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Door Handle Finger Crush?
- Thread starter Big Toys
- Start date
f205v
Member
I got caught once, and the pressure is light, no risk of injuries.
it's more the scare you get from it then any real pain.
it's more the scare you get from it then any real pain.
Your risk of minor injury is from pulling your hand out quickly.
I would guess it is less than a pound of force.
I used to leave my hand in there when the handle retracted for onlookers at car shows years ago for entertainment
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I would guess it is less than a pound of force.
I used to leave my hand in there when the handle retracted for onlookers at car shows years ago for entertainment
-I have to disagree with the other folks. A friend of my granddaughter's accidentally got her fingernail caught in the opening behind the handle and she injured her finger when the handle retracted. My wife also injured her finger when the handle retracted on her. The force is pretty strong, I guess because it has to operate in all kinds of weather (snow, ice, etc).
I wonder if the mechanism has changed over time. On mine it's very light, no risk of injury.
The gear/motor is used to push the handle out. A spring is what pulls the handle back in. (Unless they changed in later revisions.)
As others have said, unless changed, the door handle retraction pressure is comical. You can actually pull the door handle out in its retracted position (fingernail, credit card, etc) and feel the weight of the spring want to pull it back in... not a huge deal at all.
f205v
Member
Both my wife and daughter have gotten their hands caught when the handles retract, not sure how much it hurts, but it sure was loud..
f205v
Member
Yes, it happen to me as well.
It is usually more the scare than the pain.
The only thing is that if you are not expecting it and retract the hand quickly you basically scratch the back of your fingers on the recess hedge, which could cause a very minor pain.
So it is not the handle "crushing" your fingers (it can't crash anything, the spring is very light), it's you scratching your own fingers by over-reacting.
It is usually more the scare than the pain.
The only thing is that if you are not expecting it and retract the hand quickly you basically scratch the back of your fingers on the recess hedge, which could cause a very minor pain.
So it is not the handle "crushing" your fingers (it can't crash anything, the spring is very light), it's you scratching your own fingers by over-reacting.
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Shock-On-T
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I did the same thing for my kids, even got them to try getting their hands in.Your risk of minor injury is from pulling your hand out quickly.
I would guess it is less than a pound of force.
I used to leave my hand in there when the handle retracted for onlookers at car shows years ago for entertainment
I wanted to make sure they didn't pull back and hurt themselves if the handle happened to close on their hands.
You're right, that's the only way to hurt yourself, pulling back quickly.
RogerHScott
Active Member
This happened to me, for the first time, just the other day with my '16 Model S. It was actually quite painful. Is that because I pulled my hand back quickly? Perhaps, but given that that's a perfectly natural instinctive reaction to the sudden realization that your fingers are caught in a closing gap, I hardly see how that "excuses" it. As an engineer, this seems like an obvious, if fairly minor, design flaw: the system that closes the handle has priority over the system that opens it, when it should be the other way around -- it show never close, or continue to close, when the sensor input that would otherwise direct it to open is present.
So you were training them not to allow the combination of the car's behavior and their instinctive response hurt them? Otherwise, why would you need to bother?
f205v
Member
Yes, the instinct to retract the hand is dominant and leads to scratching (if you are not fast enough to pull out before it catches your fingers!)
thecloud
As rhythm raced inside, the ship came alive
Back in 2014, after I had my finger pinched in one and it left a red mark, I measured my Model S handle springs with a force gauge; it took just over 4 lbs of force to resist the pull. There was a lengthy thread about this at the time and many people got extremely upset if you even suggested the possibility that some people's fingers could be pinched, blaming it on user error and holding it wrong, or trying to short the stock. So I learned that lesson, and just went back to enjoying the drive. However, a part of my brain still keeps track of how long the handle has been extended and when it might be going back in again.Your risk of minor injury is from pulling your hand out quickly.
I would guess it is less than a pound of force.
I used to leave my hand in there when the handle retracted for onlookers at car shows years ago for entertainment
Shock-On-T
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I was showing them that it isn’t painful for the handle to close on their fingers, so that their instinct would not be to rip their fingers through the closing gap.
My entire fingernail ripped off down to the nail bed just two days ago from the doorhandle retracting on it. I’ve literally been in bed for two days because of the excruciating pain radiating down my entire hand. The door handles are treacherous and incredibly bad design.
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