THE PROBLEM WITH PUSH-BUTTON STARTERS,
This convenient feature can be a real nuisance
Push button ignitions, I’m over you. I don’t care if you take it personally; in fact, I think you should take it personally.
What began as a no-doubt inspiring moment deep in the bowels of creation at Hoity Toity Carmakers has become a pox on much of the rest of the industry.
Even if we don’t have 80K to drop on a car, we want our 20K purchase to pretend that we do. To help us along, you throw us bones like XM radio, a faux leather-wrapped steering wheel and that push button starter. Why turn a key like hordes of the great unwashed when you can simply push a button?
Actually, the hordes are shrinking, what with 72% of 2014 model cars offering a push button ignition as standard or optional. It’s a natural extension of those fabulous remote key fobs; I remember the exhilaration of being able to lock the car from the house, or to slide open a van door with the push of a button as I approached it. My joy only subsided when I realized how expensive those fobs are to replace: upwards of 300 bucks.
Several manufacturers have struggled with ignition switch woes (GM, of course, the most notable) and abandoning the key and switch assembly seems like a direct route out of the woods. The keyless option introduces a new set of problems, however, with sometimes tragic results. Growing pains included cars that needn’t be in park before being shut off and therefore rolling (“rollaways”), and engines left running in garages because a driver didn’t go through the tactile function of turning a key to shut it down, and many of today’s engines are incredibly quiet. Six carbon monoxide deaths have been recorded in the U.S., though some reports say there are more.
Less tragic but still annoying, more than once I’ve seen a key fob drive away in someone’s jacket, the car it belongs to idling in front of me. Granted, my job means I’m swapping out cars more than the average bear, but I’ve also known it to happen during more normal transactions, like parents switching cars at soccer practice to get another kid to baseball. More reminders and warnings are being incorporated, but the fact remains that a key advertised as being so smart you can leave it in your pocket means you’ll keep leaving it in your pocket.
Sometimes the inconvenience is more mundane, but more annoying. Last week, my kid inadvertently had a key fob to an Inifiniti Q70 fall out of his pocket as he brought in the recycling bins. We’d been doing some car juggling, and I didn’t give it much thought for the rest of the night. The next day, his brother went out to shovel, and came in with the remains of the key fob I didn’t even know was missing. If you’d like to see what an Infiniti key fob looks like after a snowplow has run over it, please see the picture here.
You get a real key hidden in the key fob. This is useful if the battery dies on your fob and you need to get into your car. The problem? You can open the car door, but you can’t start the engine. Nope. I’d not only destroyed an expensive fob, I now had a car I couldn’t move. I love all that technology gives us, but I recognize that every day we get farther away from being able to substitute even the most basic safety nets for more and more things. It might be better to light a candle than curse the darkness, but no candle was going to start that car, so I just cursed instead.
Never mind my inconvenience; first responders I’ve interviewed report they now have additional problems when they arrive on a crash scene involving a car with a push button ignition: they must locate the key to remove any chance of the engine being started if a rescuer bumps against the start button. If you’ve ever been in or witnessed a wrecked car, you know trying to locate something that small — that could be anywhere — is an added concern when every moment counts.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Act in the U.S. continues to do extensive testing across vehicle lineups, and they continue to find widespread issues of cars able to be turned off with a transmission not in park, and engines easily left running. Manufacturers continue to work with them to overcome problems like these, but some current fixes — like a dash warning that uselessly signals a driver who has already left the car — highlight the need for more work.
I don’t see the tide turning, ever. We will see more and more push button ignitions. Just do yourself a favour and remember how much they cost to replace, get in the habit of leaving it in the same place when you drive, and be certain the car is indeed in park and shut off when you exit. When you’re buying a car, ask about these important considerations, and make sure the carmaker is as interested in keeping you safe as they are in dazzling you with bells and whistles.