Anonymous wrote:OP, my Acura rdx does this too. I always leave a door cracked when I leave it running while I scrape it off.

I had my 2019 Mazda CX-5 idling for a long time Sunday while I shoveled and it did not lock me out. You’re really out of luck if you don’t have the second fob handy.

30 years of driving crappy and luxury cars, hundreds of times in snowy weather I’ve left my car idling while I clear the snow and never have I had a car lock me out. In fact I’ve never had a car lock me out under any scenario. I really thought it was a near impossibility.

OP, my Acura rdx does this too. I always leave a door cracked when I leave it running while I scrape it off.

Anonymous wrote:OP please come back and tell what happened. I have a 4 year old Mazda 6 and I leave it running like this in the driveway almost every day, for a few minutes. It has never locked me out. Even if it locks, it always lets me back in using the keyless entry by touching the door handle. I would hate for something like this to happen! I’m all too prone to things like this so if there’s something I need to know to avoid this ever happening, please share!

The physical key hidden inside the spare fob can be used to unlock the door. Good thinking Mazda.

OP- does your car automatically lock after X minutes of driving? Some cars have that safety feature.

Have you never idled your car before (for example for defrosting it on winter days) and seen this happen?

FWIW, my car will automatically re-lock itself after about 3 minutes if I unlock it and open only the back passenger doors. I have to be careful not to put down my keys on the seat when buckling in my kids or loading groceries or I'll be locked out.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't you have more than one key or whatever do daad to your car?

+1. My spare car key is at home.

But Op is at home- getting the mail and chatting with the neighbor

OP please come back and tell what happened. I have a 4 year old Mazda 6 and I leave it running like this in the driveway almost every day, for a few minutes. It has never locked me out. Even if it locks, it always lets me back in using the keyless entry by touching the door handle. I would hate for something like this to happen! I’m all too prone to things like this so if there’s something I need to know to avoid this ever happening, please share!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Call the dealership. They should be able to help. Or AAA. When you get back in, you need to go into Set-up and change the default for locking the car to a different option. My car's default (different brand but similar system) is to lock after 1 minute. I changed it to driving over 10 mph to avoid your problem. Hope you got back into your car okay!

Thank you!

And, OP, own this. It's clear form the PP that this was operator error, not "the car did something wrong!!"

So one day you leave your car running to warm up and clear off snow and that’s fine. But the next day you leave the car running while you go back in the house to grab something but come back and the car locked you out. Same operator actions as far as the car knows. However the car responds, it should at least be consistent. Otherwise something went wrong.

divorce it

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Call the dealership. They should be able to help. Or AAA. When you get back in, you need to go into Set-up and change the default for locking the car to a different option. My car's default (different brand but similar system) is to lock after 1 minute. I changed it to driving over 10 mph to avoid your problem. Hope you got back into your car okay!

Thank you!

And, OP, own this. It's clear form the PP that this was operator error, not "the car did something wrong!!"

Anonymous wrote:I'm so scared to get locked out of my car in just this way! I'm 99% sure my Subaru has a feature that doesn't allow the doors to be locked when the engine is running, but I still leave the door open.

The car does not know if you’re in it or not, so it can be locked while running. Ever sat in a parking lot with the car running and locked the doors?

OP, you should check with dealer and see if that's normal. Even older cars are programmed to prevent from locking when engine on/no one inside. i don't think that's normal.

My Equinox has OnStar and they can unlock and start your car via satellite. I can warm it up via remote but it shuts off after 10 minutes. Do you have something like OnStar app on your phone,?

Anonymous wrote:Yep, I left our Mazda C-X-5 running for a long time while I shoveled the driveway. No problem, it was toasty inside and ice was melting outside.

If my car is covered in 10 inches of snow and ice, I’m running it while I shovel. And I don’t consider that “unattended.”

My rule is if I leave the car running and get out of it, I leave the window open down far enough that I can reach in an manually open the door. But I rarely leave the car on if I'm walking away from it. (Also it's illegal in MD to leave a running car unattended, but that's another story.)