Car Air Bags
Car Air Bags
If your car is over ten years old you may find that your airbag will not work as it should.
If your in any doubt you should contact your main dealers to find out what they recommend.
Here is what the AA say's
Airbag renewal after 10 years. What should I do?
Cars which are now coming up to the 10 year airbag renewal point were the first to be fitted with a new system in which manufacturers lacked long term knowledge and confidence. There was an agreement between car manufacturers and manufacturers of airbag systems that they would validate (or test) them for a 10 year life span.
A sodium azide tablet produces the gas which inflates the airbag, and this tablet and the explosive device are sealed. Although some moisture ingress is possible it should not affect performance. There will also be some natural chemical decay, but again this shouldn't stop the airbag from working.
Some manufacturers are more concerned that the airbag cover could become brittle through aging and a flying fragment cause eye damage. The same manufacturer combinations have more recently increased the validation period to 15 years on later cars without making any major changes to the system.
The MOT test doesn't take airbags into account as they are not specifically required by legislation
Do you know that air bags have a bio degradable life span?
If your car is over ten years old you may find that your airbag will not work as it should.
If your in any doubt you should contact your main dealers to find out what they recommend.
Here is what the AA say's
Airbag renewal after 10 years. What should I do?
Cars which are now coming up to the 10 year airbag renewal point were the first to be fitted with a new system in which manufacturers lacked long term knowledge and confidence. There was an agreement between car manufacturers and manufacturers of airbag systems that they would validate (or test) them for a 10 year life span.
A sodium azide tablet produces the gas which inflates the airbag, and this tablet and the explosive device are sealed. Although some moisture ingress is possible it should not affect performance. There will also be some natural chemical decay, but again this shouldn't stop the airbag from working.
Some manufacturers are more concerned that the airbag cover could become brittle through aging and a flying fragment cause eye damage. The same manufacturer combinations have more recently increased the validation period to 15 years on later cars without making any major changes to the system.
The MOT test doesn't take airbags into account as they are not specifically required by legislation
"Life's goal is not to arrive safely at the grave in a well preserved body. But, rather to skid in sideways........
totally worn out and broken, shouting 'Holy ****, WHAT A RIDE!'"
FirebirdPhil
17-03-2017, 03:08 AM #3The Prius costs £2500 JUST for the dash airbag. Makes you think how much it would be to replace all the air bags in a modern car with multiple air bag systems.
"Life's goal is not to arrive safely at the grave in a well preserved body. But, rather to skid in sideways........
totally worn out and broken, shouting 'Holy ****, WHAT A RIDE!'"
Airbag Inflation
The goal of an airbag is to slow the passenger's forward motion as evenly as possible in a fraction of a second. There are three parts to an airbag that help to accomplish this feat:
The bag itself is made of a thin, nylon fabric, which is folded into the steering wheel or dashboard or, more recently, the seat or door.
The sensor is the device that tells the bag to inflate. Inflation happens when there is a collision force equal to running into a brick wall at 10 to 15 miles per hour (16 to 24 km per hour). A mechanical switch is flipped when there is a mass shift that closes an electrical contact, telling the sensors that a crash has occurred. The sensors receive information from an accelerometer built into a microchip.
The airbag's inflation system reacts sodium azide (NaN3) with potassium nitrate (KNO3) to produce nitrogen gas. Hot blasts of the nitrogen inflate the airbag.
The airbag and inflation system stored in the steering wheel. Early efforts to adapt the airbag for use in cars bumped up against prohibitive prices and technical hurdles involving the storage and release of compressed gas.
If there was enough room in a car for a gas canister
Whether the gas would remain contained at high pressure for the life of the car
How the bag could be made to expand quickly and reliably at a variety of operating temperatures and without emitting an ear-splitting bang
The inflation system uses a solid propellant and an igniter.
They needed a way to set off a chemical reaction that would produce the nitrogen that would inflate the bag. Small solid-propellant inflators came to the rescue in the 1970s.
The inflation system is not unlike a solid rocket booster (see How Rocket Engines Work for details). The airbag system ignites a solid propellant, which burns extremely rapidly to create a large volume of gas to inflate the bag. The bag then literally bursts from its storage site at up to 200 mph (322 kph) -- faster than the blink of an eye! A second later, the gas quickly dissipates through tiny holes in the bag, thus deflating the bag so you can move.
Even though the whole process happens in only one-twenty-fifth of a second, the additional time is enough to help prevent serious injury. The powdery substance released from the airbag, by the way, is regular cornstarch or talcum powder, which is used by the airbag manufacturers to keep the bags pliable and lubricated while they're in storage.
Some more useless info:
Airbag Inflation
The goal of an airbag is to slow the passenger's forward motion as evenly as possible in a fraction of a second. There are three parts to an airbag that help to accomplish this feat:
The bag itself is made of a thin, nylon fabric, which is folded into the steering wheel or dashboard or, more recently, the seat or door.
The sensor is the device that tells the bag to inflate. Inflation happens when there is a collision force equal to running into a brick wall at 10 to 15 miles per hour (16 to 24 km per hour). A mechanical switch is flipped when there is a mass shift that closes an electrical contact, telling the sensors that a crash has occurred. The sensors receive information from an accelerometer built into a microchip.
The airbag's inflation system reacts sodium azide (NaN3) with potassium nitrate (KNO3) to produce nitrogen gas. Hot blasts of the nitrogen inflate the airbag.
The airbag and inflation system stored in the steering wheel. Early efforts to adapt the airbag for use in cars bumped up against prohibitive prices and technical hurdles involving the storage and release of compressed gas.
If there was enough room in a car for a gas canister
Whether the gas would remain contained at high pressure for the life of the car
How the bag could be made to expand quickly and reliably at a variety of operating temperatures and without emitting an ear-splitting bang
The inflation system uses a solid propellant and an igniter.
They needed a way to set off a chemical reaction that would produce the nitrogen that would inflate the bag. Small solid-propellant inflators came to the rescue in the 1970s.
The inflation system is not unlike a solid rocket booster (see How Rocket Engines Work for details). The airbag system ignites a solid propellant, which burns extremely rapidly to create a large volume of gas to inflate the bag. The bag then literally bursts from its storage site at up to 200 mph (322 kph) -- faster than the blink of an eye! A second later, the gas quickly dissipates through tiny holes in the bag, thus deflating the bag so you can move.
Even though the whole process happens in only one-twenty-fifth of a second, the additional time is enough to help prevent serious injury. The powdery substance released from the airbag, by the way, is regular cornstarch or talcum powder, which is used by the airbag manufacturers to keep the bags pliable and lubricated while they're in storage.
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