Passenger Seat Airbag Fault. Help?

[Jason.Wilband]

Help please!?

My car is a 2002 1.4 T3 corolla and has just failed the MOT!

The guys at my local toyota dealership said that i need a new passenger seat airbag as there is a fault lamp on the dash. They said i need to replace the seat because you cannot just replace the bag resulting in £1000+ bill!

My question is could i just got find a similar corolla at a breakers and buy a second hand passenger seat? Would it be a plug and play sort of job wiping the fault or is there more to it?

Any advise would be great!!!

Jason

[alan333]

Changing the seat will probably only need a fault code reset, assuming it's a like-for-like swap. You could probably swap the actual airbag inside the seat if, for example, you find a similar seat but with different fabric colour or something. Bear in mind the seatbelt warning sensor will probably be in the seat wiring too.

[Jason.Wilband]

Ah didnt think about the seat belt. yeah planning on a like for like seat if i can find one......

like most people want to get it through the MOT cheap as possible and the only way i can think of doing this is buying a second hand chair. Dont want to spend time and money doing this and finding the warning light still on and having the scrap the car.

Thanks for the response

[oldcodger]

Sounds an expensive repair.

If changing the seat yourself, according to the book, you must first disconnect the negative of the Battery, wait 5 mins before disconnecting anything , otherwise you could set off the airbag or damage something.

Looking at a manual it does show the passengers seat Airbag Sensor Assembly Centre as a replaceable part.

Think I would be tempted to see if I could find a good auto electrican, its something they might be able to check out and /or replace a lot cheaper ? or possibly find its just a broken wire or connector.

Still, if you can pick up a good complete seat for a few pounds and it works ok... fingers crossed !

[yossarian247]

I don't know about the Corolla specifically, but a lot of cars can suffer airbag warning lights if the connection under the seat has been knocked. It's often just a case of remaking the connection. Actual failure of the airbag module itself is usually very rare.