China to ban hidden car door handles made popular by Tesla in world first
China is banning hidden door handles on all cars sold in the country, becoming the first country in the world to target the feature – which was popularized by Tesla but has for years drawn concern over safety risks.
The feature has previously come under heavy scrutiny, both in China and elsewhere.
Last September, Tesla said it was looking into redesigning the way to open its car doors in an emergency, after several accidents where passengers were reportedly killed or severely injured in burning vehicles because rescuers could not open them.
Other Tesla owners have reported having to break their own car windows after buckling their children in and then being unable to get in the car again, according to an investigation by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
An investigation by Bloomberg found 140 incidents of people being trapped in their Teslas due to problems with the door handles, including several that resulted in horrific injuries.
https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/03/china/china-hidden-car-door-handles-tesla-intl-hnk
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NullPointerException
in reply to MicroWave • • •like this
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darkdemize
in reply to NullPointerException • • •like this
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tempest
in reply to darkdemize • • •One is definitely way worse than the other though.
The flush handles on a model 3 are annoying in ice but the situations in which you desperately need into a car seem less likely than the situations where you need out but can't find the stupid pull tab that's hidden under plastic.
kungen
in reply to darkdemize • • •4am
in reply to kungen • • •SaveTheTuaHawk
in reply to kungen • • •MBech
in reply to SaveTheTuaHawk • • •BarneyPiccolo
in reply to kungen • • •TheDemonBuer
in reply to MicroWave • • •Akh
in reply to TheDemonBuer • • •boonhet
in reply to Akh • • •Do you own one?
I test drove one (Bolt Drive rental lol) and it was honestly a bit less smooth on the road than my 2007 A6 Allroad. The performance was amazing (even though it was the lower power version I believe), but due to the hefty weight it seems the suspension is compromised. But since it wasn't brand new, I also don't know how good a shape it was in. IIRC it was on air suspension, so it should've been better than steel springs.
Buuuuut with the prices they have dropped down to, they're also god damn enticing these days! And 300 kilowatts is a ridiculous amount of power lol. The downside of course being that a brand new battery off Audi is twice the value of the car if it goes bad lol. But EV battery repair shops are starting to be a thing here, so that might make replacing single cells a very affordable option.
SaveTheTuaHawk
in reply to Akh • • •Victor
in reply to TheDemonBuer • • •like this
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FuglyDuck
in reply to Victor • • •SaveTheTuaHawk
in reply to Victor • • •also c) the owner is a pedophile who frequented Epstein Island.
Anyways, this will all be moot in a few years, Tesla is getting out of cars and shifting to robot butler sex robots.
Victor
in reply to SaveTheTuaHawk • • •duelistsage
in reply to Victor • • •tyler
in reply to TheDemonBuer • • •TheDemonBuer
in reply to tyler • • •Tesla won the plug war - and that's good news!
YouTubeSaveTheTuaHawk
in reply to TheDemonBuer • • •Magister
in reply to MicroWave • • •How can it has been approved first? in case of crash and battery disconnect for whatever reason, you are trapped in the car, cannot get in cannot get out‽‽‽
Also I'd like to know after let's say 10 years, how many kWh did you save thanks to that?
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Chronographs
in reply to Magister • • •like this
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SpaceNoodle
in reply to Chronographs • • •like this
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JeeBaiChow
in reply to SpaceNoodle • • •SpaceNoodle
in reply to JeeBaiChow • • •aramis87
in reply to SpaceNoodle • • •trollercoaster
in reply to SpaceNoodle • • •SaveTheTuaHawk
in reply to SpaceNoodle • • •All you need is to read the manual.
I get the hate for Musk, but this is all being driven by US ambulance chasers in a class action. Remember when only cars sold in America has "sudden acceleration"?
SpaceNoodle
in reply to SaveTheTuaHawk • • •FuglyDuck
in reply to Magister • • •So, the flush handles actually save a lot.
The thing is, there’s purely mechanical ways of solving the problem. Including a hinge set somewhere towards the middle- so you push one side in, and the other angled out so you can open it.
Not the most convenient, but it’s less inconvenient than an over engineered piece of shit that breaks every winter.
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thejml
in reply to FuglyDuck • • •Last time I got on a coworker's Tesler, thats how they worked. Push the large part in with your thumb and the handle pops out. Curl your fingers around it and pull.
The thing I thought of later was "that made sene to me, who grew up in the 70's/80's/90's with handles that had a button you push in with your thumb. No kid knows that anymore."
FuglyDuck
in reply to thejml • • •Lemmyoutofhere
in reply to FuglyDuck • • •FuglyDuck
in reply to Lemmyoutofhere • • •The normal pocket handles do create a not insignificant amount of drag.
The pop out mechanism is stupid, don’t get me wrong, but it does have an appreciable effect on range.
SaveTheTuaHawk
in reply to Magister • • •You can get out using a manual pull.
But Americans don't read manuals.
madjo
in reply to MicroWave • • •If it weren’t a leased car, I’d remove those flaps next to the door handles myself.
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Sarah Brown
in reply to MicroWave • •World News reshared this.
boonhet
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •I mean the entire goal of Tesla's design was to minimize drag coefficient. It's important in EVs because with ICE you just burn more fuel which takes 5 minutes to refuel, with EVs you have tedious charging stops more often - particularly with older EVs like the Tesla Model S that popularized this.
Say what you will about Tesla, but their Cd is pretty darn impressive especially if you consider that every car in the table that beats the Model S, save for the EV1, is newer than the Model S. That and the powertrain are the two things they absolutely nailed in their otherwise pretty mediocre EVs.
common measure in automotive design as it pertains to aerodynamics
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Jax
in reply to boonhet • • •like this
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boonhet
in reply to Jax • • •SaveTheTuaHawk
in reply to boonhet • • •The model 3 handle is just as flush, cheaper to make, far more reliable.
BarneyPiccolo
in reply to Jax • • •SaveTheTuaHawk
in reply to boonhet • • •That's their bullshit story. They just love to market gadgets. The Model 3 handles pivot out and are just as flush, without the need of an electric motor and pointless complexity. Those stupid handles also fail and freeze closed. It's bad design. A tiny door handle does nothing to Cd compared to side mirrors, and cars in the 70s had smaller mechanical handles.
Read the table again, the S is beat by 4 models, one of which is 30 years old.
boonhet
in reply to SaveTheTuaHawk • • •The Model 3 is several years newer and likely by that time someone brought it up that the original was idiotic.
Never said it wasn't a bad design, just that there was reason to innovate when it comes to door handles. Tesla did it, they just didn't do it well.
Tesla's side mirrors already look pretty aero. You also can't remove them completely or make them flush, because they're actually needed for safety. Some manufacturers have gone to cameras, but that's just another part that can fail + they're significantly more expensive than regular old mirrors.
... show moreNow go read my comment again, I said:
The Model 3 is several years newer and likely by that time someone brought it up that the original was idiotic.
Never said it wasn't a bad design, just that there was reason to innovate when it comes to door handles. Tesla did it, they just didn't do it well.
Tesla's side mirrors already look pretty aero. You also can't remove them completely or make them flush, because they're actually needed for safety. Some manufacturers have gone to cameras, but that's just another part that can fail + they're significantly more expensive than regular old mirrors.
Now go read my comment again, I said:
Yes, the Model S gets beat by 4 cars (probably more, this is just an examples table), but 3 of them are an entire generation newer EVs and one is an experimental vehicle that was 110% about efficiency. Tesla positioned the S as an executive/luxury car, they could NEVER afford to have a design like that. The entire reason Tesla was the first successful EV was that they made one of the first ones that looked like a normal car, while still being slick so it would have good range on the highway.
To be clear I don't think Teslas are great or that motorizing the handle was a great idea. I was just saying that flush handles make sense on an EV where Cd is pretty important.
Gates9
in reply to MicroWave • • •aquovie
in reply to Gates9 • • •BarneyPiccolo
in reply to MicroWave • • •Heh-heh, now China is just fucking with Tesla.
Tesla will be bankrupt in 2 years.
Ziggurat
in reply to BarneyPiccolo • • •skozzii
in reply to MicroWave • • •Earthman_Jim
in reply to MicroWave • • •khaleer
in reply to MicroWave • • •I got uber once, and tesla arrived. I was unable to enter this piece of death machine.
So now imagine that you want to help people locked in burning tesla, but you have no idea how to open freaking door. Tesla is protecting the world from some kind of people.
dovah
in reply to khaleer • • •