ever have a bad key day?

lst night we took our son to see beauty and the beast at the theatre.. late night, early morning.. got half way to work. about 25 min away. realized my wife left her keys to the house and her car in the van.. so call her at 5 am and tell her i am on my home to drop her keys off. fast forward to about 1030 this am. I get a call at work from my wife, she has now locked her keys in the trunk of her car. which of course is all locked up and no access to the lever. so i tell my fairly new employer i have to head out and get in her car.. now mind you she is at work which is about an hour from my work..lol go there open her trunk get her keys.. all is well in the barnes universe... we now have as of this aft AAA for her..lol

did that with a previous boss.. He is at a convention, half way across the country and get a call. His wife locked the keys to her car in the car.. with it running, at the local mall.

Took me twenty minutes to find his spare in the mounds of paperwork that was his desk.. but did manage to get her back into her car

Strangely, it's ME that does this, never my wife. And it's always cold out.

Needed something in Concord(hi, Barnca!), stopped for directions, locked keys in running Tercel at LL Bean. No problem, I carry a spare in my wallet... which is on the passenger seat, I'd just run by the ATM. 20 degrees out, serious wind, thin sweatshirt and jeans. Had $2 on me, so I found a payphone to call my wife at work... in downtown Derry. She was pissed.

Locked keys in Forester at work, engine off, power on. Twice. Wife came with spare, 40 minutes each way.

Locked keys in Impreza at home, 4am and 30 degrees. No spare, but I had my phone! But the wife's was on silent. If I beat on the door hard enough to wake her, so will the kids, so I hung out on the porch and shivered for three hours until she was up. It was a great sunrise.

I'd loved to say I've learned my lesson, but I've had the current Legacy nine months and still only have one key. I'm berked. PS, it's really hard to get into Subarus with a coat hanger without ruining something.

A couple summers ago I broke the key off in the door lock while parked at the store. Fortunately I was only about a mile from home, so I walked there, got my spare key and a pair of tweezers, walked back to the car, and was able to pull the broken stub out of the door.

Another time I washed my car on a mild winter day, but it turned real cold that night. I went out to meet some buddies for a beer, and when I came back to my car the locks were frozen solid. I called AAA, and the guy who came out thawed it by putting a hose over the tailpipe of his towtruck and blowing the hot exhaust into the lock.

THANK YOU for the idea of using exhaust to thaw the lock! That goes into the "I hope I never need this, but..." file.

Do they still sell little keyholder boxes that attach to a car with a powerful magnet? Now that everybody has plastic bumpers etc. it might be tricky to install, but it beats standing around thinking up new things to call yourself.

i have 2 strategies for making sure i don't lose/lock my keys in the car or have to worry about a frozen lock or the key breaking off in the lock.

1) always put keys in my pocket- it just feels weird without my keys in my front pocket and wallet in bakc pocket.

2) never lock doors- i have nothing of value in the car, and don't see the point.

so far, in 22 years of driving, i've got a 100% success rate..

My Miata is an ugly convertible and the driver's side door came off another car, so it isn't keyed the same. I never bother locking it and so don't have these problems.

Our front door however, can be opened from inside while it is still locked. SWMBO and I have both managed to lock ourselves out wearing pajamas in cold weather because we were taking the dog out when only half-awake.

I locked my keys in my car on one of the hottest days of the summer at the community college parking lot (not sleeping will do that). Went for spare on lower rad hose, nope, its in the center console from when I locked the keys in it at a gas station in Ypsilanti. Unscrew antenna and try to unlock, drop antenna in car. Called AAA, nearest building on campus had lost AC the day prior so I stood in a thin band of shade from a decorative tree for half an hour waiting for a guy to come break into my car.

Did I mention a few days before this, my AC blew the rusty overpressure valve apart?

I’ve done this more than once over the years.

A long long time ago before I moved to the States I went out for my birthday on a Friday night with a bunch of guys from work. I lost my key’s in town and couldn’t get into my apartment, luckily the outside door was unlocked, but my door was locked. My garage was relatively easy to get into so I got out a crowbar and forced the lock (yes, much beer was involved in those stupid days). Anyway the next day I had to go in to work even though it was a Saturday. berkeley it I thought, I closed my door the best I could and went to work. A few hours later the office phone rang (yup, communal office phone in those days not individual desk phones). I pick up perplexed as no one ever called on Saturdays.

Phone: “Hello, this is Chief inspector so and so. Is there an Adrian Thompson there?”
Me: (puzzled) “eeerr yes speaking?”
Phone “I’m afraid there appears to have been a break in at your apartment, your front door has been jimmied”
Me: (Bashfully) “Eerr, I’m afraid It was my birthday last night, I went out and lost my keys and had to break in to my own place, I needed to come to work this morning and plan on buying a new lock on the way home”
Phone: Pause…..bursts out laughing….pause…..”We traced you through your father, I just talked to him, he said ‘It was your birthday last night, you probably went out, got drunk and lost your keys so had to break in to you own place”…..”have a nice day”

Another time I locked my keys in my 94 Mustang while it was running. Luckily the SN95’s had pillarless glass so I managed to carefully pry one of the windows out and using a bamboo garden can push it thought the gap to the other side of the car and press unlock on the door. Stupidly easy car to break into.

I've managed to take both sets of keys to my wife's car to work with me before. That resulted in lots of frustration since she didn't figure this out until she had to be at work in 15 minutes and I was 30-45 minutes away. Ooops.

Locked the keys in my P71 while it was running during a date. Date was a bitch and I started dating my wife a week or so after. Guess it was a good key day..

I had a boss years ago who was driving a Lexus GS430 with the new "Keyless Go" keys. He was telling me how he went to the gym early one morning before work. Coming out to the car with a bunch of stuff in his hand, he puts the "Keyless Go key" on the roof as he shoves everything in the car. He proceeds to start it and takes off. Said about 3 or 4 miles in, he goes to the gas station, turns the car off, pumps some gas.... then.... no go. He had to back track the 4 miles (walking), looking for the key. Finally finds it in the middle of an intersection..

In reply to DukeOfUndersteer:

Chip implants. Their coming.

worst I ever did was lock the keys into the back of the box truck I was driving. I was in a seedy part of town, at night, and could not even get into the cab to call the office to send somebody to help me.

I was able to find a place half a mile down the road that had a set of bolt cutters I could "buy" for 20 bucks if I returned them when I got the truck running

Datsun1500 wrote: Put a key behind the license plate, using one of the tag screws to hold it. Tighten that screw with a coin, you can always find a coin.

I guess you haven't seen a modern key. Examples of my cars below.

Volvo C30

Mustang

My wife was taking classes during the week about 5 hours from our house, and carpooled with coworkers Sunday evening and Friday evenings, leaving her car about an hour from home. I take off Thursday afternoon for a race at Road America (a 10+ hour drive from home), and Friday evening at about 10pm, wife calls me at the track, can't find her keys anywhere, do I still have a spare set stashed on the truck somewhere. I tell her where they are, and hope that she put them back after the last time... but she hadn't. Had to get a lift home from her parents, and I broke into the truck at 4am the following Monday with a coathanger in the parking lot of the police station. I was Mr. Popular that morning.

What us surfers use to do before we went out, we would put our keys on top of our tires inside the wheel well. This stopped promptly after cars were being stolen while we were out surfing.

One time I got the keys that belonged to the fat chick with the wonky eye...oh wait

I've locked the keys in the pickup truck once, I don't think it is possible on the mercedes to lock the key inside as the central locking only allows you to lock the drivers door from the outside unless you open the passanger door and manually lock the drivers door.

One funny thing that happened was I went to unlock the mercedes door and lock cylinder broke so I ended up pulling the lock cylinder out with the key, weird day.

benzbaronDaryn wrote: I don't think it is possible on the mercedes to lock the key inside as the central locking only allows you to lock the drivers door from the outside unless you open the passanger door and manually lock the drivers door.

A nice thing about older German cars - my BMWs are the same way.

stuart in mn wrote:

benzbaronDaryn wrote: I don't think it is possible on the mercedes to lock the key inside as the central locking only allows you to lock the drivers door from the outside unless you open the passanger door and manually lock the drivers door.

A nice thing about older German cars - my BMWs are the same way.

So are my VWs. And the only Honda I ever owned was the same way.

I did manage to get the keys locked into the Golf once, though. My daughter and I were at Road Atlanta. She wanted to listen to the radio for awhile, so I gave her the keys. When she got out, she was a dutiful daughter and locked the car. Keys still in the ignition. Lucky for us, the (manual) sunroof was cracked open, so I just pulled it the rest of the way open and dropped her 9yr old self down through it. We still laugh about it.

Adrian_Thompson wrote:

Datsun1500 wrote: Put a key behind the license plate, using one of the tag screws to hold it. Tighten that screw with a coin, you can always find a coin.

I guess you haven't seen a modern key. Examples of my cars below.

You can still do it with the Mustang. Just get a plain flat key cut at any hardware store. It won't start the car but it will unlock the door so you can get the key you locked inside.