Our '85 Toyota Corolla LE has an electric door lock switch on the driver’s side door. It will lock or unlock the front and rear doors with the press of the switch.
If you lock the rear doors electrically or manually while the door is open and shut the door it will lock. Doing that with the front doors you must hold the outside door latch up when you shut the “locked” door or it will pop up the lock. This way you have to consciously intend to lock the front door and not do it accidentally… Additionally, if the ignition is turned off and the keys are left in the ignition and you open the door, the car screams like a banshee…
The car also came with Valet Keys that will only open the front doors and start the car, it will not unlock the trunk or glove box… You just have to remember to snap the internal trunk locks that prevent the rear seat backs from folding down to access the trunk from inside the car…
I always thought this was “Luxurious Overkill”… I never imagined pulling the Toyota up to a place like “Casino Royale”, hopping out, tossing the keys to the Valet and saying, “Park it close, I’ll only be a minute… The name’s Corolla, James Corolla.”
Matches the description of both my early 90’s Corolla and early 70’s Ford truck. Somehow I’ve managed to never lock the keys in either. The Corolla — to its designer’s credit — makes a loud buzzing noise if I open the driver’s door with keys in ignition, so it would be hard to lock the keys inside. The truck has no alarm, but even if I locked its door w/ the keys in the ignition, 50 years ago it was pretty easy to open the door with some simple tools.
I remember one or two of my mom’s older cars that did that as well, probably a popular thing on certain vehicles way back when.
In a way, we’re also working backwards where some cars will unlock as you get close to it and lock as you are walking away. I think Tesla is one of the makers that does this and maybe BMW or Mercedes, but it isn’t something I would want on my car.
Just to get back to the original question, on page 54 of the owner’s manual there are instructions on how to set these complex functions in cars without a TFT display. It’s a bit like eating crackers and whistling the “Star-Spangled Banner” at the same time.
You’re right! I read too fast. It seems there are only some settings that can be changed without the TFT or smart key system, and those are only possible if the dealer does them. Page 513 is the beginning of a list of possibles.
