My first car was a 1988 Buick, which after a while developed a problem where it would start to idle extremely rough and sometimes stall completely when stopped at a red light. When that happened I’m sure I had to put it in neutral before I could restart it. But I don’t know if the starter interlock was something that was required back then or if it was something automakers did voluntarily.
Here’s the thing- modern cars work the same whether you stick a key into a slot and twist it, or push a button. Why? Back in the day, when you turned the key you were physically operating a set of switches controlling the various operating modes. OFF was, well, OFF. ACC (accessory) sent power to a limited number of circuits, e.g. to the radio and maybe a couple of other things. The next step was RUN, which powered up everything in the car as if it was running. The last step was START, which physically closed the switch sending power to the starter solenoid to start the engine (and cut power to non-essential accessories while cranking.) once the engine fired, the key returned to RUN.
But cars have not had hard-wired ignition switches (in general) for a long time now. I think my 2011 Ranger is among the last, and that was because it was last redesigned in the 1990s.
In a modern car, the BCM/PCM control engine start. if you have a push button, all the button does is signal the BCM to tell the PCM “engage the starter solenoid until you detect the engine is running, and then disengage it.” If you have a key, all twisting the key does is signal the BCM to tell the PCM “engage the starter solenoid until you detect the engine is running, and then disengage it.” In fact, all you have to do is turn the key briefly and release it, and the starter will operate as long as necessary. So a push button switch is cheaper than a lock cylinder and rotary switch, and doesn’t wear out like a lock cylinder will.
Also, the PCM will have protection logic and stop attempting engine start if if fails more than three times in a row to prevent overheating the starter.
If someone takes the fob out of the vehicle while running, you will (or should!) get an alert and chime saying “no key detected” but the vehicle will continue to run. You just won’t be able to start it again.
you could only ever do that on cars with manual transmissions without clutch safety interlocks (or with disabled interlocks.) Wouldn’t work with automatics because the starter doesn’t turn the engine over fast enough for the transmission’s hydraulic pump to generate enough pressure to engage gear.
The car companies do not reason. They make what makes the most money. In a free-market economy, they cannot push things on people that they don’t want in an attempt to make money, because someone else will sell exactly what people want. If people didn’t want these, or didn’t want to pay for it, then customers would flock to the companies that offered cars without it. That’s not what happened. You need to understand the consumers’ reasoning, not the car companies’ reasoning, and there is a load of that in this thread.
My Infinity Q50 does this too.
As for the relay/replay attack that the Faraday pouch is intended to thwart…I’m aware of one single incident. I get the impression that this is extremely rare and not something the average car owner needs to lose sleep (or money) over.
I guess the concern is that “75-year-old father” won’t notice the dashboard warning before he parks the car and shuts the engine off - at which point he’s in a bit of a pickle.
Tesla Model 3. And it is awesome. Makes even keyfobs feel like ancient technology. No starter button, either–just get in, “shift” into drive, and go. When you stop, you put it in park and leave. The car locks and goes to sleep when you go out of range.
There’s a credit card sized backup key in case your phone dies or for valets, etc. But I’ve almost never needed it.
In my car there’s a very loud annoying chime when the engine’s running but the key’s not there. Unless the 75-year-old father is deaf he would know something was wrong before he got out of the driveway.
I guess that’s not true of all cars though, as your previous story shows.
Not true. Relay attacks are extremely common today, and probably responsible for tens of thousands of thefts per year. That said, the problem is likely to go away with fixes from the automakers–in particular, disabling the radios when the fob has not been moved in some time. The fob still works when bouncing around in your pocket, but not in the middle of the night sitting on your nightstand (which is when relay attacks are likely to take place).
Not all automakers have implemented this fix yet, but it’s cheap and easy, so I’d expect pretty much everyone to have implemented it within a few years.
To add to your discomfort, have you ever tried “programming” a backup fob using your current one and your car? You need to buy a special device for that. I don’t know how easy it is in later models, but the instructions for my 2008 Altima are daunting enough to keep me from trying it. I could end up with my current fob nonoperational, and having my car towed.
I have a 2018 VW Tiguan and it will leave the radio on even when you shut off the engine via the push-button. It does not shut off the radio until you open the driver door.
I bought my Prius in early 2010, and I think I’ve changed the batteries in my two fobs three times since then. Really simple to do.
I love keyless ignition (like almost everyone else here) and hate renting a car with a key. I open the door to the car with the fob stick the key in my pocket, sit down, and take the key out of my pocket again. Grrr.
But I had keyless ignition back in 1973. I had a Galaxie 500 parked on Memorial Drive in Cambridge that someone really wanted. They scooped out the ignition and got defeated by the steering lock. When this happened the second time I wired a switch and a push button to the ignition and stuck them in my glove compartment. Voila, keyless ignition.
They finally towed the car, which was fine since it was a piece of shit. I replaced it with a much better car.
A Pinto.
Now that you mention it, that was how it worked in the Chevy Malibu rental car I drove a few months ago. Hmm, maybe this is actually a setting I can change somewhere in the infotainment system. Given how customizable these things are nowadays it’s worth checking.
My experience is with Nissan. For driveway moments, hit the button to turn the car off. Then release the brake pedal, then push the start button. This should turn on the accessories only.
Mine’s a little overzealous and keeps powering the entertainment console even if it is not in use at time of engine off. Then I get a battery discharge warning after a couple of minutes.
OK. Then turn yourself off already!
I actually managed to accidentally lock my keyless fob inside the car - something which is supposed to be impossible.
What happened was that my bunch of keys, including the fob, were in the front pocket of my laptop bag. As was my habit, I keylessly opened the boot (trunk), threw the bag in, and closed the boot. So far, so normal.
This time, when I closed the boot, the car locked itself up again, flashed the hazards, did the whole “safe and sound” routine. I stood there, tried all the door handles and the boot again, and nothing. The car was locked, with the keyless fob inside. I was 30 miles from home. There was swearing…
Luckily, my wallet and phone were in my pocket rather than the bag, so I was able to get a train home, and a lift from the station. I returned the next day with the spare keyfob, and the car opened up as normal.
There are two prevailing theories as to how this happened. The first is that there was some kind of failure by the car to detect that the key was inside the boot, so it locked itself when the boot hatch closed. The other is that when I threw the bag into the boot, the key fob nudged up against something and the “lock” button was pressed, just as I was closing the boot.
So it’s unlikely, but not impossible, that a keyless fob can get locked inside a car. My fob stays in a pocket now, rather than my bag. Still a fan of the tech, though.
My previous car came with a fob. I carried it for a week or so, then got tired of having it randomly locking/unlocking the car, arming/disarming the alarm, &c, and threw it in the junk drawer in the kitchen. When I got my new car, the fob went straight to the junk drawer.
Only if my 75 year old father is somehow driving even though he’s deaf. Because every car I’ve been in with a keyless start bings as soon as the fob leaves the car- in addition to the dashboard warning.
And regarding the size of the fob- my fob is the same size as the remote from my last vehicle which controlled the alarm and the remote starter- and had the key needed to actually drive the vehicle attached. So this fob is actually smaller than the remote plus key
I had to drive a company van a few weeks ago and sat there for three seconds looking for the nonexistent start button. I had to reach into my pocket. It was awful.
It’s terrible on the starter but I did it a few times. The street I lived on at the time was graded high in the middle. It was apparently enough of an angle to pool the fuel on the opposite side of the tank from the pump intake when it was close to empty. I gave it a tiny bit of clutch and used starter power to pull into the middle of the street and get the engine started. It was a 1989 Dodge Daytona.
Ford and GM cars will also sound the horn if you exit the vehicle and close the door while it’s on, and the fob is no longer inside the car.