Airbag went off - without impact/accident
Discussion
Hey chaps
Need some advice
Last week, the passenger airbag went off in my Mini JCW (**** me does it go bang !) Thought someone had driven into the side of me. Lots of smoke and powder - luckily i was heading in a straightline and managed to keep control and stop safely
The car wouldn't restart and I'd called mini recovery (under warranty still) - in fact 20 mins later the car would start, so i drove it straight to my mini dealership.
The seat is destroyed (it's housed in the seat) so that combined with a new airbag is £2k
And guess what Mini - they don't want to pay !
So the airbag deploys without any impact - and that's not a fault !
advice anyone else had this happen?
Need some advice
Last week, the passenger airbag went off in my Mini JCW (**** me does it go bang !) Thought someone had driven into the side of me. Lots of smoke and powder - luckily i was heading in a straightline and managed to keep control and stop safely
The car wouldn't restart and I'd called mini recovery (under warranty still) - in fact 20 mins later the car would start, so i drove it straight to my mini dealership.
The seat is destroyed (it's housed in the seat) so that combined with a new airbag is £2k
And guess what Mini - they don't want to pay !
So the airbag deploys without any impact - and that's not a fault !
advice anyone else had this happen?
just got the call from them - saying it won't be covered - but going in to see the aftersales manager at (xxx) mini tomorrow
They've always been great in the past - this is my second one - hoping that they'll do the right thing and just replace the seat and airbag !
They've always been great in the past - this is my second one - hoping that they'll do the right thing and just replace the seat and airbag !
Edited by TonyHetherington on Thursday 7th June 15:40
I don't understand their position. The car is undamaged so obviously there was no crash. Play nice at first then tell them you'll send pictures of the interior and exterior of the car to the Motoring Editor of the Daily Telegraph, Sunday Times In Gear, Autocar, and Watchdog. They'd LOVE a story like this.
Balmoral Green said:
Is the car still under warranty? If so, I don't see a problem, if it isn't, then no, it won't be covered, just like anything else on the car won't be covered either.
yep under warranty still (by a few months) - it's there ex demo, though I've had it for 2 years nowaudidoody said:
I don't understand their position. The car is undamaged so obviously there was no crash. Play nice at first then tell them you'll send pictures of the interior and exterior of the car to the Motoring Editor of the Daily Telegraph, Sunday Times In Gear, Autocar, and Watchdog. They'd LOVE a story like this.
Yep - just what I was going to say. The last thing they want (as a dealership or brand) is every mini owner or buyer thinking they comes with comedy airbags...I work for a police force in England, and one of my staff was recently driving a certain popular estate car in response mode, at approximately 50mph on a completely straight road, when the passenger side airbag activated without warning or any sort of collision.
From what I gather the matter was handed over to Transport Services and high-ranking representatives of the car company came down the next day to inspect, but could find no obvious fault.
No doubt car manufacturers are terrified of faults like this, because it only needs a few and the "watchdog effect" for them to have to recall many thousands of cars...
Still a very very dangerous thing to happen though.
From what I gather the matter was handed over to Transport Services and high-ranking representatives of the car company came down the next day to inspect, but could find no obvious fault.
No doubt car manufacturers are terrified of faults like this, because it only needs a few and the "watchdog effect" for them to have to recall many thousands of cars...
Still a very very dangerous thing to happen though.
woof said:
yep under warranty still
Then I don't really know what their problem is? 
I've been in the trade for years, dodgy aribag activation is just a straightforward warranty job, and be extra nice to the customer due to it being an embarrassing type of fault to occur for the manufacturer.
It was fairly alarming moment - the airbag inflation is incredibly loud and then there's the smoke - it filled the car up within seconds and even with the windows opening it took several minutes to clear - some pedestrians thought the car was on fire !
It's certainly doesn't inspire confidence in the safety features of the car - though, I'm sure it was a freak fault. Lucky it wasn't the steering wheel airbag
woof said:
It was fairly alarming moment - the airbag inflation is incredibly loud and then there's the smoke - it filled the car up within seconds and even with the windows opening it took several minutes to clear - some pedestrians thought the car was on fire !
It's certainly doesn't inspire confidence in the safety features of the car - though, I'm sure it was a freak fault. Lucky it wasn't the steering wheel airbag
Yes they are very loud, there is smoke and a certain amount of talc.It's certainly doesn't inspire confidence in the safety features of the car - though, I'm sure it was a freak fault. Lucky it wasn't the steering wheel airbag
Drivers airbags inflate AND deflate very quickly and would not restrict your vision from the bag obscuring your view. It would be up and down before you knew what had happened.
Still they shouldnt ever go off if not in a crash......
This is a serious safety issue. If an airbag on the driver's side went off in a moving vehicle it could cause a driver to lose control and crash. Not only that but they would be crashing without the protection of an airbag because it had already gone off! Warranty or otherwise it should be replaced without question and an investigation should be conducted to ascertain whether it's a one-off or a possible design fault which constitutes a recall. I wonder if VOSA would be interested to hear about it? I've heard of cases of E46 3 series side airbags going off after very minor impacts such a wheel hitting the kerb when parking, car going through pothole, etc. Again, unacceptable.
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