Seat Belt Systems: Description and Operation
Occupant Restraint System
This vehicle is equipped with five inertia reel, three point lap and diagonal safety belts, one in each seat position, including the center rear seat position.
The center rear safety belt retractor is housed within the rear parcel shelf. The safety belt webbing is secured to the floor pan by a conventional buckle on the left-hand side. This allows the safety belt webbing to be detached from the floor to allow unrestricted access when the rear seats are folded down.
The safety belts in the front seat positions incorporate an energy management feature which is designed to further reduce occupant injury in he event of a full frontal impact of similar severity to that required to deploy the air bag(s). The safety belt webbing is designed to pay out some safety belt webbing in a controlled manner, this design helps reduce the safety belt webbing force acting on the occupants chest.
Each of the safety belts in the passenger seat positions, with the exception of the center rear safety belt are equipped with Automatic Locking Retractors (ALR). The ALR function of the safety belt allows the safety belt webbing to be tailored to a child seat. Only forward facing child seats are permitted in the front seat when a passenger air bag is fitted. For additional information refer to the owner guide.
Principals Of Operation
The safety belt system fitted to this vehicle utilizes the conventional lap and diagonal three point fixing in all seat positions.
The front seat safety belt buckles are attached to the seat frame of each front seat. The rear seat safety belt buckles are mounted directly to the floor pan underneath the rear seat cushion. The safety belt buckle attached to the driver seat is fitted with a switch (depending on market options), which is connected through the wiring harness to a warning indicator in the instrument cluster and a buzzer (depending on market options) contained within the central timer module. When the ignition is first turned on, the warning indicator will only illuminate and the buzzer sound if the safety belt is not fastened. If the safety belt is fastened before the ignition is turned on the circuit is broken and the light will remain off.
The front seat safety belt retractors mounted within the base of the B-pillar, incorporate a torsion bar load limiting device. The device consists of a retractor reel which is mounted onto a spindle (torsion bar) which, once the sensor has locked the retractor reel and a predetermined load is applied, twists and pays out additional webbing into the system. The deceleration force required to initiate this sequence is approximately the same as that required to initiate air bag deployment. The torsion bar load limiting device will only react if the safety belt is in use at the time of impact.
It should be considered that during any event which utilizes the full capability of any safety belt restraint, the safety belt webbing may have elongated and discoloration around the "D-loop" may also be evident. For this reason if a vehicle is involved in an accident which results in the deployment of the air bag(s), all the safety belts that were in use at the time of the accident must not be reused, new safety belts must be installed.
Emergency Locking Retractor (ELR)
The retractors in all seat positions feature Emergency Locking Retractor (ELR). During any period of sudden deceleration, or under torsion load when cornering at speed, a weight within the safety belt retractor moves a locking pawl against the teeth on the retractor wheel, which then locks the retractor preventing any further release of webbing. As soon as the load applied onto the retractor through the safety belt webbing is removed, the locking pawl releases the retractor reel and normal movement is returned to the retractor.
Automatic Locking Retractor (ALR)
Automatic Locking Retractors (ALR) are installed in all passenger seat positions, the safety belt webbing on these are clearly marked to show their operating feature. The ALR feature is initiated by pulling all of the webbing from the retractor with the buckle fastened. When the webbing is then released, as it retracts the retractor locks, allowing travel in only one plane, thus producing a fixed length restraint and preventing the safety belt from introducing slack, making any child seat it may be restraining insecure. The ALR mode of the retractor is disengaged by allowing the unfastened webbing to fully retractor on to the reel.