Is the RACQman in the same league as Superman and Batman?

Submitted: Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 14:41
ThreadID: 22645 Views:2384 Replies:10 FollowUps:1
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The other week, my dear wife, was coming back to the car after doing some shopping. With the remote, she opened the doors, put our little 8 week old in his capsule, placed her handbag and keys on the passenger seat and walked around to the driver’s door to find that the central locking had locked the car.

You can imagine the panic that swept though her, knowing that the little one was locked in the car and there was no fast way of getting to him. My wife started panicking and wondering around not knowing what to do.

Fortunately, a girl in the next parking space was in total control and gave my wife some money to call RACQ. The people in the nearest shop were also really great and let her use the phone for free.

Within ten minutes there were two RACQ cars ready to help. They opened up the car doors, got the little fella out, and went on their way to help others in need. As with all superheroes, they did not ask for any payment, they were just happy to help.

Now, I’ve let my RACQ membership lag for a few years now, but after such great service I felt that it was my duty to sign up again, and so I have.

With that in mind, I figured that I have also gained a huge amount of knowledge from Explore Oz and after nearly two years of being a visitor it was time to sign up as a member. So here I am, a member at last.

R.
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Reply By: steve-h - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 14:51

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 14:51
I have had the same problem with my subaru liberty but we were minding the child for a freind . If you opened the car by usung the central locking button it would self lock after 30 seconds . It gave my wife and I real fright . lucky we were only about 2ks from home and my son could bring the spare key . I have since had subaru remove that "so called" safety/anti theft feature
AnswerID: 109618

Reply By: Member - Poppy (QLD) - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 15:26

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 15:26
Welcome robak
Good to see another babana bender on EO
You obviously appreciate all the info gained from this site, as I have.
I must admit I get more info than I give, but will help when I can
Any way hope you enjoy your time as a member
Cheers Poppy
AnswerID: 109624

Reply By: Wombat - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 15:29

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 15:29
Welcome Robak.

Sometimes it's little things that really restore your faith in human nature. On Monday my darling decided to slip in a bit of supermarket shopping with our angel, on the way home from a birthday party. Whilst struggling to load the shopping into the boot a freak gust of wind blew Kiralee's newly acquired balloons out of the boot, across the car park and into the adjoining service station. To an adult this is a disappointing ocurrence with minimal impact on day to day living, but try telling that to a distraught three year old! I think for a split second Helen contemplated taking off after them shopping trolley, crying child and all. Common sense won out and she decided to retire the trolley to the appropriate bay and put Kiralee in her car seat, at the same time trying to pacify her with a promise of replacement balloons when they got home. They both agreed that the replacement balloons wouldn't quite be as good as the ones from the party which had got away, but in the circumstances they would suffice. Having averted what had the appearance of bein akin to a life threatening experience imagine the surprise for both of them when a gentleman in, probably his late twenties tapped mummy on the shoulder and handed her the balloons which had previously been surrendered to outer space, with a simple "There ya go luv". Amazement at the act of benevolence which they had just witnessed rendered both of my girls speechless for a couple of seconds and by the time they recovered their composure the mystery man had vanished. We worked out later that evening that he must have sized up the situation instantly as the balloons took flight, then sprinted after them for at least 400 metres, assuming the strong winds had not taken them further, before returning them to a very delighted little girl. From a cynical aspect this event was not earth bleep tering or even newsworthy, but it has reiterated for one small family the long held belief that there are a lot of very special people out there, even if the majority of them are anonymous. Thank you to our unknown hero and here's hoping, we can "pass it forward" in a way similar to the Spielberg movie.

Enough of my self indulgence, to answer your question the RACQ man is indeed in a higher league than Superman and Batman, simply because he's real.
AnswerID: 109627

Reply By: Member - Andrew (Bris) - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 15:30

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 15:30
Welcome aboard.
AnswerID: 109628

Reply By: Member - Ross P (NSW) - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 16:09

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 16:09
Welcome R,

Now I must check my manual but I'm pretty sure that if I unlock using the remote and don't open a door then the car automatically locks after a preset time. However, I thought that as long as I actually opened any door any time before this preset period then the logic disabled this antitheft feature.
Maybe I can use it to lock by youngest in the car.
He's a 26 year old 6 ' 1" NSW Detective so there's no way he'd find is way out, God Bless him - just kidding.

Regards,
AnswerID: 109631

Follow Up By: Member - Geoff & Karen - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 22:34

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 22:34
Hi Ross, we have a 2002 Patrol and ours is like you said. If you remote unlock it and dont open a door it will self lock again. But if you open and close a door it will not re lock itself. Good in some ways when you havnt got your hands full, but annoying in other ways...........
Karen
0
FollowupID: 366296

Reply By: Brian B (QLD) - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 16:27

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 16:27
Robak,

Welcome aboard. Looks to me like you made two wise membership choices there.

Cheers

Brian
AnswerID: 109636

Reply By: WDR - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 19:42

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 19:42
The Kluger does that too - I am not sure what happens if a door has opened after the remote is activated though. I must check it out.
We have done 35,000 in the Kluger and still it makes noises in certain circumstances that we are not sure of (mind you I am a bit stupid but here is an interesting one) -
I drive with the fog lights on all the time for visual safety (they are soft and point down so they make good daylight driving lights) If the fog lights are on all I need to do during the day is stop and open the door and hey presto all exterior lights go off. BUT for some reason on occasions when I am going throught the process of opening the door, turning off the engine and withdrawing the key I geta warning bleep bleep) only does it occasionally and I cannot for the life of me make it happen - Also the practice of leaving lights on and relying on opening the door to tum them off is great unless you are waiting for the missus or something and just sit in the car with the keys in the ignition - the fog lights stay on.
Don't get me wrong I am not complaining but it has taken me a while to get used to this thing. specially if I drive the Jack for a whil - then it gets interesting.

Ain't technology grand though - just imagine going back a few years and having the following safety features on a car (eg when I was hooning around in a GT Falcon)
ABS
Traction control
EBA (Electronic brake assist - has helped me avoid one accident that certainly would have happened in the Jack)
The thingy that takes over if you go into a corner too fast and activates individual brakes and the throttle to help. Hasn't happened yet so either I am slowing down in my old age or it dosen't work)
DAT (Toyota driver assist technlogy)
8 airbags
Constant 4x4 drive
Staged crunple zones
etc etc etc

We take it for granted now but I shudder when I think of some of the things I did in overpowered under tyred, underbraked, undersuspended cars during my youth.

AnswerID: 109678

Reply By: Footloose - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 19:55

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 19:55
Completely off topic but Movieworld didn't have an RACQ Man ride. I did go on the Batman ride though. (at my age !) . Was thrown around so much that if the lady beside me had gotten much closer we would of had to get engaged :))
Everyone was buying "I survived the Batman Ride" T shirts. I wanted to buy one with the word "NOT" on it :))
AnswerID: 109682

Reply By: ianmc - Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 22:15

Wednesday, May 04, 2005 at 22:15
Yeah, some of this stuff is unbelievable, unbelievably difficult to keep up with.Just my opinion but I observe that many of these gadget filled vehicles are just too expensive to repair as bits go wrong that they get to the wreckers yards rather than restorations just adding somewhat to the cost of motoring.
AnswerID: 109712

Reply By: robak (QLD) - Thursday, May 05, 2005 at 10:25

Thursday, May 05, 2005 at 10:25
Thanks everyone for your contributions.

We actually just had the remote locking/immobiliser put in recently, simply becuase my wife was sick of having to go to the drivers door to open the car (passenger door lock is stuffed) and then go around to the rear passanger door to put the little man in his capsule. This way she just has top press the button.

Like most of you mentioned, it's not suppose to relock once a door is opened. I think in our car we need to open the drivers door for that to happen. I have now turned that feature off so I won't be finding out. But my wife might have accidently pressed the button when she put the keyes on the seat. Who knows. Hope it doesn't happen again, especially somewhere remote. It may be wise to attach a spare key to the outside of the vehicle somehwere.

Anyway it's good to be on board

Cheers

R.
AnswerID: 109786

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