Kids have the silliest, usually irrational fears. I used to fear toilets, thinking that I’d fall in and drown even though I knew how to swim. Apparently, I also wasn’t alone in having a fear that I’d fall out of a moving vehicle.
Brian wrote about how the Nissan Altima is getting recalled for faulty door strikers, which could cause the doors to open while driving. Sid Bridge:
The biggest surprise in this article is that an Altima failed at striking something.
Hautewheels:
Back in the 70’s, we had an old rusted-out Suburban that had this very problem: taking a hard right turn would cause the front passenger door to fly open. Dad was in the Navy and was gone to Vietnam and my Mom didn’t have the mechanical know-how or funds to get it fixed. So as the oldest child, my job was to tend the door. Whenever Mom got ready to take a right-hand turn, she’d give me the signal and I’d grab the door handle and hang on. Also, the wheel wells were rusted through and when my sister and I got to ride in the way-back, we’d drop small rocks and army men and stuff down onto the tires to watch them get whisked away at high speed. Rusty clapped out cars are loads of fun when you’re a kid!
JJ:
For our 7 year old readers: rest assured that, at least at highway speeds, the wind will keep that door from flying open.
Alexk98:
…a technician noted the striker wire loop had separated from the door striker plate during a door fit and function check on a Model Year 2025 Nissan Sentra vehicle. Nissan implemented containment measures, initiated a yard audit and launched an investigation along with the supplier.
It’s incredibly easy to give Nissan a hard time for their quality issues, but this should be applauded. Having worked in manufacturing environments as a design engineer, it’s extremely common for technicians to not report quality problems, either because management/engineers don’t care or because they fear they will end up behind on their production targets. Sure, we shouldn’t have to be giving out gold stars for doing what is correct, but based on reports about Tesla manufacturing punishing anyone that doesn’t act in lock-step with Elon’s looney demands, it’s nice to see not ever company is irreversibly ruined.
Thomas wrote about how a high-mileage Audi RS 3 can be had for Honda Civic money. Taargus Taargus:
In a previous article I commented that my biggest fear as a child was volcanoes.
As an adult, spending 26k on a performance Audi with 140k miles on it would have me waking up in a cold sweat, just like Dante’s Peak did back in ’97.
Topshot image graphic: Nissan
The first winter after our reassignment to Upper Michigan, our ’69 Galaxie 500 would freeze solid – and the doors would come flying open when making turns. That’s when Mom because a stickler about seat belt usage, and we had to hold those big coupe doors closed by hand.
The reason for this was the window seals in the doors were shot after just a few years of being parked in the blazing sun of Central California – and without a garage or carport in base housing, snow and ice would accumulate in the doors, freezing up and disabling the door latches and locks.
That spring, Mom marched Dad down to the Ford/Lincoln/Mercury dealer in Sault Ste Marie to order up her new 1972 Mercury Monterey Custom sedan.
When we moved back to California my parents bought a house with a garage – and that Mercury (and later, Volvo) was always parked inside.