I’ve always preferred what would now be described as a steam punk car. I would rather have manual controls for air/heat and switches to turn fans on and off.
Tesla and other high-end vehicle buyers want the the highest end tech they can get and an electric door opener is on that list. If I bought a car like this (and it’s not just Tesla) I would immediately learn how open a door manually.
There’s another issue with this truck and that’s the side windows. They can’t be broken with a glass-break tool in an emergency. Maybe a fire crew has an ax that will pull the window out but it’s NOT going to happen by a passenger. If the door jams in an accident and the vehicle catches fire it traps the people in the vehicle. Maybe one of the other doors can be opened but time is critical in a fire. I don’t think the truck should have been certified with these windows. I thought about starting a thread on this when it first came out.
I think this page from the manual is clearer, although the process to open the rear doors manually seems unnecessarily complex. And I think the thing you need to pull on to open the door manually should be in neon orange, given that you might need to open the door in an emergency situation.
I think it should be a regular door handle that unlocks when you open it regardless of car electrical status. Safety standards have to be based on an assumption that someone unfamiliar with the car will use it.
Huh. Not sure which Teslas I’ve been a passenger in, but that wasn’t my experience. I used the button, and i didn’t realize there was a manual latch. I found it recently, just groping around. So maybe it’s more obvious on one model than another? I’ve probably been a passenger in most of the standard Tesla sedans.
Thank you for carpooling with me today, for those sitting in the rear, please watch this safety video on how to escape in the case of adverse circumstances.
Wow, you have to pull up the bottom of a junk bin to fish out a release pull. That’s a seriously bad design. NOBODY who is new to the car would find that.
There’s not much they can’t do with their clever brains and nimble paws. At my previous house, special “raccoon-proof” bins were distributed to contain “wet” kitchen garbage to be used for composting. They had complicated latches that I suspect even some people couldn’t figure out. Raccoons had no problem with them. Embarrassed city officials had to recall all the bins from every household and issue new ones.
I have seen quotes, real or not, from various Interior employees along the lines of “It’s a narrow line between the smartest bears and the dumbest tourists.”
