smart Keys

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Permalink Reply by Terry Stibal on August 26, 2009 at 9:33am

We have just gone through our first problem with our Smart key sets. While understandable given the parameters surrounding these things, it still was a two hour hassle.

Aware of the problems of key loss of modern cars (my lovely wife once lost two of these keys (not Smart, but still programmable) during a sixty foot walk from her car to her classroom - they apparently just vanished into thin air), we have always kept four keysets for our two vehicles. One set goes into the master key box, one set hangs by the garage door (and goes along on trips as a spare set in the luggage), and each of us has our set.

When we bought our Smart, the cost of the extra keys was eyebrow raising but not completely unexpected. However, with Toyota, it was a two day wait and a ten minute service visit, and they were done. Even when the immobilizers came into play, still the same wait.

Not so with the Smart. Here it was a [i]one week[/i] wait for the key blades (which had to come from Deutschland, no less!), which then the dealership managed to lose (internally) for a couple of days. Then, when we went for the programming, we were told "something is wrong" with the key blades, and they were going to have to call the home office and figure out what it was.

So now we have two key heads that have not been programmed, but still only two keys. Bummer.

Posit this situation when it comes to [i]your[/i] security in mind. You and your wife have left on a long vacation in your immobilizer equipped car (Smart or otherwise). She loses her keys (I've been there for that - twice now). You now have only your car keys between you and complete, "Your car as dead as if it had been treated with Clunker Bomb", 'ain't goin' nowhere' immobility somewhere to the south of Disneyworld. If [i]your[/i] keys go south, a possibility not beyond imagining, you are up the creek without the proverbial paddle.

Like the commercial levels of security that now accompanies some computer functions for computers never used for anything more than browsing the Internets from the comfort of your home, the security encompassed with these modern car keys seems to be a bit much. It's too bad that they don't either a) make a "safe" set of keys as part of the price of the new car, or b) make it a little easier to get a car moving if the double loss should happen.

Until this happens, we are resigned to getting a minimum of four keys, and putting up with the cost and delay of getting them. No more silver keys that fit in your wallet. Sigh...

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