1994/1995 Escort AirBag

I don't know if this is appropriate for your escort or not, but on my dad's last one he was told it was a common fault and always happened and indeed he says he's seen it on lots of escorts, his was 95. Anyway, check and clean all the seatbelt tensioner thingymbobs as apparently the contacts get dirty and knackered.

MadCrazyNewbie ( snipped-for-privacy@nospam.com) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Is that a trick question? They're in the seatbelt buckles.

Disconnect the battery, and leave the car for half an hour to let the capacitors discharge.

Just out of intrest, as my 94 keeps flashing every now and again, where are the seatbelt tensioners?

Also isn`t there a risk of deployment if you disconnect your airbag?

Ta MCN

I'd have thought they were under the seat somewhere (the ones I've seen on other cars are.)

MadCrazyNewbie ( snipped-for-privacy@nospam.com) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Stick your head under the seat and have a look.

They're not linked to the seat belt in that way. There'll be a control box somewhere in the dash or console. When it detects an accident big enough, it'll fire a current to the belt buckles and to the windbag, deploying both.

On start-up, there's a self-test signal sent to them both, to test they're still connected OK. In your case, the belt pre-tensioners aren't.

Great cheers for that i`ll have a look tonight, i remember a while ago ford told me that it was probably the air bag clock spring they wanted to charge £490 to change the full airbag:( just out of intrest would this be a MOT failure if thay noticed?

Cheers MCN

MadCrazyNewbie ( snipped-for-privacy@nospam.com) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

No. Windbag light isn't testable.

The message from "MadCrazyNewbie" contains these words:

They're usually a cylinder that runs fore and aft under the seat on the same side as the buckle.