The headline used to be the thing said just prior to the beginning of a race. Perhaps a new saying is needed now – and never mind the race. Reports are bubbling up about Ford Mavericks starting themselves. Whether this is the result of a glitch or inadvertence (i.e., someone accidentally butt-dialing the remote start app on their phone) the take-home point is that self-starting is a built-in possibility with any vehicle that has keyless ignition and remote-start capability.
It was an impossibility with analog-era vehicles that have ignition switches – does anyone remember? – that had to be turned and held in the “start” position to start the engine. You released the switch once the engine started. This could be done in some instances without the key being inserted into the switch – if the switch had worn to the point that it would turn without the key being inserted first – but the relevant thing is you had to turn the switch. It could not be done remotely – except perhaps by a Poltergeist. This meant at the very least, someone (corporeal) had to physically turn the switch to start the car’s engine. Otherwise, it stayed off.
Keyless/push-button ignition (and remote-start capability) changed all that.
The keyless thing was initially a race car thing because race cars are simple machines designed to be raced – not parked on the street, where some random person might start the engine and drive away with the thing. You also didn’t want to lose the keys and not be able to race because you couldn’t start the engine.
It was also not software-driven. It was a simple electrical switch, like a doorbell. You pushed it and the electrical connection between the battery and the starter solenoid was made, causing the starter to turn, which started the engine. Someone in marketing picked up on the “raciness” of this way of starting an engine and – voila! – start buttons began to appear in street cars. At first, it was performance cars. I remember test driving a new Honda S2000 back in the early 2000s. It had a button-starter. So did the Acura NSX. It was very “racy.”
Fast-forward to now and pretty much every vehicle – including the dowdiest crossovers – has push-button start.
Which is software driven, because it needs to be. Otherwise – if it were just a simple electrical switch, like a doorbell – then anyone could just start the engine and drive away. So, the push-button is a receiver, activated by a transmitter – which is the fob you carry instead of a metal key. As you get close to the car, the transmitter fob emits a signal that lets the car know you (well, the fob) is near. Most of these systems will automatically unlock the vehicle’s doors first, too. Once you’re inside the car, you can start the engine by pushing the button. It won’t work if you just push the button and don’t have the transmitter fob. At least, it’s not supposed to.
Sometimes, you don’t need to have the fob. I discovered this earlier this year. The delivery service that drops off and picks up the new vehicles I get to test drive left me a Nissan Murano one day. I went outside to take it for a drive and noticed the engine was still on. The delivery driver had apparently forgotten to push the button to turn it off. This is a fairly common thing that happens in cars that have stop-start “technology” or are hybrids, because the system typically turns off the engine (but not the ignition) when the vehicle isn’t moving. It’s easy enough to have a Biden Moment and forget to turn the ignition off – by pushing the button – and leave the car where you parked it.
The engine’s not running, but the system will restart it after awhile.
That’s what happened with the Murano. Its engine was back on when I went out to go for a drive and I assumed the driver had inadvertently left it running and left the fob in the center console, which is the usual protocol for the drop-offs. So I drove downtown – about 30 miles away – and parked the Murano at my gym. That’s when I looked for the fob – so as to lock the car. I found a fob, but it wasn’t the one for the Murano. The driver had inadvertently left the fob for his personal car and driven way with the Murano’s. He was more than 150 miles down the road when I discovered the inadvertent switcheroo.
He had to turn around and drive back to give me the correct fob, because I did push the ignition/start button – which stopped the engine and turned off the ignition. Nevertheless, I was able to drive the Murano into town – I could have driven it across the country – without a fob. So long as I didn’t push the button again, the engine would have kept running as long there was gas in the tank.
That was an accident. How about a hack? Or a theft? If you have a remote start app on your phone and you lose your phone or someone steals it – or hacks it – now they can unlock and start your car remotely, too. That’s maybe what’s been happening with the self-starting Mavericks.
Maybe having metal keys and ignition switches that had to be turned (and held) by hand wasn’t such a bad idea.
. . .
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