From the article:
The man is blaming the automaker even though the manual door opener was under his left hand the whole time.
A man in Arizona says that he was recently trapped in his Tesla after getting in, closing the door, and then realizing that his battery was dead. What he didnāt know is that the manual release for the door was under his left hand the whole time. Now, heās blaming the automaker and raising awareness.
Rick Meggison, 73, says that Tesla needs to address what he calls a āsafety concernā involving how to exit the car when the battery dies. The main door latch actuator on all Tesla models is electronic so if the 12-volt battery dies it wonāt work. To ensure safe exit of the vehicle Tesla includes a manual release. Meggison didnāt know about that and ended up trapped in his car for 20 minutes on a hot day.
āI couldnāt open the doors. I couldnāt lower the windows. The computer was dead, so I couldnāt open the glove box. I couldnāt open anything,ā he told ABC7. Of course, he couldāve opened the door in about two seconds had he known that the manual release was just ahead of his window switches. His situation has many wondering whoās to blame in situations like this.
On the outside, the door handles of a Tesla automatically recess when not in use, which reduces drag on the car and letās it drive more efficiently (therefore giving you more range).
Tesla does a lot of āreinventing for the sake of itā but in this one instance there is actually a reason for it.
The door handle in question is on the inside of the car. It doesnāt serve any engineering reason to be resigned other than for aesthetics.
Wikipedia article concerning drag coefficients
The drag coefficients of even the more recent Teslas are comparable to other vehicles that donāt use retracting door handles, even the GM EV1 from 1999 beats all the Teslas on the table in terms of drag reduction. The door handles may technically be a contributing factor towards their more favorable position on the list, but theyāre certainly not necessary and donāt seem to be highly impactful. A large part of Tesla design philosophy and marketing is making their cars seem futuristic and highly advanced through things like motorized door handles and autopilot. Their primary goal is to provide a unique and pleasant user experience āout of the boxā and their justification for things like the door handles retracting are almost certainly retroactive.
Genuinely curious, how much savings does that accomplish? Something as small as a door handle doesnāt seem like it would create a lot of drag, but it might just be unintuitive
I seriously doubt it changes much.
Hypermiling is a thing where people try to get 100 mpg from a compact car like the Honda Civic. Itās been around for a few decades now.
There are things you can do to improve aerodynamic abilities of the car. The biggest is the wheel shrouds and overall car shape (nose and tail). Then youāre covering up seams in the body work. Iāve not heard of anyone swapping out or door handles.
Iām sure the cause drag, but there is so much lower hanging fruit to address before changing something that small.
Itās bullshit. Theyād save 1000x more in range if they fixed the shitty gaps in their paneling instead of doing away with door handles.
Just because itās new doesnāt mean itās better. Reinventing door handles is something no car needs.
I honestly donāt know, there does seem to be some controversy around this but Tesla seems determined to want flush handles so there must be something to it.
So, it might just be aesthetics then?
Itās definitely not just aesthetics, but the impact is up for debate. Tesla arenāt the only EV manufacturer doing it.
The impact on drag at normal highway speeds is negligible, there is no debate. It is entirely for cool factor points. Nothing accomplished by retractable handles couldnāt be done better, cheaper, and with fewer moving parts with a standard handle.
errr, yeah there is debate. Given that nearly every EV manufacturer is doing their darnedest to flatten or remove door handles, donāt you think there must be more than a ānegligibleā impact?
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180105005468/en/Top-3-Drivers-of-the-Global-Automotive-Retractable-Door-Handle-System-Market-Technavio
If there is no data, how do you know it ISNāT just for aesthetics? It certainly seems that way.
Well, I did some googling and found this:
Source: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180105005468/en/Top-3-Drivers-of-the-Global-Automotive-Retractable-Door-Handle-System-Market-Technavio
Seems like there is indeed plenty of data.