Anyways, here is Ford of Belgium's contact info for the few who might be interested in replacing their airbags. The whole set with shipping will cost me 830 Euros. Best of all my dealer will pay 30% of this price and will keep the old air bags.

Ford Motor Company (Belgium) S.A.
Avenue du Hunderenveld 10
1082 Bruxelles
GPS : 50° 52' 12" N - 4° 17' 14" E
Tel + 32 (0)2.482.2000
Fax +32 (0)2.482.2009

 

Dam some people are parnoid!!

Richard

 

Please dont try to deflect and redirect what was said.

It was never said that "driving a car was an essential liberty". You cant see the forest for the trees...

I was talking about Freedoms and Liberties. In broad terms!

The more freedoms (no matter how small ) others let them take or many like you, freely give away the less everyone is free.

I find it funny how you make light of 200 year old quotes that you
feel are outdated and useless today...

What do you think of Sun Tzu and his writings about the "principals of using force", commonly referred to as "The Art of War"?

I guess that since these writings are WAY older than 200 years that it would be DEFINTELY could not be applied to any modern situations...

or have they ? Look it up!

Losing your freedom is not a funny matter.

LB

P.S. Thanks for the info Z!

 

There, I fixed it for you. Maybe you should consider the principle that the music companys and artist have for selling their product instead of ripping it off. How can they enjoy their freedom to create their music? Seems your principles (or principals as you call them) are only in the direction favoring YOU and YOUR behavior.

Your principle is flawed and miscontrued by fear and paranoia.

FACT: The device is a data recorder on a car you CHOSE to buy and CHOOSE to drive on public highways where the information in the recorder MAY be used in an accident investigation.
FICTION: The device is some sort of big brother tracking device used by the co-conspirators (Law Enforcement, Auto Manufacturers, Insurance Companys) to get YOU.

I'll choose fact and live with it happily. You can choose fiction and have your air bag module removed

Enjoy

 

2MFF your post on page 3 I think it was, was the best post within this thread. Well said.

Richard

 

I'm sorry, I thought this was a thread discussing the black box in S197 Mustangs. If your thread was reagrding something else then I think the deflection and redirection belong to you. I was on topic.

You mean you were trying to deflect and redirect the thread? Be careful, someone just asked me not to do that.

Please, feel free to post a list of all the freedoms I have lost due to the black box since purchasing my Mustang in February 2005

I find it funny that people try to define current situations by these quotes instead of looking at the actuals and making a modern, rational decision. I'll be waiting for a list of those freedoms I have lost due to the black box in my 2005 Mustang......

Is that another deflection/ redirection??? Man, you are king of "do as I say..."

OK, I'll bite. I have one question for you:

Do you believe in all of the Principles of war and that they have applied all throughout history right up until today?

Answer please..........................

 

FACT: Cars with OnStar and black boxes not only record your parameters, they also transmit them to base.
FACT: There's no regulation about who owns the information on the EDR, it can be used against you in any way, including speeding.
FACT: Mitsubishi and Subaru use the data to void warranty.
FACT: Without protective legislation the 2020 Mustang will probably feature a live transmitting black box that will not allow you to go over the speed limit.
FICTION: The EDR is a safety feature that will never be misused in the future, and will not evolve into a far more intrusive system.
FACT: Ignorance is BLISS.

 

FACT: Onstar is optional. Don't like it, don't buy a vehicle with it or have them disable it (quite easyily done)
FACT: I am sure Miitu and Suby clearly stated the parameters that would void the warranty and said assclowns (referenced in my earlier post) tried to tell them the vehicle blew up while driving their grandma to church. Don't like the warranty terms and conditions? Then don't violate them, or don't take your car in for a warranty claim when you do.
FACT: Most states have legislation protecting the use of the data. Most requiring a court order not unlike they would use in ANY CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION. However, I am not a mind reader so I have not idea what will happen in 2020. I can only deal with the facts of the reality of the current time. If it gets to a point where data FROM PBLIC HIGHWAYS is reported back and used against me, so be it. I guess I will just have to abide by the laws I agreed to when I CHOOSE to get a drivers license, when I CHOOSE to buy a car, when I CHOOSE to purchase insurance, and, most importantly, when I CHOOSE to drive on PUBLIC highways.
****! Lots of freedom of choise there!
FACT: Sounds like that last one is coming from an expert

 

Not to mention if our founding fathers were alive today they wouldn't be able to quote anything. One look at our current tax laws or a glance at any modern spending bill and they would drop dead faster then being hit by lightning.

 

I'm done with this one... This thread has served its purpose and is now turning into a useless heated debate that doesn't really belong on this forum. I call for a

 

Back to the beginning of the thread ...uh...correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure the airbag module mentioned is not one of the actual airbag canisters but the airbag control module that's located ....wait. If people in this thread are stupid enough to think its a good idea to disable airbags to get rid of the EDR, then they might actually try it.

Look people. Have fun but drive safe. There's a time and a place to get on the throttle.

 

Skimmed the thread - relax. I've worked in insurance and bodyshops for the last 7 years. Not one single time have I, nor any co-worker pulled an EDR for investigation. Heck, even in the never-ending training has it even come up. No big deal to me. Driving a Torch Red Mustang GT w/ 300+ h.p.'s - I want it there. I'm already a target. Having the impartial witness may save me in certain situations. Say a pregnant mom in an SUV is too darn busy talking on her cell phone that she blows through a stop sign and we have an accident. But, then she says that I was racing over 100mph and she had no way to see me, blah blah blah... I don't want to be responsible for the lawsuit, etc if she looses the baby in the crash. And no way in heck am I dumb enough to take out my airbags to save my privacy in what would be a very, very rare situation when EDR info was requested.

 

05GT-O.C.D.,

My biggest issue is how these things grow with time:

1) Some company adds them because they can (no regulation) and they think the data on extreme crashes will benefit their ability to improve the design in the future. Not a bad idea...
2) Some government type decides that it would help even MORE if all autos came with a standard datalogging to help companies design better cars using the data from really bad crashes. Again, nothing that the costomer should worry about, and it only addes a "few" dollars to the price tag (because you KNOW the government isn't going to pay for the mandated hardware!)
3) Auto company decides that now that all of their cars have this "feature", they can use the data from the black box to help them avoid "unnecessary" warrantee coverage while still staying within the bounds of the Federal warantee act. But if it "only" impacting people that "abuse" their cars, well, that's got to be a good thing for the rest of us. Right???
4) Some government type decides that they should be able to use this data to help bust people for reckless driving. Of course, to do that they need more than 30 seconds of data, so they mandate the data retention be increased to 30 minutes so an officer can scan your car for "evidence" of reckless driving after he pulls you over for any "other" traffic stop. Again, it's for our own good. Do we really want these reckless morons running up and down the roads??? Think of the children!!!!
5) Governments love the increase revenue from the "reckless" drivers above. They loved it even more when they changed the definition of "reckless" to include driving more than 10 mph over the limit. Even in the middle of no where.
6) Of course, it was much easier to prove you were speeding when they required all new autos to include GPS. The vehicles location is logged along with it's speed, so the cop doesn't have to know what road you were on, he can just download the data and the software will figure out what the speed limit was at each location and time. Ain't technology grand?
7) Some government type decides that it is just too much trouble to have a police office actually pull you over to find out if you are a reckless driver. So they implement the Federal "Speed-No-Pass" system that adds a small radio link that will automatically upload your traffic data when your car passes by any of the speed beacons placed around the country. And just to make sure you don't go do something reckless in the middle of no where, they increase the retention time from 30 minutes to 30 hours. Storage is cheap! And besides, the car buyer is paying for it anyway!!!!
8) Government types decide they really don't like going to the trouble of mailing traffic tickets to people. So they mandate each new car sold includes a build in ticket printer! Each time you drive by a speed beacon, your car will automatically print out a ticket for each infraction. Just don't let your ticket printer run out of thermal paper! That is an UGLY fine! And you KNOW your car will tell on you at the next speed beacon...

No one will come in and just take away some freedom in whole. Instead, they will nibble away at it one small piece at a time until it is gone so slowly that the people can't even remember what the freedom WAS, let alone that they used to have it. Usually, these freedoms will be taken from us not by tyrants who only wish to dominate our lives, but by people with the best of intentions who are "only" trying to keep us safe from all those "other" people out there.

Remember, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

 

Clint, no arguements here. I don't like them either. I was only addressing the current insurance issue. A government who likes to abuse it's power is a whole 'nother issue. I'm actually surprised they don't propose GPS mounted to our cars that connects to a state system that monitors speed 24-7 on the roads.

 

Right now, fortunately, that would never fly. People would vote against it or petition against it en masse.

But it can definately happen in our future if we allow our expectations-for-privacy to slowly erode. We don't lose freedoms in big chunks, we lose them in baby-steps, where each baby-step can be rationalized to save lives, protect the nation, etc.

But in its current state, I support the existance of this particular black box. It only exists to show the truth of what happened in the last 5 seconds before an accident. Andthe truth is important because lives & money may be involved.

 

Well we promote this 'big brother' behavior as we are so voyeuristic in this country wanting to watch and study what everyone else is doing. But we also see in this thread another trait prevalent in the US, not wanting to take responsibility for anything.

 

Kevin you hit the nail on the head there!! I see it every day. Instead of just owning up to their own mistakes, people will lie to and manipulate anyone or anything to get out of trouble.

 

Heh, they'll try to blame on somebody they've been doing everything to spy and pry on if they could...

 

My bet is that Jefferson would be a Stang guy.






























And he'd rip out the black box and set it on the sales managers desk.




And he be gettin' a supercharger!

Hey, it's my little world, but they know me here.

 

Numbers 3 through 8 all deal with the vehicle owner violating some law or contractual obligation. Typical of conspiracy theorists; freak out that illegak activities may be brought to light. Seems like the laws are what are taking away the "freedoms" you describe. Why not just lobby for anarchy?