doors, and the button to open them were located right below the control to operate the electric windows.
Very simple - unless you're not quite looking, and accidentally prod the door button, rather than the window button, then in which case, the door will just start to trundle open, even when the car is travelling at 70 mph...
Shortly after this occurrence, the family decided to change cars, sharpish.

But I have no idea why Peugeot wouldn't think to include some sort of system that disabled the electric door system at speeds above 10 mph, but not lock it (as the door still had pull-handles in case the electrical system was too slow or wouldn't work), so to prevent this kind of thing from happening.

TheInsanity1234 wrote:I must say, having doors that lock automatically over a certain speed would be handy to prevent those mistaken door openings whilst in motion.

I would agree with you there, but i think that in some way in the accident scenario that's even worse because then you cant get out of a burning car for example.

The more i think about this, and i have thought about this before is to get an emergency hammer for the car, then my occupants can use it to get out, or i can assist another car in trouble.

I doubt you need a hammer to put a side window through. Invest in hardened elbow patches if it's a serious problem.

My daughters Cooper S automatically locks at 10mph and my sons Ibiza locks at 15mph. Both automatically unlock after a crash. My Fiesta doesn't lock automatically but I think the wifes Octavia does.

TheInsanity1234 wrote:I must say, having doors that lock automatically over a certain speed would be handy to prevent those mistaken door openings whilst in motion.

Ha ha - not necessarily! My sister's Citroen had this feature, except one morning the car was frozen. She unlocked the car, only to find the handle would pull but the door was frozen shut. Being 6.45 in the morning, dark, and about to leave for work minus first coffee of the day as she'd had to defrost the car, she thought nothing more of it, climbed over the passenger seat and drove to work. Motorway hits, rush hour queues arrive and the door obviously defrosts (just apparently not the locking mechanism. Queues move off, as does the Citroen, and once up to cruising speed the driver's door pops open. Naturally, she brakes to allow herself time to grab said door, thus enduring the handle is flung further away from her in her efforts. All this time the interior light has come on to say 'there's a door open' so everyone flying by can see exactly who it is scrabbling with their driver's door on the m6. Made me chuckle anyway!

My Leon locks at 10mph, but supposedly opens after a crash. I have to say, I do wonder whether it would open if it went into many of the deep water filled ditches round here, at which point the electric windows would also likely stop working...

Jeremy Clarkson's solution to doors that don't open.
Hammer.

Reported conversation between Major Archie Frazer-Nash and a prospective customer for one of his eponymous vehicles. In response to a question from the customer, there was a roar:-

"Door? DOOR?? Whaddya want a door for!!"

skodatezzer wrote:Reported conversation between Major Archie Frazer-Nash and a prospective customer for one of his eponymous vehicles. In response to a question from the customer, there was a roar:-

"Door? DOOR?? Whaddya want a door for!!"

Ah, good old Majors!

trashbat wrote:I doubt you need a hammer to put a side window through. Invest in hardened elbow patches if it's a serious problem.

Have you ever tried breaking a side window with your elbow, fist , head? I'd suggest a window punch, or combined seatbelt cutter/ punch is useful to carry, not just for self escape but to assist if you come across an accident. Thankfully fires in RTC's are relatively rare but yes they do happen. In my experience when attending these type of incidents it tends to be that the person has either been incapacitated by the crash or is physically trapped rather than a locked door preventing their exit as most if not all automatically doors will open when the handle is operated from inside.

I've tried punching the side window of a car (I was an angry 10 year old when that happened), and it's obvious that considerable force is needed, and not everybody has the upper body/arm strength to be able to do that.
Hell, my 87 year old grandmother wouldn't be able to squash a fly.
My mum wouldn't be able to punch a window through, and I doubt the rest of the family could.

Also, the doors provide a bigger opening to jump out of so that's something to think about.

TheInsanity1234 wrote:I've tried punching the side window of a car (I was an angry 10 year old when that happened), and it's obvious that considerable force is needed, and not everybody has the upper body/arm strength to be able to do that.
Hell, my 87 year old grandmother wouldn't be able to squash a fly.
My mum wouldn't be able to punch a window through, and I doubt the rest of the family could.

Also, the doors provide a bigger opening to jump out of so that's something to think about.

You want one of these then:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/LifeHammer-Orig ... B000BN3A4Y

Dom

dombooth wrote:

TheInsanity1234 wrote:I've tried punching the side window of a car (I was an angry 10 year old when that happened), and it's obvious that considerable force is needed, and not everybody has the upper body/arm strength to be able to do that.
Hell, my 87 year old grandmother wouldn't be able to squash a fly.
My mum wouldn't be able to punch a window through, and I doubt the rest of the family could.

Also, the doors provide a bigger opening to jump out of so that's something to think about.

You want one of these then:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/LifeHammer-Orig ... B000BN3A4Y

Dom

Ah yes, that's exactly what I had in my head.