Key points of the car door lock system

The mechanism for opening your door locks is really interesting. It must be very reliable because a vehicle needs to perform tens of thousands of times to open and close the door. When reading the lines below, you will know what is required to lock the door to close and open.

Locking the door can be with a keyboard, keyless entry system (keyless entry), normal mechanical lock system or a combination of those methods, and even current cars can have four to six ways to lock the door. With modern locking systems, you only need a very simple press to open the door, but what happens in the structure is quite complicated.

Popular locking and unlocking methods. There are currently 6 popular ways to lock and unlock on cars:

- By key
- By pressing the ' unlock ' button in the car
- By external code lock (digital key)
- By pulling the knob above, inside the door
- By remote control
- By signal from the control panel.

Some vehicles have electric door locks, the ' lock ' switch and ' unlock ' are actually sending electrical signals to the actuator to unlock the door. However, some systems have a better combination so there are many ways to lock and open the door and the central control block will decide when to open the door.

The central control block is a computer in your car. It covers even the smallest ones to make your car more friendly; For example, it controls the lights in the car until it starts up or it reminds you with a 'beep' sound when you forget the bright headlights or keys in the locks.

In the case of an electric door lock, the control unit monitors all 'lock' and 'unlock' signals. It will monitor all the impact on the open code and automatically open when the code is received correctly. The system also detects the radio frequency and automatically opens when it receives the correct code from the transmitter on your hand and it also checks the switches inside the car. When it receives signals from any source, it provides power to let the actuator close and open the door.

Structure of car door lock system

Look at the car door inside the cover

In this vehicle, the actuator is locked under the door latch. A stiffened bar connects the structure to the door latch, and another bar connects the door latch with a knob to rise above the car door.

A: The bar connects to the latch to open the door;B: Fasteners;C: Executive structure

When the mechanism moves the latch up, it connects to the handle outside the door so that it can be opened completely by mechanical. When the door latches down, the outside door handle is not connected to the system mechanically, so the door cannot be opened. To unlock, the control unit provides power to the door lock mechanism for a moment.

Inside the structure

The actuator of the car door lock system

This system is quite simple. A small electric motor rotates a series of cylindrical gears to reduce speed. The last gear drives a tooth bar connected to the hard brace. The rack bar converts the rotation of the electric motor into linear motion to move the latch.

Another interesting thing about this mechanism is that the electric motor can turn gears and shift the latch. But, if you lift the latch, the electric motor cannot be turned. This is done by a centrifugal auto clutch that connects gears with electric motors.

When the electric motor turns the gears, the clutch will connect the small metal gear to the larger plastic gear, allowing the electric motor to link to the latch. If you lift the latch, all the gears are still spinning, except for the plastic gear due to the clutch clutching it.

Sometimes you accidentally forget the key in the car and lock the door, you need to know a tool to unlock it very effectively, which is a thin strip of metal with a flat trailer. aluminum). A vertical movement from any door handle or electric locking mechanism affects the key lock that is all that is needed to open and close the lock. The unlock will end when the metal strip touches the point where the door opener or the electric locking mechanism is connected. That is all that is the key to the door lock system.

Quang Hung (Translation)