Autoseatbelts Fixed!

I know there's alot of people out there that have the common, "gotta open the door before you turn the car off, or the seatbelts wont retract problem." And while searching have found very little advise on how to fix it. Well fixed mine after 2 months of tinkering, and the solution was.................drum role please.............a loose connection!

There's a 4 wire conenction directly below the seatbelt motor. Even though there's a "lock tab" to securely hold the connection together, there's a lot of play in it. The instant I pushed the two conenctions together, the seatbelts fired. Doesn't seem like they have been messed with, just looks like the connections were a poor engineering build. Zip Tied the connections together and the seatbelts have been working perfectly for a week now. NOW GO FIX YOUR SEATBELTS

[ensteele]

I will go try this right now. If it fixes it, I will bow to the east for this great suggestion. That is probably the only thing that I have not tried. It worked like yours, but now it will not go back. It will only go forward. I will let you know how it turns out. Thanks

Yee-ha.

I'll be interested to hear if this fixes it for earl!!

Mike

[svx1999]

Hey,
Now my Auto Belts did this a time or 3.. Kinda funny trying to get out when not expecting it. then all would retunr to normal.
it's comes and goes...

I think I've now just gotten so use to opening before I turn the ignition I dunno if it still has an issue or not.
BUT thank you very much for this suggestion.

Now Back in the old days of Yahoo there was mention of something like electrical contact grease called Cromlin. it's not really a grease but more of a eletrical stabilant.
VW has such a product for Audi and VW's. It's not cheap and no one knows what the name is..
I've heard too many swear by it and it's gota make ya wonder why Audi has something VERY similiar to it..
Protects contacts and enhances connection so they claimed.

I've searched and searched and never found it..
but I know it exist...

SVX1999

[Earthworm]

Hmm, I wonder if that stuff would help us with dim headlights?

[curlykicker]

Hey 96svxer, could you include a pic of the "4 wire conenction directly below the seatbelt motor"? I'm really anxious to fix mine. I've been riding around for the last month without a belt across my chest! :-P

The motor is not in the door right? It's located under the panel, below the rear window correct? SO, if that's right, I have to take out my rear seat - top and bottom?

I dont have a pic but you dont need one, really easy to find. I just removed my bottom seat, left the top on, You have to recline it to get at one screw though I believe. Yeah the seatbelt motor is located right below the rear window. You'll see the seatbelt motor at the bottom near the door, cant miss it, if you do slap yourself. And there is a large four pin connection, the only one, feeding the motor.

Just an update though. My wife borrowed the car and magically the seatbelts seem to be an the frits again. It worked perfect for me for a few weeks, now they are working most of the time, wich is still better than none-of the time before. So Not sure if this is a permanent fix or not? Possibly another conenction loose? I will be looking at it again this weekend. It's easy so it's worth a try I guess.

[alia176]

Awright, I removed the rear seat and checked out the connector. I even tied a wire tie around it for more "snug" factor. Unfortunately this didn't cure my seat belt issue. Furthermore, I ran a self test with the diagnostic plug with pin #8 and that produced zilch. There isn't any fault codes stored in the memory for the belts.

Back to the drawing board for me!

Ali
'92 SVX

Sorry to hear that. Yeah my seabelts worked great for about two weeks, and they are on the fritz again. Who knows. So I completly tore apart me door and got out my old multi-meter and starting measuring voltages and resistance (cant let those 4 years of college go to waste). Again, I wasn't getting any seat belt error codes either. I drew out a complete pin out of all pins/connection/voltages/resistances. Basically what was happening, long story short is my seatblet motor was'nt getting any voltage, when I applied 12 volts directly to the motor is fired and ran fine. SO that leaves up with either a bad limit switch (even though I didn't have a code) or a bad computer. I measure the resistance over the rear limit switch and it had some very funny readings, so I'm guessing the switch was going. Keeping in mind that my seatbelts would fire sometime, and not others. I'm ordering a new one from Kervin subaru, I'll let you know if it cures the problem. If you want I could e-mail all the measurments I took. Maybe it will help you out

[alia176]

Are there any relays that can be experiencing bad contacts in this circuit? After so many cycles, I wonder if one of the relays simply need replacement. I'll need to refer to the electronics manual to see what's up. Do let me know of your progress.

Thanks.

Ali

That was my first thought, somebody told me of two relays located below the rear window that control the seatbelts, I found none. Unless these relays are located in a remote location there are none, but why would you need a relay on 12VDC? You probably dont. Limit switches dont require any current. And the motor is driven off it's own wire bundle, not sure if it requires a relay, doubt it though.

[alia176]

Here're some of my symptoms:

-the system does know that the door is open. It definitely knows when the door is closed
-the belt moves out of the way sometimes one sec to 30 sec pause after the door is open.
-coincedentally, if you manually release the belt, then it moves out of the way.

The signal to tell the motor to run, I assume are: door trigger is open or the dome lights are on. Dome lights always come on as they should so I don't think it is telling the belt system to turn on. So there must be a sepate signal coming from the door trigger, which I assume is negative switching.

I mentioned relays because the motor may draw an amp or two, specially as the track wears due to age and not properly lubricated. Typically, relays are used to switch current but i don't know what's happening in this case.

The search continues....!

Ali

I have the exact same problems as you. Yeah I agree with you on the relay part for the seatbelt motor, Usually though relays either work or they dont. Not much ground inbetween. The motor works on a reverse voltage switch. 12 volts goes forward, -12 goes backwards. Motor work perfectly when an external 12 volt system I wired up was applied. So it's just not getting 12 volts. Which I'm hoping isn't a fried computer somewhere. Or Cross your fingers, A floating ground. Just havent had a chance to trace the motors wires back to under the dash to see whats controlling it. Hoping my new limit switch cures the problem.

[alia176]

Just talking out loud here....

The purpose of the limit switches - stop the motor once they're tripped, otherwise there will be a chance of overtravel. In our cases, the motor does know when to stop, at least that's the case in my car. If the limit switch is bad, then the motor would stop halfway (thinking that it's reached the destination) or even try to force the seat belt mechanism past the stopping point. I don't think you're experiencing that, right?

Question:
Why do we have to open the door before shutting the IGN off in order to have the seat belt get out of the way?

The system works beautifully when the IGN is on but hap hazardly when the IGN is off. If you're looking at your circuit book, see where the power to the motor is originating during these two instances. I don't think it's anything big as the computer. If it was, then the entire seat belt system wouldn't work. My passenger side works fine as far as I know.

On a side note, relays do have issues with contacts burning/corroding due to high cycles. It's always a good idea to replace relays once they've reached a certain life cycle (years, heat/cooling cycles, humidity, etc).

On a totally unlreated topic, last night I found my spare tire floating in the trunk! Guess what I'm doing tonight!

Ali