Can a car with an automatic car starter start prematurely
If your automatic starter has a remote, yes. The receiver in you car may be triggered by some other electrical device that uses the same frequency. Not likely, but it can happen.
Yes. It will not normally happen, but it can happen. As Uncle suggested one way is interference, another is a failure of a part.
It is my opinion based on the number of questions we get about them, and the number of them in service, that the failure rate is higher than I would be comfortable with.
Personally I would rather not have one. It is generally better for the car to start it and drive off in 15 - 30 seconds on a cold day. However I have to admit that letting the car idle while it warms up is not likely to do great damage to the car. Just make sure you change the oil often and that you don’t drive off as if the car was really warmed up. The engine might be warm, but the transmission and suspension systems are not.
Oh, yes. We read reports of this all the time.
Someone else’s remote can trigger your car’s engine to start, and if that happens in the middle of the night, and your car is in a garage attached to your house, the carbon monoxide in the exhaust can suffocate everyone in the house.
That’s the worst case scenario, but it could happen. Remote car starters sound like a good idea, but in practice they present many problems.
I will never have a remote starter on any vehicle I own.
If the makers of the unit use a “rolling code” feature to make the signal from the remote unique, activation from somebody elses remote, well the mathmatics make it look impossible,the same 15yr old technology that keeps someone elses remote from opening your car. That being said this type of work was my speciality (RKE) at GM and I had customers swear that their “friends”,"coworkers"someone next to them in the parking lot was able to open their car.
I think most inadvertant car starts are from accidental button pushes,like what happens when you accidently activate and dial your cell phone.
Check some Federal product safety web sites,let us know what you find