Originally Posted by
elbailey23
So I spoke with a higher up service manager from the dealership yesterday and he was helpful. He seemed very concerned why they drove the car and did not actually test the srs system. He admitted that they did NOT hook it up to the Star scanner and that their dealership had to borrow/rent one from another dealership anytime they needed one. He stated he would refund me and look into getting the scanner. He mentioned they had another crossfire there also that had the recalled airbag swapped and that the SRS light also came on soon after. Uh oh, looks like we may have some bigger problems with this recall.
There have been quite a few of us that had the airbag module replacement recall completed without incident. I suspect the dealer's service department didn't complete the replacement per Chrysler recommended procedure. Many of us have removed the DS airbag & re-installed it without having the SRS lights come on. The key to this is disconnecting the negative battery cable and letting the car sit for 2-3 minutes to clear the system before starting the airbag repair. Even if the SRS light came back on afterwards, the system can be reset using the DRB or similar scanner tool. And your dealer already admitted they didn't have one and had to borrow/rent from another dealer. This also would verify to me that he knew what typically needed to be done, but tried to shortcut it since he didn't have the scanner tool. The fact the the Service Manager admitted they have the same problem on another Crossfire customer substantiates they do the repair wrong consistently!
Originally Posted by
JHM2K
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the replacement unit built for market claims has a line (or five) of code that doesn't jive with the OEM airbag control unit, and it's popping the code. With the ever-increasing complexity of systems in cars these days, it's a very common problem if the past-point-of-fit (PPOF) component is going into a 10+ year-old car.
A major supplier for lane-departure warning systems for Nissan struggles with this issue a LOT. I'm one of the guys that approves the Parts Submission Warrants for these SW changes, and ten times out of nine there are issues detected downstream when the factories overseas have to do PPOF replacements.
TL,DR version -- he needs to borrow Star-DAS to fix it. But it's fixable.
This is interesting reading. Learning this from someone that provides this expertise with another car manufacturer could explain issues some of us are having with the airbag module recall. But I still suspect certain dealer service centers are performing the repair outside of the recommended procedure. They probably don't see these cars on a regular enough basis to remember how sensitive the on-board electronics operate.