I have a '04 limited and the driver side air bag just went off on its own while I was driving. There was no impact, no accident, did not hit a pothole, nothing. The thing just shot out of the door an whacked me. Anyone else have this happen?

 

Now that is totally hosed. You are lucky you didn't get hurt or wreck your car! Now I'm concerned about my '04 coupe. Please post what you find out about the cause so we may all be aware. Thanks in advance!!

 

UH...would that be a lawsuit??

 

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Doubtful especially since no one got hurt. However, it could be issue of concern and possible recall if others start doing it.

 

How about mental trauma?

 

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That would scare the stuffing out of me... I was passing a large semi once when a tire blew right next to my car during rush hour (we were all going around 65). Half of the tire flew right past my nose... and LOUD!!! Phew... I'm lucky I didn't swerve into another car.

 

I'm pretty intrigued by this air bag deployment. So much so that I had to dig out the service manual and take a good look at the electrical drawings. One thing is pretty clear (like duh...) (I'm an electrical/mechanical engineer, so no wise cracks... LOL), everything is redundant, ie, left side impact firing squibs, driver seatbelt firing squibs, driver firing squibs, except for the left side impact sensor itself. So according to the electrical diagrams, it appears that if the left side impact sensor had failed, not only would the side air bag deploy, but so would the drivers air bag and the seat belt tensioner would have fired.

With redundancy being the key here, the logical thing to look at would be the Occupant Restraint Controller. It's a complicated little gadget that looks at the inputs from the impact sensors (and lots of other things like vehicle speed) and tells the firing squibs for the air bags to fire or not to do any thing at all depending on the situation. So a good guess here would be some type of a failure in the Occupant Restraint System is what caused your air bag to just pop out on its own. That air bag has 2 firing squibs on it. Both squibs have to fire for the air bag to deploy. So if one of the squibs would have failed then nothing would have happened.

Hope this makes some sense and gives you some kind of an idea on what may of happened. I could be off base on this but looking at the drawings in the service manual, I think I am on the money.

Let us know what you find out.

 

I missed something. I hate it when that happens... I just read that if a fault occurs in the Occupant Restraint Controller only 1 firing squib my fire and still deploy the air bag. Under normal conditions both squibs fire to ensure deployment.

 

Yep, it's actually a dual stage system. So one or both squibs will fire depending on the severity of the impact.

But to your original question, either the ORC or one of the lateral accelerometers has failed. The squibs themselves take a lot of juice to fire. Current induced by ambient RF energy will not fire a squib under normal circumstances.

I would take AMGlover's advice and have the dealer check for DTCs. My guess is that the driver's side lateral accelerometer, possibly in conjunction with something else that was happening at the time caused the ORC to fire the airbag.

 

Just a silly question, you didn't happen to spill any liquid into the area of the center console, just forward of the cup holder, did you ?

 

Will be seeing the dealer on Friday will let you know what the outcome is.

 

I hope this doesn't matter cause I know I have, once.

 

Wow, keep us updated. I don't think I have ever heard of an airbag deploying all on its own. Keep us updated!!

 

Just curious because the lateral accelerometer is located under the center console about 4" forward of the cup holder and has exposed wiring connectors. Could be shorted-out with a big spill that ran under the center console...

 

Have any updates for us?? Thanks in advance.

 

Excellent place for a liquid sensitive device... Under the cup holder... Yep, that's where I would put it...

I guess having a beverage in the Crossfire is like drinking coffee while surfing the forum...

"Oops there goes that keyboard..."

Getting my Starbucks at the drive-thru on Monday and the lid popped off when the cashier handed over my iced-vanilla-latte... I must of looked pretty mad because the cashier had that "deer in the headlights" look as I said "Get me a towel, please."

No more beverages in the Crossfire...

Back on point - anybody know what the outcome of this was??

 

Please do share... I'm getting tired of my guesses being wrong...

Wait, let me guess anyway... Some little Bosch gizmo that is under the console, just forward of the cup holder shorted out and wreaked havoc with the body sensor computer... It took a week for the whiz bang Chrysler Technicians to figure out and then another week to get the parts in... Then they screwed-up the repair and you still have problems...

Am I warm ?