Air Bag and ABS Warning Lights

kja1888

I've heard some dealers have taken to wiring up air bag/SRS or ABS warning lights to either the ignition or oil pressure warning light circuits if they're not working or are staying on to indicate a fault with the air bag or ABS. Not only is this cheating a prospective buyer, it's also potentially lethal, as the owner would have no idea that the airbag may not work in the event of an impact, or that the ABS may not function as intended. If you go look at a car, turn the ignition on for a few seconds before you start the engine. In most cases, the warning lights should go out. If they don't, but they do go out when the engine is started, you should suspect that there is a problem.

mickdw

Thats a pretty smart way of doing it. I had not thought of that. It is a dirty trick. Having siad that though, I can think of a few car owners who would do this themselves to get a car through the NCT instead of forking out serious cash

Cosmo K

Oldest trick in the book.

Tigger

should be illegal and an nct check
there is a how to on another forum as a cheap way of passing the mot so its common enough in the uk

Any decent tester would spot that staight away, was tempted to do similar with my old Merc last summer as the ABS was a problem, bulb was removed by previous owner or some mechanic / whatever (was going to tap into the heater plug circuit ). After thinking about it I decided it probably would be noticed and I'd feel an awful retard. So I fixed it.

mickdw

Connecting it to the oil pressure light or ignition lights wouldnt be that great of a solution as you would have to start the car as the OP said for the light to go out. Connecting a faulty system light to one of the other electronic systems would be a better con but I figure it is more difficult to cut into the other electronic sytems without possibly triggering a fault in those whereas as the oil light or ignition wouldnt be a problem at all.

CiniO

kja1888 wrote: »

I've heard some dealers have taken to wiring up air bag/SRS or ABS warning lights to either the ignition or oil pressure warning light circuits if they're not working or are staying on to indicate a fault with the air bag or ABS. Not only is this cheating a prospective buyer, it's also potentially lethal, as the owner would have no idea that the airbag may not work in the event of an impact, or that the ABS may not function as intended. If you go look at a car, turn the ignition on for a few seconds before you start the engine. In most cases, the warning lights should go out. If they don't, but they do go out when the engine is started, you should suspect that there is a problem.

1. Some people might go even futhers, and just install a little electonic unit worth couple of euros, which will keep lights on for a couple of seconds after engine is stared. That's actually pretty easy to do.
So even if the lights work corectly, it doesn't mean everything is fine.
Even more - in that case it would never be spotted by NCT tester.

Airbag is actually impossible to check on it's own.
When I sit into any car with ABS, and I'm not sure if it's working, that's actually one of the first things I do - step on a brakes to check ABS.
Then at least I'm aware what am I driving.

CiniO

CiniO wrote: »

Airbag is actually impossible to check on it's own..

Not if you snip the wiring for the airbag circuit, if light is then still for a few seconds at start up any wiring modifications to make it appear ok would be evident Not impossible.

CiniO

RoverJames wrote: »

Not if you snip the wiring for the airbag circuit, if light is then still for a few seconds at start up any wiring modifications to make it appear ok would be evident Not impossible.

That's true. I didn't think about it.
But on the other hand then, it's possible that if the airbag was fine though, after doing that the light will come on and stay. And you will have to plug you car to the service computer to reset the airbag error.