# What exactly does opening the trunk first do when doors are locked?



## aadams1278 (Jul 8, 2018)

I travel for work so my Model 3 is parked at an airport for several days at a time on a weekly basis. I always walk up to the car and put my luggage in the trunk first, before opening any other doors. I am using the phone as key (iPhone). 

I NEVER have to wait for any delay when attempting to open the trunk. It always opens immediately. However, sometimes when I get to the driver door and pull the handle, it won't open and will give me the "use keycard to unlock" screen. I keep my phone in my left pocket and I have noticed that turning so that my body isn't between the phone and the car while continuing to pull the handle will usually "resolve" the problem and the door will then unlock and open. I THINK this typically happens when my phone battery is rather low, and I suspect there may be some decrease in the amount of power the phone allocates for bluetooth in that case...BUT the trunk already opened so???

This brings me to my question... What exactly happens when you open the trunk? It would seem that it ONLY unlocks the trunk and keeps the rest of the doors locked AND requires a separate validation from the phone to unlock the doors.

Clearly the car detects my phone because it lets me open the trunk. I know the car is in deep sleep because it has been sitting for at least 2 days and I also hear the battery relays clank closed a couple seconds after opening the trunk...usually an action that is coupled with waking the car up, which happens when unlocking doors. So if the car is awake and "unlocked" from the trunk opening via detecting my phone key, why the delay when opening the driver door?

I can't figure out why this would be programmed in this way. Any ideas or details i'm missing that would make this make more sense?


----------



## Frully (Aug 30, 2018)

The trick with all the doors is they ALL are electronically opened all the time, and are ALL 'locked' all the time. The door handles are only switches that say 'please open the door' - much like how the trunk button says 'please open the trunk'. The only time this isn't the case is when the manual pull cable release is used.

As for there sometimes being a delay with one or the other is probably a weak connection on the bluetooth and probably entirely anecdotal. I've had it let me in the car door and refuse to let me in the trunk...and vise versa.

The big relay contactor clunk is just the HV system booting up to be ready to drive. Any 'button' (door or trunk, or app wake request) on the car should wake the car to the driveable state causing that clunk.


----------



## iChris93 (Feb 3, 2017)

aadams1278 said:


> I THINK this typically happens when my phone battery is rather low, and I suspect there may be some decrease in the amount of power the phone allocates for bluetooth in that case.


Normally, the only time I notice any issues is if I'm on low power mode.


----------



## Ed Woodrick (May 26, 2018)

It's basically the position of the phone, your body, and the car. 
Try holding the phone out in front of you as you approach the car. I suspect that you will find the car open when you get to it. 
Also with baggage, you are probably following a different path and add a few pauses that you wouldn't normally do


----------



## viperd (Feb 17, 2017)

Also, a similar trick is used to wake the car in the morning so that you can unplug the charger. Tap one of the door hockey sticks to wake the car (as if to open the door, but stop after a mm of movement), and you can quickly remove the charger.


----------

