It’s also so glass doesn’t shatter on your passengers if a rock comes at it while you are driving. There’s pros and cons. It’s not unbreakable either (definitely tougher), they did break it to get this young lady out after all. It’s not my favourite feature. My other non-tesla car has it too though. As did the car the Tesla replaced.
It’s not buried under the speaker grill on my model Y. Its under a rubber thing that has a grab handle and then a big bright red tab. Wouldn’t be my pick for the design of the year, but it’s there. Sure as shit needs to be a sticker on the door panel illustrating that though.
My FIL’s Corvette has the exact same style of latching. It has a manual override, but I’d challenge someone to find it without googling it, especially if it’s dark. But that cars made by Chevrolet, so we don’t do them dirty, now do we!?
Also they hit a cement barrier after bouncing off a guard rail at over 200km/hr. So I mean yeah, don’t think those doors were opening even if the latches were made of Oreo cookies. Not to make light of what’s obviously a horrible event that resulted from some shitty choices made, but there’s also pictures being used in all the press articles that show a side view of the car that’s pretty clearly being used to add to this all. It’s pretty clever framing, until you look at this car from the front and realize more than half of it is squished/missing.
It wasn’t until after I owned a Tesla that I realized just how bad this shit is when it comes to the press articles about them (ignoring the fact that gigachad Elon is currently acting like a skid). Let’s also just completely gloss over the fact that someone survived this accident (with relatively light injuries), which is sort of a miracle considering this vehicle was estimated to be travelling in excess of 200km/hr at accident beginning. Wonder what the results of a fossil fuel burning domestic car in the same situation. I mean let’s not actually find out, but just food for thought.
Just for the record, my model Y had fully functioning manual overrides on all doors, frunks, trunks and even the charging port. The back ones are actually a pretty stupid design, no denying that, but they are there.
Just one thing I’d like to point out, it looks like that, sure. Notice how it’s missing the entire B pillar? That didn’t burn off, they had to do extensive cutting.
Also this is how it looked from a side view: https://toronto.citynews.ca/2024/10/24/four-dead-electric-vehicle-crash-toronto/amp/
The accident was at high speed. That car is mangled. This is the press making a very big deal out of facts that aren’t entirely straight (there’s no way to open the doors manually! - when there is), and it’s heavily reliant on the words of a 74 year old man who’s feeding into this. It’s definitely food for thought, but it’s also a lot of hysteria. That car is hella bent, the doors probably weren’t opening regardless of the door mechanisms, and yeah EVs require a different approach to fighting their fires. Fossil fuel powered cars burn too, eh? And they can be a real bitch to put out as well, people burn alive in them too.
Regardless of the arguments, it sucks that people had to die here. I think it speaks well to the safety of the vehicle though, that someone survived. I do agree on the glass, but there’s a whole lot of vehicles that use that type of glass, so again Tesla takes the beating meanwhile half the manufacturers today use it. Everyone wants whisper quiet interiors, so that sound insulation has to come from somewhere.
There’s a lot of cars that use this same design, which I agree is annoying. I also have a Mini Cooper and it’s the exact same damn problem. It’s always a bugger to wash them too because water gets inside the window trim and then every time you open the door it smears water along the bottom and the top, because the window recesses to be closed.
Make sure you tell them that the hammer probably won’t work great at first, as the windows are laminated, so they are a bitch to break. You have to keep at it, in the exact same spot. I don’t love the laminated windows, it’s a gift (when broke, they stick together and dont shower the passengers with glass + they have sound/noise advantages), and a curse (they are a bastard to break when you need them to break).
It’s sort of changed. There’s a big bend in the rubber now (which the passengers strangely think is a door handle), and it is an obvious grab point. Underneath is the panel, but it’s not one that you have to grab with your fingernails anymore, it’s got a big red tab that pops right off with the littlest pressure, exposing the wire. To me it’s fairly obvious, but I still think there should be a mandatory sticker on the panel. It’s not the greatest system either, but it exists whereas these news articles are trying to shape the narrative that it doesn’t (just like when that lady drunk drove into the pond). Probably isn’t the worst idea to ditch the rubber in the pocket over the override, that part is pretty stupid and doesn’t really serve a purpose anyways.
It definitely needs to be marked better. The latches are definitely there, but I think the thing that sucks with them, is the owners generally understand where this stuff is, but the passengers often don’t. I’m not denying that’s not an issue, it is. Especially when everyone else is dead. It also doesn’t help that everyone often stuffs rubber mats in the backdoors that cover over the mechanical switches. I feel like this could be pretty easily solved with a sticker on the door panel, pointing to the latch, but then everyone would probably complain how it looks and some would likely would peel it off. These are the exact same folks that can’t be bothered to read a manual either.
Mechanical latches can break in accidents too though, especially ones that operate on rods, which is lost in the hysteria here. Sometimes the doors just get bent real bad too, like I suspect even if the manual override worked in this door, these young adults hit the barrier at a very high speed, that door was going to have serious damage. You were probably going to have to use Jaws of Life or break the window no matter what. I used to drive an after hours tow truck years ago for a dealer that I worked for, and in quite a number of accidents (especially the high speed ones) the doors were no longer operable. It’s just one of those things
There’s a couple things that I would like to point out here. I am a Tesla owner, not a huge fanboi or anything, but this is another press example of trying to incite fear.
One: this vehicle was travelling over 200km/hr. It hit a cement barrier. That car could have been made of bubble wrap, it wasnt going to be pretty, no matter what.
Two: there is, in fact, a mechanical override latch in Tesla doors. You pull up on the latch at the top of the panel. It looks like a door handle. In fact, most people who are first riders in my car, end up pulling it before they realize there’s a door button there. Which is a pain in the ass because the door window doesn’t automatically roll down when it closes and it can damage the seals. But yeah, there’s a mechanical latch right there for the pulling.
Also there’s other vehicles that have the exact same door systems, but the press also neglects to ever mention that. Corvettes are one that comes immediately to mind.
Again not totally a Tesla fanboi, I bought it before Elon went off the deep end. I do like the car though. Don’t hit shit at 200km/hr or drunk drive into ponds, and you are generally fine.
I have a buddy that I grew up with that does penetration testing. Like I live in a city a whole continent away from home, and I run into him here or there, looking like a random smoking a cigarette outside an office tower or whatever. And thats what he’s doing, he’s on assignment trying to social engineer someone to give him access.
Are you kidding me? Aggressive, unstable and destructive seem to be core tenants for the CEOs of many large scale blue chip firms.
If you want actual penetration defense, you absolutely hire the unstable person. I’m not saying you put him or her in the centre desk on the main floor, let him or her work from an environment where they are most comfortable, and one that supports them best.
If you want window dressing, hire the neat and tidy person, who couldn’t actually penetrate an Excel sheet.
Honestly it’s probably because you are likely in the minority in wanting this, at least according to the car manufacturers. Cell phones haven’t had audio jacks for a few years now. Most iPods are in junk drawers, dying long and slow deaths. Take a look around the next time you are in a crowd, the people with headphones on, like 90% of them are going to be airpods or other Bluetooth style headphones.
Ain’t saying I like it either, don’t get me wrong, but I imagine that’s probably the logic behind it.
It’s apparently quite a mess. Quite a few of the late summer and fall builds went into 3800 production status. That means it’s built, like it’s off the assembly line but sitting before the final inspection staging and shipping. So for some this went on for a couple months, and some people started questioning where the fuck their vettes were, like 3800 status usually doesn’t last for very long.
Then someone in Michigan noticed their OnStar got activated, and pinged the car and it was saying it was in Pontiac, not Bowling Green. So someone apparently went and looked and sure as shit, lot full of vettes. They took a bunch of shots of like heavy security but otherwise the cars just all sitting outside. GM was and is absolutely zipped about what’s going on, it’s under lock and key. Prevailing rumor is they needed heavy rework, some rumors are aimed at something to do with the DCTs, there’s also rumors that the bodies needed heavy reworking. Whatever the issue is, it’s a friggin snafu and a half. The boomers that have their orders sitting there were going thermonuclear because their Vettes have been sitting outside in the rain and snow. They just started getting delivered this past month, so guess we will see if some issues become apparent down the road. It’s maybe still going on too, like some cars are still getting stuck at 3800, and are returning pings a couple hours east of Bowling Green. Not sure I’d touch a late model 23 build, that’s for sure.
My personal car (the second, mostly unused car in our family) is from 2016, and it has nav and everything, but it looks like it’s a commodore. It’s also woefully out of date, my house is in the middle of a cornfield according to my car. Literally unusable, and was pretty much right out of the gates even. Doesn’t work very well with my phone, I’m still able to stream Spotify and skip songs or whatever, but guess how I have to control it? The phone hooked to the cord and sitting on my seat.
My wife’s car, I don’t even think I’ve ever used the navigation. I’m not even really sure how her radio works come to think of it, because it just switches to Android Auto when I start it, and whatever I was doing on my phone, well it’s right there. Spotify starts up, and on the way we go. Don’t even look at it most of the time, if I’m being honest. Super unsafe for sure, the proprietary solution is for sure better (/s)
This would inevitably put the manufacturer in a bind though. You’d have a pile of pissed off customers standing in a line one morning for you, because Apple or some third party pushed an update that suddenly makes the product incompatible with your car, and they’d be screaming at you about it. You’d have techs piled around a car scratching their heads, like is it the car that’s fucked up, is it the device? All without knowing that some third party has randomly done something unbeknown to the person who is scratching their head trying to figure it out. It’s frustrating when your Android Auto isn’t working suddenly for reasons like this one, this I personally know all about. But could you imagine if it was suddenly the whole dashboard that wasn’t working?
Also it beholdens you to third parties to provide solutions that you can’t really control from a quality standpoint, but any quality or compatibility issues will 100% affect the customers perception of your product. For example, “I can’t get my iPhone to work in that piece of shit car, I fucking hate that far so much,” because they can’t control the car suddenly either.
Don’t get me wrong, your idea is neat, and it would be cool if you could get that all to work, for sure. But it’s also fraught with peril, you know what I mean?
Capacitive buttons need to die a painful death. I’m ok with some functions being capacitive or touch screen buttons, like little unimportant ones like accessing my 6th favourite radio station or whatever. Or even Carplay or Android Auto.
But when it comes to operating the HVAC or shifting gears, it shouldn’t be allowed that these aren’t mechanical switches with proper fail-safe backups. I don’t even think those shifter buttons in a lot of modern vehicles, or the shifting knobs, like what’s been in the Jeep SUVs for the past decade, are the best idea.
My family is weirdly intense about my choice in car manufacturers because I’m from a small town, and growing up there was quite the vested interest in what I’m seen driving because I’m a GM dealer’s something something. It’s caused quite a few issues in my personal life over the years, which I’m not expecting you to comprehend or understand.
All you need to know my hatred for the modern day General runs deep. Mostly because it’s a company with a long institutional-like history and a deep integration into many communities, and was formerly a company that I cared very much about, for a variety of personal reasons and interests. But it’s also a company that has been run by a long succession of absolute fucking morons that have made a long successive chain of absolutely r word decisions. Like this one for example. So I mean I’m biased, and that needs to be stated. But this is still the stupidest fucking move by a company that I’ve read about all week.
Also the vehicles are terrible and I’m about to have to haul my wife’s POS GM for what feels like the 80th time this year to our local dealer (who is also complete shit, but I have a higher expectation of dealers than what is probably ordinary). I’m just over it.
No my counterargument is that there’s thankfully lots of alternatives on the market. I could care less what GM does at this point, honestly. There’s going to be some upset people at the dinner table next year, but I’m driving something else in 2024. The quality has just gone to absolute shit, and they are pretty clearly trying to rush everything out and come up with all these fucking pretend schemes why they are doing it and why options are missing. When it’'s got zero to do with safety, and everything to do with their new UAW deal, where they are going to try and find new revenue streams to offset their rising costs, while also charging everyone out the ass for their bullshit. Because heaven help if the executives or the worst CEO in their history has to give back the increases in their bloated salary/bonuses. Mary Berra couldn’t successfully run a fucking lemonade stand, let alone one of the biggest companies in the world.
I’m dropping GM, because they are unsafe. I’m not going back to looking down at my phone while I’m driving.
Also, as a former 2005 Chevrolet Cobalt owner, I’d love to have a good chat about safety with the executives of GM. That is, if they aren’t too busy creating their new in-dash subscription model. Which is what this is really about, and we all know it.
Maybe they should first focus on their gross manufacturing shortfalls, and their other issues. Maybe take a look at that parking lot in Pontiac that’s bursting at the seams with Corvettes stuck in limbo, and their very pissed off purchasers.
Fuck. What a bunch of numbskulls.
AI is the replacement for the paperless society.
Here we are all these years later of AI changing our lives, yet Google Assistant/Gemini still tells me it’s now streaming Madonna’s Vogue on Spotify, when I ask it to turn the lights on. AI’s chats are still a mix of commonly achievable search results (that you’d have just as quick if you typed it in yourself) and a bunch of mumbo jumbo that’s often quite wrong or misleading. Ask it to spit out a bunch of code, and that code is about as useful as peanut butter on a pile of vomit. Maybe you’ll get it to create a picture of people eating at McDonald’s, except they have beetlejuiced sized heads, Picasso expressions on the faces of the people in the background, and everyone’s got six toes and foot long fingers.
It’s still quite impressive, don’t get me wrong, but we need to tell the boomers and the stock market that it’s time to take the excitement from a ten, to a two.