This could be public enemy number one on the ever-expanding list of utterly hopeless and infuriating automotive technologies that nobody asked for. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you keyless operation.
Passive keyless entry (PKE) is how it’s known in the industry. It invites you to leave your keys in your pocket and unlocks the car automatically as you approach. Apparently it was pioneered on a Chevrolet Corvette in 1993.
But in that case, as a little preview of the industry-wide absurdity to follow, once inside the car you had to take the keys from your pocket or bag anyway to start the key using the ignition barrel.
My first experience with a PKE system was on the third-generation (K12) Nissan Micra of 2002. Autocar’s long-term test car was driven to Bedford Autodrome as a support car one day when I was on work experience.
On occasions such as those, keys for parked test cars would commonly be chucked onto the cowl (the exterior join of bonnet and windscreen) so that they wouldn’t somehow be inexplicably locked inside or disappear into someone’s pocket.
You can guess what happened. The key wasn’t needed to open the car, so the door opened at the first tug of the handle and the tester in question assumed that the Micra had been left open and the key must be inside.
The car duly started. He never noticed that the key was actually where it should have been – on the cowl – to begin with, nor when it quietly slid off while he was exiting the Bedford pit lane to drive 50 miles home.
And on arriving, he gained an immobile Micra for as long as it took to get a spare key sent from Nissan.
Today, quite possibly thanks to idiots like us, cars with PKE usually sound an alarm if they’re running but suddenly aren’t in the presence of the key. But things have got worse in so many more respects as other largely pointless peripheral ‘aids’ have been added.
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Absolute nonsense. Typical lazy journalism just looking for clicks. I've a 2007 Toyota with keyless entry and start - never need to even see the key from one week to the next. It senses my hand on the driver or passenger door and unlocks. I lock it again with a press of a button on the door handle. No confusion as to whether it is unlocked or not. And, it's a 2007 MPV so I'm not too worried about theft!!
My wife has a Tesla and again, we don't worry about keycards. Either of us can just get in with our phone in our pocket and the car is ready to go (with seats, steering and air con all set to our preferences). A simple PIN code protects against any opportune theft.
I can't imagine going back to an old fashioned key after experiencing both these systems.
Tesla & Polestar for exmaple have a perfectly seamless system that works from the phone app.
Who would refuse a single phone app for their car?
Absolute Luddite nonsnese from the reviewer. He should only be allowed to review British leyland products from now on.