Safety Issue?

[BavarianZHP]

If the doors are locked and the battery dies, how are we supposed to open the doors from inside? Is there not a mechanical override somewhere?

I locked my doors last night and this morning only opened the trunk using the fob button (which keeps the doors locked), unplugged my battery and crawled through the folding seats (I'm in the middle of installing reverse camera and other things...). Once I got inside, I realized I couldn't open any of the doors!!! Isn't this a safety concern? It sure is to me... i would like to be able to open the doors from inside - battery independent please!

[Hornung418]

Driver door is a mechanical lock. Pull twice to open.

From a GS3, this was sent.

[Leon]

At least in the front drivers seat you just pull the handle and it unlocks it..I'd imagine the same at least for the front passenger.. not sure about rears

[az3579]

From the outside, use the key and the keyhole on the door handle. From the inside, just pull on the handle and it'll pop open the lock. Pull again to open.

Sent from my DROID RAZR MAXX HD

[BimmerWill]

Yep double pull will open drivers door at least. Not sure about the other three though.

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

[wsmeyer]

This might just be a convertible thing but if you lock the door with the key fob the double pull does not work. If the doors auto lock at speed or you push the console button, the double pull will unlock the door though.

[Hornung418]

Interesting note about convertibles is that the glove box locks with the alarm. Pretty cool feature.

[BavarianZHP]

This might just be a convertible thing but if you lock the door with the key fob the double pull does not work. If the doors auto lock at speed or you push the console button, the double pull will unlock the door though.

Yep. I am familiar with the double pull and it does not work in my case since I last locked it with the fob, so you're observation with the convert holds with the sedan as well.

FYI: driver's and all doors cannot be opened from inside. I had to use the key on the driver's door...

[Hornung418]

Well if you arm the alarm and are now inside of the car, of course that wouldn't work.

[az3579]

Well if you arm the alarm and are now inside of the car, of course that wouldn't work.

Well, an alarm doesn't matter because the battery's dead... no?

Sent from my DROID RAZR MAXX HD

[wsmeyer]

Interesting note about convertibles is that the glove box locks with the alarm. Pretty cool feature.

It is except that is the mechanism that fails on convertibles and then you can't get it open!

[BavarianZHP]

Of course this a hypothetical situation: I do not have an alarm, so it wouldn't matter. The thing is that there is indeed a way to lock yourself (or anyone) inside the car. What if there's a short or power failure? Say you lock your 6 yr old in the car to take a quick bathroom break at a rest stop, and then the battery/power cuts out (eg: car crash, tree falls on car, whatever...) It's pretty ridiculous of BMW to set it up this way. There should ALWAYS be a mechanical override to open the door from inside - no excuses.

[Hornung418]

You're thinking about it too much. You cannot arm the alarm with someone in the car. The motion sensor would set the alarm off immediately.

And if you use the fob to lock the car from the inside you can always pull twice to unlock the door. There is no way to trap yourself in the car.

From a GS3, this was sent.

[BavarianZHP]

Hmmm. I do not have an alarm - hence no motion detector. I believe most of us do not have the OEM alarm installed so this would apply to most of us. Yes, I do agree that I am overthinking it. I was just surprised I couldn't open the door from inside with the battery off though.

[wsmeyer]

It is kind of strange.

If the alternator goes out and you keep driving the car, the engine won't die until the battery is completely dead. Then what?

[Avetiso]

Perhaps it doesn't open on rear doors, but when my car was getting fixed, the battery remained unplugged. Doors opened the same way, double pull.

[wsmeyer]

It is kind of strange.

If the alternator goes out and you keep driving the car, the engine won't die until the battery is completely dead. Then what?

***************

Disregard. I forgot the double pull unlock is only disabled if you lock the doors with the key fob.

You can still lock people in the car though. Strange.

[BavarianZHP]

Perhaps it doesn't open on rear doors, but when my car was getting fixed, the battery remained unplugged. Doors opened the same way, double pull.

Nope, if you lock with the fob and your battery dies, all four doors are locked (BMW's "Double-locked" state). It's the same if you had locked the door by the key (turn it all the way to the right). You can try this for yourselves, roll down the window use the key (from inside - hence driver's window rolled down) to manually lock all four doors and then try to open them with the handle - you won't be able to.

[BavarianZHP]

Avetiso, I do remember being able to use the double-pull to unlock the door with the battery disconnected though. That was months ago when I was working on my lock... There are multiple ways to lock the car so perhaps some will and some won't allow the inner door handle to be pulled.

[Avetiso]

Perhaps. I'm not knowledgeable on the subject. It's just a detail I remembered.

That is weird. However, what are the odds of your battery dying in a double locked state with someone in the car? You should never lock anyone inside of the car, either way. It's probably an anti-theft method in case the battery dies and alarm is thus disabled.

Not sure how easily BMW glass is to break, but I would imagine on their lower-end cars like 3-series, that is always an option. I know some of the higher up models have that unbreakable glass, not sure if that is on our ZHP's.