#799 Backseat car windows that go down all the way

The definition of frustrationWhen it’s a dark, summer night, and you’re cruising around town, bass thumping, head bumping, rocking out in the backseat, let me ask you something: what feels nicer than slipping your hand out the window and letting that cool breeze wash right over you?

If you said not much, baby, then you got it.

Listen up, Auto Industry — to get our summer groove on, we need those backseat windows to drop down all the way. None of this half-way, quarter-way, all-the-way-but-an-inch business. We won’t have it. We The People need that non-stop, all-drop window. Window makers, you heard it here first: stop stopping, start dropping.

Because there’s nothing quite as frustrating as a window that stops short. Have you ever tried to dangle your arm out a stopped short window? Welcome to a world of cut-off circulation and cold, blue hands.

Don't let it happen to you

Also, think of the poor children. The poor nauseous, carsick children sitting in the backseat on a swervy freeway. A world of car windows that don’t drop the full drop is a world of hot, splattery, autumn-colored doors. I know it’s not pretty, but you know it’s the truth.

Backseat car windows that go down all the way make life a little bit sweeter. They blast us with wind, let us rock out with our elbows out like the front seat crew, and give our spinning stomachs the occasional sweet relief it needs without messing up the ride.

So let’s ask the car companies to give us all the full roll down. We deserve it. We can handle it. And let’s be honest: no one’s going to throw the baby out anyway.

AWESOME!

Let's make them all like this

Photo from: here

47 thoughts to “#799 Backseat car windows that go down all the way”

  1. They are awesome, but there may be logical design behind this…

    Ever gone down the highway or just gone fast in general with back windows that could roll all the way down? It creates what I like to call a helicopter effect. Pockets of wind get caught in the vehicle, then release out, cause it to sound like a helicopter in the car. That is actually kind of cool, but I imagine if the force gets strong enough you could end up with a shatter rear window or something.

    And thus ends my hypothesis.

    1. Yeah maybe…………Or maybe the window can’t roll down all the way because of the shape of the door. Didn’t any of you Einsteins ever look at a rear car door and notice the giant half moon shaped cutout that fits around the rear wheel well. Dumbasses.

      1. While this may be a good point, you can also notice that the rear window doesn’t typically go all the way back to the rear windshield, as there is typically a small triangular window that is permanently fixed in place. If you follow the line between the moving window and the fixed window, it goes down to the beginning of your wheel well, thus showing that the window could go down without being impeded by the wheel well. So, before you call someone a sarcastic Einstein or a dumbass, take the time to look at everything.

        1. oh snap.

          it is true though; there is no reason that if your back window has the little triangle window, your back window doesn’t go all the way down. Its just damn annoying! What’s the point of the triangle window if not to allow the main window to go all the way down?!

  2. That’s SO true! I remember those horrible days when I was a kid and way too short to enjoy the wind coming in from the windows, cause the windows didn’t roll all the way down. And, of course, there was no way me to reach my hand out of the window. Maybe the palm of my hand, if I was lucky, but that really was all.

    BTW, my mom always said it’s extremely dangerous to hang an arm out of the cars window, so I’ve never really been able to enjoy it, and now, when I’m old enough to do whatever I want, I believe her and am afraid to hurt my hand by doing this. :(

  3. Backseat windows that do not go down all the way are designed to keep children from falling/jumping out of the window.

    However, if your children are attempting to jump out the backseat window, or are about to fall out while seated, you have a much bigger problem than just making sure their windows protect them.

    1. That’s actually not the intention at all. The windows do not go all the way down because they physically can’t.

      On these cars where the windows stop short, notice that the doors have a cutout from the wheel wells. The windows cannot fit in the doors all the way, thus they stop at about 2-4″ from being fully opened. On cars where the cutout is not an issue, the windows open the full way. I know this because my brother in law works is an engineer at Chrysler.

      1. Not true… minivan rear windows don’t go down all the way and they’re just a huge ass door with no wheel below it.

          1. That would be false. I have ridden in some of the nicer mini vans where the windows on the big sliding doors went down. Now THAT was awesome to ride in.

      2. Suzuki grand vitara…back passenger windows go all the way down!!!!! and,while we are having this discussion, why do smaller cars HAVE to be so low to the ground…Jeeps have higher bases and cause no problems.

  4. Most of the time it is too windy to roll windows down all the way. I always thought also it is just a safety reason.

  5. i have to say that is an absolutely amazing feeling! ahhh.
    also when you walk out of a restaurant at night and it is warmer outside than it was in there!
    maybe its just my living up north that makes me feel that way- like i’m on vacation, but for a few months. its aweeeeesoomeee

  6. Some vehicle manufacturers might tell you that this is a safety feature, but in reality, it’s a design flaw.

    On cars where the wheel well cuts into the rear door, there’s just not enough room for a full rear window to retract. There are plenty of manufacturers who get this right though, and allow us to fully stick our hands/heads out in the back seat.

    1. Now @Harper’s post sounds like the correct logic. I knew it couldn’t be for “safety” reasons.

      1. Yeah – This is the correct reason. If you have a car whose back window doesn’t roll down all the way, go out to your car, and open the back door, With it open, take a look at the window, vs. the door body, and you’ll see why the window won’t go all the way down.

        Sometimes they’ll try to get around the problem by doing something like this: http://imgs.getauto.com/imgs/ag/ga/32/02/1/JA3AV66V49U023202-1.jpg
        Essentially, they cut the rear-window into sections, where one section will roll all the way down, and another section that doesn’t roll down at all. A decent compromise, but nothing is as good as the full window, all the way down.

        1. The worst is when it goes ALMOST all the way down, but just leaves enough glass to cut into your arm if you wanted to hang your elbow out the window. Hello, engineers – can you get me another half an inch?? Would that be so impossible??

        2. Gah. I always wondered about that small triangle of a window on the rear doors of some cars. I probably could have asked my mechanical engineer sister and brother-in-law but it never occurs to me when I’m around them.

          The power of the internet… love it.

  7. !!!!!!!! the number of times I’ve thought this exact same thing, especially as a kid when I was trying to catch leaves on the trees while driving in the country-side.

    I just discovered your blog through PICDIT, this is great :) keep it up

  8. I think it’s awesome that my car’s rear windows actually do go down all the way! `02 Mitsubishi Galant. Not that I’ve had a need to be in the back seat with the windows all the way down…it’s just nice to know that I can. :)

  9. Um, ignorant rant or request. The reason that most rear car windows don’t go down all the way is THERE IS NOWHERE FOR THE WINDOW TO GO. LOOK at the shape of the rear car door, most are compromised by the the rear wheel well, so that there is no place to FIT a full sized rear window when or IF its rolled down completely in the door IF it was possible. DUh!. There are mechanicals, door hinges, door opening and door lock mechanisms to be cleared. In most cases the only way to make this work would be to redesign the rear “C” pillars and rear roofline of the car, and/or change the rear design of it. Kinda diminishing the point of the design of that particular car and its attractiveness (i.e. reason you bought it) to begin with.

  10. Go learn this (“shh: is secret from BKGBGBK”): “form before function”. This western brainwash has been ripping us off for decades. Why do we want to be different from the Soviets? After all, the Lada was an automobile, who cares about this ‘style’ garbage? We do not need a new style every 10 or 20 years, we LIKE cars that look exactly the same as our grandfathers car!

    But seriously, readers, the automakers ARE making compromises so that the car looks attractive. Open the rear door, look at the glass, see if it can even fit all the way down. Many cars have rear doors whose lower rear portions are very deeply curved, all because the vehicles rear wheels are crowding into the passenger compartment. The automaker simply does not hear you when you state your opinions. In fact, I can’t think of ANY way to give feedback to ANY company: consumer hotlines are sooo 1950s.

    You’ll really need to exert some consumer fortitude next time you visit the car dealer for a new car…. just think: you CAN tell the dealers salesperson that their supplier makes vehicles you do not wish to purchase. Just be sure to send me an email about this effort, so I can photograph the event, it is very rare that people refuse to purchase a car based on rear windows not going all the way down!! And even if they COULD, nobody will care enough about what you say to actually send the automaker your views!

    So suck it up, you must buy the 4000 horsepower, 0.321 MPG SUV because “all incentives go to the dealer, and you must take delivery before decembruary 93rd from dealer stock. Offer not valid for prior sales, see dealer for details”.

    k?

  11. When I buy a car. That back window will go down all the way. Swear to god, first question I’ll ask the dealer.
    I seroiusly hug people that have cars that the back window goes down all the way.

  12. Oh yeah! I was a car-sick backseat kid, and i was ALWAYS annoyed about that! It’s not like we kids are going to unstrap and launch ourselves out the window anyway, and if we really wanted to we’d just open up the door and hop out. What’s the point!?!?

  13. I know, I’m not a child that gets car sick, but it annoyed the crap out of me, when I wanted to put my hand out of the window (not all the way though) I still can’t drive yet, but it annoyed me as a little girl when my parents got to put their window all the way down.!!!!!!!!! PLEASE STOP DOING THIS AUTO-COMPANIES. YEAH AS THEY SAID THINK OF THE POOR CHILDREN.(that is if you even care!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

  14. haha i love this…i love putting my arms out and its not the same unless the window goes all the way down =)

  15. And this is why old cars rock, especially 1965 Mustang convertables!
    I say Neil Pasricha has won the right to raise those blue arms up and shout-out,
    “We the people of this Awesome Community” want the old to be new again!
    And we want a penny to be valuable again, so that when we go to the candy shop, 10 cents is worth a mitful!
    Go Neil!

  16. Certain cars, like Honda CRV, are marketed to young, single, and/or childless people (Like me). So, I expect “don’t care about child” features for such cars.
    My old 1998 CRV’s real windows rolled down all the way. (I loved that and my dog who sits in the back seats loved it too)
    I just purchased a new 2011 CRV. And to my dismay, it comes with child safe features. First night, I was putting somethings in the car while sitting in the backseat of my new mobile and I was not able to open the back doors because of a child safe lock inside the car door frame. I screamed loud so my hubby can get me out of the car. There is a disable button to unable the child safe lock (Thanks god). I didn’t know anything about this kind of feature until now.
    In addition, the REAR WINDOWS DO NOT ROLL DOWN COMPLETELY!!! YAAAA!!
    My dog is so annoyed and unhappy with the new CRV. He can not lean out due to the window glass cutting into his little neck.
    If I wanted any child safety features on my car, I would bought a min-van. I bought a CRV again because I liked the fact that CRV used to be designed specifically for people like me. (Childless and young at heart)

  17. While it may be true for many cars that the rear car doors overlap the rear wheel wells, I have a larger SUV (Jeep Grand Cherokee) and the rear car doors and windows stop just short of the rear wheel well. Yet STILL the rear seat windows will not go all the way down. I honestly suspect this is some punk-ass liberal nanny-state ” child safety” regulation.

  18. My car has windows that are able to go down all the way and I consider myself to be the happiest girl alive. Coincidence? I don’t think so…

  19. In the name of awesomeness, the word dumbass should not be applied. Peace and awesomeness to all!

  20. my 2006 suzuki grand vitara has rear windows that go all the way down..great for my doggies and friends. AND, it can stop halfway and be locked if u r worried about kids falling out. I want a new vehicle, but do not want to give up my windows…and what about the back wondows on suvs that do not open anymore..sorta sucks

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