Evo One Locks keys (and infant) in car

Question

Evo One, 2016 Honda HR-V, Manual transmission, Push button start I have an infant who is in an infant seat and is unable to get out of the seat themselves, let alone open a car door. The following situation has occured a couple of times, and luckily we have been at home near a spare set of keys to unlock the car before any excessive overheating in the car. The steps to reproduce the issue are: Car running Put car in neutral Activate parking brake Take foot off pedal, wait for "click" sound after a couple of seconds Leave keys in car Exit car Car turns off, and 2 seconds later all doors are locked with keys (and infant) in car The same issue occurs with this other set of steps: Car running Put car in neutral Activate parking brake Take foot off pedal, wait for "click" sound after a couple of seconds Put foot back on brake, and press start/stop to stop the car Leave keys in car Exit car Car turns off, and 2 seconds later all doors are locked with keys (and infant) in car We have friends who sadly recently lost their toddler due to overheating in their car and we would be heartbroken if this happened to anyone else due to something as simple as a remote starter. The easy answer would be to say don't leave your keys in the car, or don't leave your car running, but the reality is people forget their keys all the time, and sometimes you need to leave the car running because it's too hot and you need A/C or in the cold, you need the heater while you grab something. We would never leave our kid in the car during one of these situations but it still means your keys would get locked in the car if you ever wanted to leave it running (because it won't run with the keys out of the car). Either way, it scares us to think that our remote starter could possibly lock our kid in the car, with the keys in there as well. Please advise if this is intended behavior (and what the fix is) or if it was installed incorrectly, or if there is a way to turn off the auto lock feature when the keys are in the car.  Thanks!

Answer 1

This is a great question! When a remote starter times out, it will LOCK the doors. This is to ensure that if the vehicle was left unattended, that the doors remained locked.

The best solution would be to use an aftermarket RF-KIT and have the remote starter set so that it DOES NOT enable ready mode automatically and that the sequence is ended by pressing LOCK on the RF-KIT versus door close.  With this, the vehicle will not shut down until LOCK is pressed.  This is CHOICE 2 in the user guide: https://fortin.ca/en/download/87611/87611.pdf

Comments

but the reality is people forget their keys all the time, and sometimes you need to leave the car running because it's too hot and you need A/C or in the cold, you need the heater while you grab something. With an RFKIT, there is something else you can do.,IDLE MODE. Idle mode is for exactly what you described, "needing the heater while you grab something".  Idle Mode allows the vehicle to run without the key in the ignition barrel. For example, if you stop for a quick errand or delivery, simply allow the vehicle to run while you are gone. The engine will run until the Remote-Starter runtime expires. Press START any time the vehicle is running with the Remote-Starter to reset this timer   (because it won't run with the keys out of the car). Vehicles equipped with Smart Key DO NOT require the key to be in the car once the car is running. The car will not shut down if the key is removed (some models may prevent shifting but the car will never shut down).    Please look up IDLE MODE in this example RFKIT owners manual. Yes, there will be warnings to not leave children or animals in a remote-started vehicle.  https://fortin.ca/download/68411/rfk912-user-guide-68411.pdf