killeraxemannic

Hi everyone! First post here and for good reason!

I recently picked up a 2003 Allroad. Today I was trying to figure out why my drivers seat was squeaking and found a yellow plug hanging down under my seat. It appears to have a few wires coming out of it 2 of which are cut about an inch from the plug and then I can see that one of the wires coming off of it is spliced with a crimp connector to another wire. The yellow plug is plugged in to a black connector on a wire that is also hanging down. Its all pretty much laying on the carpet under the seat. I did some research and found that the yellow plug seems to be for the air bag. I don't however have any lights at all on my dash. Any ideas why the plug would have ever been cut? What should I do with it?

It was raining pretty bad today so I wasn't able to take the trim off and get any pics but I may be able to get some tomorrow if needed.

tenspeed

Sounds like someone was getting a alarm to buckle up the passenger when there was none...

I would leave it alone.

P4Ring

Airbag wires. The airbag light may have been on due to high or low resistance reading from the seat airbag. Someone cut the wires and override the circuit to think an airbag is connected when it is actually disconnected. That way no airbag light appear on your dash.

Real simple overide...and I will not comment further. Why? Because it MAY be illegal.

killeraxemannic

So if I wanted it to work correctly I would replace the air bag and reattach the wires? Its the drivers side seat not the passenger.

Also if the wires were cut will the airbag still deploy in a crash?

John535is

When you say cut do you mean cut off and not reconnected? or has someone essentially just bypassed the yellow connector and used crimps to keep the circuit going. I ask because there is a known repair of VW Golf (rabbit) Mk5. I just completed it following a VW Technical bulletin (TSB) which bypasses the yellow connector under the seat due to high resistance in the connector caused the warning light to come on. The bypass means the air bag will still deploy when required. And the TSB called to wrap the crimped lugs in yellow electrical tape so future VW technicians know it was completed by VW repair shop. Someone should tell them every $2 corner shop sells yellow tape!

killeraxemannic

They are indeed cut and not connected to anything. There was no yellow tape that I saw but I will have to look closer. Good to know that if this was done correctly the airbag should still deploy. I will investigate more when I have some time.

P4Ring

The airbag in question is NOT the one in the steering wheel.

If the wires were cut and left hanging the airbag light would be on due to the circuit seeing a resistance of infinity. (Too high, circuit open). In this situation (AB light on), i do not know if the other airbags will deploy. AUDI don't share that info.

On the other hand if a particular AB circuit is tricked into having an AB present (lights off, no error) then all OTHER airbags will deploy eEXCEPT the one on the circuit that is FAKE. (Lack of other words)...contrary to what member John535is says, the airbag bypassed will NOT deploy. Bypassing the AB take it out of the circuit.

ELECTRIC/ELECTRONIC CIRCUIT can detect resistance, voltage pulse of a certain time constant (example a digital code), or frequency. (AC volt). In our case its resistance. Electronic components have resistance. If you substitute another component of equal restance value, the circuit will not know or care to give an error. It is the technician responsibility to ensure the equivalent component will handle the wattage when the trigger curcuit apply voltage.

If the wires are cut and left hanging, this means, (resistance too high) AB light on.
If the wires are shorted/bridged, meaning cut one or both wire(s) from the plug and simply connect them together, this means (resistance too low) AB light on.

What should you do?

First ensure that the AB light comes on when you turn the ignition to on and go off when the engine in running.
If the above is true...
and you don't care about having a driver seat AB then leave it as it is, no one else will ever know that it don't work.
If you need to have a driver seat AB, then re-connect back the wires as it suppose to be and see if the AB light in your dash stays on when the engine is running. If it does, that mean someone fake the circuit...buy a new airbag/igniter.

Good luck.

John535is

Maybe my description of 'bypass' was confusing. (Thanks P4Ring I didn't realise it read that way!)
I meant deleting the connector out of the circuit, not bypassing the actual air bag.
Link below should be to the VW forum which explains in detail.

VWVortex.com - HOW TO: Perform your airbag TSB

The document is TSB #6906-05

P4Ring

The instructions in the document bypass a defective harness connector. In this case nothing is modified, all airbag will still work. In this situation no wires will be left hanging.

A harness connector is used so you can remove the seat without cutting wires. If the connector contact is defective, you can cut the wires and connect them directly, which is what they did in this case. The drawback to this is, "if you need to take out the seat, you must undo the splicing of the wires you connect earlier".

In this case you have no other choice thou. It is so sad that VW would do such a thing instead of providing a new connector with some type of element to fasten the wires to it. They have access to the manufacturer of these wires and harness.

You are technically correct...they bypass the connector.

killeraxemannic

I checked on Alldata for my car and I don't see TSB 6906-05 listed. I searched all TSB's and don't see anything related to bypassing the airbag. I will have to pull the trim and inspect to see exactly what was done.