Evolution of car door handles over the decades
newatlas.com
newatlas.com
Stylish, good gas mileage, decent performance, it was a great car. It had one fatal flaw, a weak linkage in the drivers door handle.
The linkage included a small plastic clip that didn’t quite align properly. It would pop out of place periodically, making the door impossible to open. I became adept at taking apart the door from the inside and popping the pieces back into place.
I once returned to my college dorm after a snowstorm, the car got stuck in the snow. I had another trick for this situation, I’d ease the clutch out ( leaving the back tires spinning slowly ) and would exit the car, pushing it by hand. When the wheels caught and the car started creeping forward I’d jump back in and drive off. ( Foolish, I know. I was 20. )
Well, once I had both mishaps at once. The car got stuck, so I got out to push. The door handle broke, locking me out of my car with the engine running and the wheels slowly turning!
Praying fervently, I ran to my dorm room, got my spare key and went in through the passenger door to stop the engine.
It was a memorable day.
IMO their handles are stupidly over-engineered. It shows when you get problems like ice, etc. in northern climates.
I really like Tesla's approach to door handles - it's clean, polished, and gives a fine and smooth look. But was surprised to learn that China will ban them beginning next year. Other countries might follow suit as well.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/china-hidden-door-handles-cars-...
BMW owners often find out they have a spare key when the key fob separate, for no reason, from the physical key (those keyfobs tend to be extremely badly designed, where the plastic knobs holding the physical key tend to become loose with age).
A spare physical key of course means that the door handle has a lock that can be opened with the key.
Wife is stuck under pouring rain with the battery of her BMW's keyfob that died (because she didn't pay attention to the message on the dashboard saying it needs replacing): "Please come pick me up" / "Babe, take the physical key, open the door, start your car with the physical key, come back home and I'll go buy a new battery and place it into your keyfob".
> More recently, there's been a trend of “suck-in” handles that are flush with the body. As noted earlier, flush handles come in two basic varieties.
Handles flush with the body are nothing new that said. I've got a car from 1992 (model came out in 1989) with flush handles.
in the article, it shows a Magna-Steyr handle on a Mercedes Gelaendewagen, which looks like those on the Ineos Grenadier, and not very different than the ones that Ford uses on various trucks.
that contrasts with those on Audi and BMW evs, for examples i see often, where the CoD is a stated spec for ev shoppers, and the handles have motion to them, but are flush (but not Tesla vanishingly flush). Weirdly, some Porsches (intimately related to Audi...just read the shared parts) use flush handles and some the protruding handles with an actual handle.
i admittedly pay an unusual amount of attention to car componentry, sort of a hobby really.
Flush handles exist as brand differentiators. They're a "futuristic" feel-good feature that consumers want, like engine noise, tablets, and colorful dashboards.
These are not in conflict. The energy you save from drag stacks with the energy you save from "learning how to drive".
And that’s before we consider the other aspects of these door handle designs that make the cars a death trap.
Maybe as legal and reputational backlash spreads the pros will not outweigh the cons. But someone designing a car a decade ago, marketed towards early adopter types, would have had no reason not to.
And I say this as someone who hates these handles designs personally.
I have a car with a "novel" handle situation. (Ford Mustand Mach E) The door is operable from the inside with a dead battery. Maybe this particular one isn't as challenging as some of the other designs, but calling it a "puzzle" definitely overstates the case. I think it took me maybe 4 seconds to figure out the first time.
The production vehicles designed after these concepts often used flush pull-up handles for aerodynamics. Those handles later disappeared in favor of the more reliable pull-bar handles we're familiar with because improved CFD made it clear how minimal their benefit actually was for the tradeoffs.
Of course, even if we accept that all the mechanical complexity of flush handles is necessary for aerodynamic reasons, it's not the only alternative to pull-bars. Look at the Volvo EX60 for an example. Designing a flush handle is hard. Tesla spent years working on it. It's not something undertaken for negligible aerodynamic benefits.
The pull-up latches also caused issues for people with long nails. In some places spiders liked to nest inside them. Places with snow had issues with a sheet of ice forming over the entire panel, an issue that also occurs with modern flush latches.
Similar to how Mazda has bragged about shaving grams off of a rear view mirror in a Miata. Are Miata's light because their rear view mirror lost a few grams of weight? No. Are Miatas light because Mazda applied that design philosophy to the whole vehicle? Yes.
https://media.landrover.com/new-range-rover-sport-press-kit-...
https://usa.infinitinews.com/en-US/releases/2025-qx80-press-...
To complete the loop on the latter: Tesla's 2012 handle patent https://patents.google.com/patent/US9103143B2/en
> Conventional door handle designs typically have less than desirable aerodynamics due to protrusion of the exterior door handle from the surface of the door and the recessed area over which it spans. As the vehicle moves, these conventional door handles interrupt the smooth surface of the door and thereby increase the overall drag of the vehicle. Depending on the size, depth, and overall shape of the recessed area, for example, the corresponding area under the door handle further contributes to reduced aerodynamics of the vehicle. Designers have not focused on improving aerodynamics in this area as the exterior door handle seems relatively small and inconsequential.
> 104 in the retracted position provides both a smooth appearance and advantageous aerodynamic qualities when the vehicle is in motion
I'm starting to wonder if an interview with David Wheeler (what a name for a car patent) et al would even be believed here at this point.
Even the aero study done by range rover doesn't claim they're a meaningful improvement. It claims the handles came from the product design vision first.
> Depending on the size, depth, and overall shape of the recessed area, for example, the corresponding area under the door handle further contributes to reduced aerodynamics of the vehicle. Designers have not focused on improving aerodynamics in this area as the exterior door handle seems relatively small and inconsequential.
Aerodynamics is complicated. You should measure the actual impact rather than guess. "just make it smooth" is a rule of thumb, not a law. If we're following rules of thumb, my copy of Theory and Applications of Aerodynamics for Ground Vehicles specifically says this on the subject:
The door handle does not need to be flush with the car body to be aerodynamically beneficial; it only needs to blend with the car body in the same way that the posts blend with the side glass.
I'm not sure how this differs from when I had previously started "Very peculiarly, everyone seems to actually agree the handles are a little more aerodynamic. It's the possibility the manufacturer's teams (except marketing, apparently) could ever have also considered this as one of several benefits when choosing the design which is at such levels of doubt".
Regardless, I continue to find myself in complete agreement w.r.t. this.
> Even the aero study done by range rover doesn't claim they're a meaningful improvement. It claims the handles came from the product design vision first.
My argument remains flush handles in the automotive industry are about more than just one thing alone (more specifically, that drag is indeed also one of those things). Hence I find myself rather lost as to how lack of being the first reason for Range Rover should strike drag as having already been shown as one of their other listed reasons. As far as I can conceive, being about more than one thing alone inherently necessitates some of those reasons are not always to be given as a first reason. Similarly, I don't follow why only the first reason might be held as non-negligible.
> Aerodynamics is complicated. You should measure the actual impact rather than guess. "just make it smooth" is a rule of thumb, not a law.
Other engineers in the field are well aware aerodynamics is a fickle beast and they are not commonly guessing their vehicle aerodynamics by rule of thumb, as you already seem to be very familiar with based on mentioning the Range Rover aero study. Of course, I don't like to leave such a claim uncited or unsourced (regardless how familiar it seems to all already) so here is an SAE paper backing claims Tesla did indeed extensively test the aerodynamics of every external component (for the same vehicle the patent is referring to) rather than guess the impact of exterior elements by rule of thumb https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Robert-Palin/publicatio...:
"Aerodynamic optimization is a major contributor to the overall efficiency of an electric vehicle and the close integration of the Design and Engineering groups at Tesla Motors was specifically arranged to process design iterations quickly and enable the fully informed development of the exterior surfaces at a very rapid pace... Following aerodynamic optimization at the overall shape level, focus switched to optimization of production parts, and every external component of the Model S has been examined in great detail searching for aerodynamic performance, since areas that may seem insignificant in isolation can rapidly accumulate to have a substantial impact on the whole."
> If we're following rules of thumb, my copy of Theory and Applications of Aerodynamics for Ground Vehicles specifically says this on the subject...
We're not just following rule of thumb, but everything in the comments prior still appears to align with this passage anyways. One indeed does not need to make the door handle optimally flush to make a design choice which is aerodynamically beneficial. Clearly, however, the additional possible efficiency is not completely negligible (or an ignored factor) in flush door handle design consideration by many manufacturers in order to make exclusive way for reasons other than drag. One does not even need to conclude this from any of the evidence, to repeat the relevant portion of the prior citation instead:
"Following aerodynamic optimization at the overall shape level, focus switched to optimization of production parts, and every external component of the Model S has been examined in great detail searching for aerodynamic performance, since areas that may seem insignificant in isolation can rapidly accumulate to have a substantial impact on the whole."
.
Again, I'm not trying to argue drag is the only reason (or even that it's the primary reason). Just that claims the additional drag is negligible or saying that flush handles aren't about drag does not redefine what the auto makers themselves say about drag being a reason.
Incorrect. They are most definitely there to save money on production and development costs, like all the other stuff you misattribute to brand differentiators. Consumers like lower prices, car companies like more profit. Yes, it looks fancy, but it is cheaper to produce, judt like the tablet dash.
I'm not sure a flush handle is actually cheaper either. The only real difference is the metal bits that connect to the latch assembly. One goes to the interior lever, one to the exterior, and one has the lock pin.
A cost-optimized flush handle gets rid of those in exchange for a motor/encoder unit. The expensive parts of the latch mechanism remain basically identical since it has to be a giant chunk of metal for safety reasons. Maybe the handle differences make up for it, but I'd want to see numbers given that it's made its way onto high end cars first.
Flush handles have to do with creating a recess in the body for normal handles. It’s just easier to cut a hole.
I’m guessing you aren’t willing to consider that the car companies are just being thrifty rather than extravagant, but ya, it’s a win win for them if they can save on costs at the same time as being seen as fancy.
I’m guessing you aren’t willing to consider that the car companies are just being thrifty rather than extravagant
A touch screen is literally one component plus a computer you need anyways.
Flush handles have to do with creating a recess in the body for normal handles. It’s just easier to cut a hole.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp37g5nxe3lo
> It comes as EVs are facing scrutiny from safety watchdogs around the world after a number of deadly incidents, including two fatal crashes in China involving Xiaomi EVs in which power failures were suspected to have prevented doors from being opened.
You had one job, door handles... but being made sleek and sexy and unlike normal door handles also made you a fucking liability.
Simply put vehicles are at the point where we need a rule that says "The doors can be unlocked and open if the battery is dead" Full stop, no ifs, ands, or buts.
If you want to do that stuff, do it with a performance test or criteria, not with stupid whack-a-mole rules. And don't think that weasel wording the test to the same effect is any better. If you want to do this the not stupid way you need to actually do the hard work and figure out what the over-arching general case performance characteristics need to be.
With better styling cues and design that make it obvious how to use the Tesla handles (and all the degrees of copycats) it wouldn't be an issue. But that isn't the kind of sleek sext angular bullshit modern car designers like so it never got made and here we are.
Bureaucracies have many fathers, the society we have is the result of conflict and incentives.
You wind up with smaller gaps with the qualitative and rules based approach than you do with the whack-a-mole list.
>then government agencies get in trouble (isn't it your job to stop this kind of thing?), so government agencies issue strict rules.
Government agencies tend to grow in scope and resources when they screw up. Even when punished, it's not like they go bankrupt and everyone is out of a job.
>Bureaucracies have many fathers, the society we have is the result of conflict and incentives.
And ideology. You can incentivize the Taliban all you want they won't send their girls to school. I postulate that the failure of american regulatory to systems to regulate without sucking is driven in large part by what goes on in the heads of the subset of people who spec out, create and operate said systems.
As commonly said by the libertarian at heart, right up until the point their loved one gets injured or killed, then they are at the forefront of regulation.
> But that isn't the kind of sleek sext angular bullshit modern car designers like
Who likes safety and security? These features commonly make every day use more difficult. Who needs unblocked fire exits, that takes up too much room in the building. Who needs a common interface for a safety critical device, that removes the 'cool' factor.
This bans new cars from having clamshell bodywork like that found on classics like the Jaguar E-type and Ford GT40. I suspect it also results in many cars having narrower truck/hatch openings than they would have if they could put mandated lights on the trunk lid or rear hatch.
It's not hard to imagine the partially legitimate reason that on occasion, someone will drive with the trunk open, but do we really need a law about it?
No, it's a much more serious and likely reason -- people stopping on a highway at night, getting out, and opening their trunk for some reason (like a spare tire, fluids, etc)?-- then their lights (and the reflectors in the lamp housings) are pointed at the sky.
Headlights get out of alignment sometimes. I posit that likelihood goes up if the lights are themselves mounted on a hood/door/whatever that can also go out of alignment.
That particular blood was probably people stopped at night with the trunk open to access a spare tire or tools. And then there was more blood because sometimes those people forget to leave their lights on, or their lights don't function because the battery has died, so we got more regulation requiring ugly reflectors.
And so on.
This has become a mantra, but it's not always true. Automatic shoulder belts, for example were a terrible idea, and 5 MPH bumpers were more about repair costs than reducing injuries.
Automatic shoulder belts being annoying is irrelevant. The dozen-ish explosive, expanding gas sacks in my car are kinda frightening. Both originated with a regulation requiring passive restraint systems to reduce collision injury/death.
People stopped at night with the trunk open to access a spare tire or tools, ok. How did that get them killed?
You are driving on a road with only a single lane in each direction, and there is no verge or hard shoulder.
All you can see is the short area in front of you that your headlights illuminate, and they are dipped as normal so as not to dazzle oncoming drivers. You can see cars ahead of you quite easily because they have two red lamps on their rear, at their left and right extremities. You can see them even when you can't see the road between you and them. You can judge their relative speed from a long distance away.
Imagine a car has broken down. Remember they're in the same lane as you. You can see their red lamps and hazard lights, and you can judge they're not moving, well before you reach them. You slow down and go around them safely.
Imagine a second car has broken down. This car has an electrical fault and no lights, but has rear reflectors, just like roadsigns, which even your dipped headlights reflect quite well, and give you time to react. You manage to go around them safely.
Imagine a third car has broken down. The lights and reflectors are on the trunk hatch. It's opened and pointed at the sky. You're not in the sky. All you see ahead of you is blackness. The car body is only illuminated by your headlights once it's too late. You slam straight into the stopped, dark car. The person who was looking in the trunk is crushed to death.
I’m not being obtuse! I’m genuinely concerned that my understanding of car safety features is correct here.
Reflectors tend to be positioned around the bumper.
For example:
- https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/9PQAAOSwlbdkueA8/s-l1600.jpg
- https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/PxQAAOSwDSthH35W/s-l1200.jpg
That is around the seven minute mark of this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32u6KPTALxg
Manual windows roll up and down for decade after decade...
Electric door locks are bad, too. After a while, they won't lock or unlock.
I've had three cars where the electric windows failed and two where the electric door locks failed.
https://www.reddit.com/r/nextfuckinglevel/comments/1qwfjuu/i...
If they evolved, one might assume they'd survive more than a few years.
My last two vehicles have been Toyota and Hyundai, both of them having multiple broken and malfunctioning door handles.
Every time I get into a commercial* or antique vehicle, I long for the solidity, surety and hardness of the dark ages when things were built to last.
Driving semis, I'm well acquainted with automobile 'evolution', and all but a few are hardly worth entering. UPS trucks, Mac, some others still make stuff for adults, but International, Peterbilt, even Kenworth are using sillyputty for parts. Consumer vehicles, to me, are the antithesis of evolution. And for all the wondrous eco tech, their merit is contested by landfills, downtime and piles of repair receipts.
Not that eco couldn't work, but the way it's been introduced, in the US, has been replete with cut corners and outright scams. An old truck pre-DEF still runs far more reliably than anything new on the road. Volvo has done reasonably well with trucks, but no new truck can stand to the old ones. CAT!
Door handles are symptomatic of the disposable infrastructure we've built our new country on, and come hard times, when folks can no longer afford a new HVAC system every 8 years at 12 grand, coupled with everything else falling apart around us, we'll be longing for the dark ages again.
Thankfully it's not everything. I just bought a pair of Knipex pliers, which should make it well through the century.
For the young, or majority I presume, if you can suspend your contempt of a less fuel efficient steel monstrosity, hop into an old vehicle from the 70s or earlier. Close your eyes if needed, but just feel around a bit. You'll feel honest engineering. Not as safe, but there's something obnoxious anyway about being too safe and cozy trundling around in a big bulbous plastic bubble. We didn't always drive unaffordable fluorescent pillows.
Edit: correction it seems to be crashing on my adblock.
Bring back window-opener crank handles.
And ditch the touch-surface of the LCD screen too.