hobojack

My thought is the government has let this saga to continue for so long. The only way you get the attention of these big companies is in the bottom line.

goldenpony

Ford keeps pushing this issue down the road. I predict that in the not too distant future there will be a class action suit against Ford and it will cost them dearly.

hobojack

There should have been a class action suit already. We have taken the hit on the value of our cars.

karman

I just collected from the guy that caused the accident.
The government mandate of airbags was at fault, not the manufacturer.

My injury was a direct result of the fact that all airbags only inflate once, then start to deflate.
When you hit the second major impact in an accident, anything that has fallen between the partially inflated airbag and your body in the interim between collisions can cause problems.
Again, anything can happen.

m05fastbackGT

What you posted would seem to make sense, as the manufacturers have to abide by federal mandates.. Therefore I agree that it's government who should be at fault and not the auto manufacturer, especially after providing the info from your latest post in which airbags appear to cause more problems in causing injuries following a collision rather than preventing them as they were intended for in the first place.. At any rate, if there's anyway to deactivate/disconnect the airbags without causing the vehicle's ECM nor the electrical system to malfunction, I will do so without hesitation..

In the meantime, I'm glad to know the person who was responsible for causing your injuries was all covered by his insurance company and that you were able to make a full recovery

GhostTX

I got my letter that parts are still not available. The recommendation is to not have anybody sit in the passenger seat.

Great, now I have a one adult car.

MustangHeidi

I recently received the recall letter from Ford warning me not to allow anyone to ride in the front row passenger seat. I purchased my '05 GT in Feb. of 2017, so I have been driving my kids around all this time, allowing them to sit in a seat where they could potentially be killed in a minor accident. I was recently told by the Ford dealership that the remedy parts for my car probably wouldn't come in until June. This is so unacceptable to me! Fortunately, I have other vehicles I can drive if I need to, but what if I didn't??? Ford owes us something for all this inconvenience, but I can't see them compensating anyone for this . What I really want to do is disable the airbag system until the remedy parts come in, but I am going in circles trying to find out how to do this. Anyone know?

m05fastbackGT

Perhaps some of the posts in the following thread might be useful. Here's the link below

https://themustangsource.com/forums/...ir-bag-545007/

Scarpi

Well I'm still waiting for my passenger air bag replacement. Has anybody been getting word from Ford that they can bring their 05-09 car in for the passenger air bag replacement? My wife and I have not used the car together since Ford warned us not to. Yeah I'm kind of pissed at Ford and Takata for turning my Mustang into a one passenger car for so long a time period. What do you people do if you are a couple and maybe have a kid and the Mustang is your only car, take the bus?

Isn't it funny that all the new Mustangs are rolling off the assembly line daily with airbags but we have to wait so long to get our airbags replaced in our older one passenger cars. Apparently there are companies making good airbags for the new cars daily. Why can't they first focus on making airbags for the old cars? Like I said before, maybe production of new cars should be shut down until all the airbags in the old cars are replaced. Because according to Ford anyone sitting in the front passenger seat could be killed. It's really not right for the auto manufacturers to continue putting airbags into new cars while we can't enjoy our older cars as they were intended to be enjoyed. Sorry for the rant and for your information I do own two Ford vehicles and have supported the company.

m05fastbackGT

Not all Takata's fault huh So just who exactly was at fault for making the defective airbags in the first place and who filed for bankruptcy after being sued for negligence and wrongful death, thanks to Takata.

m05fastbackGT

From my understanding, Takata is manufacturing the replacement parts. What I don't understand is why doesn't Ford, GM, Honda and Fiat/Chrysler find a different airbag manufacturer rather than risk sticking with Takata. IMHO the damage has already been done thanks to all the injuries and wrongful deaths resulting from their negligence due to their defective airbags.

There's an airbag manufacturer based in Sweden called Autoliv. According to the article link below, their company is highly favored to come on top for cleaning up Takata's airbag mess. So why not just start fresh by dumping Takata altogether and select Autoliv for the replacement parts instead

http://www.autonews.com/article/2016...as-airbag-mess

houtex

Everyone is in on the replacement game:

http://www.autonews.com/article/2017...bags-contracts

Takata, Autoliv, ZF and Daicel are all making replacements. There's too many to only have Takata try to fill the orders.

What Takata has done is sold itself, with the exception of the inflator division, to Key Safety Systems:

http://www.autonews.com/article/2017...-reorganiztion

It is expected that the remainder of Takata will shut down operations at the end of the inflator recall project. It likely will be defunct and all remaining assets sold to clear debts, the company shuttered forever after.

Where Autoliv is going to come out on top is the new contracts, which it's been winning... and sort of has to, because there's going to be one less player in the field. Honda, Takata's biggest client, said in no uncertain terms it's not going to be giving out any new inflator contracts to Takata, which pretty much sealed the deal on what happened next... the sale to KSS.

Anyway, all hands are already on deck for the recalls. It's just that kind of a massive problem to slog through is all.

---

Gravydog, I would like very much to have some credible resources cited regarding the government causing this to be backed up/slowed down. I am honestly curious, because I see nothing indicating that in the searching I've done on that issue. Beyond the safety standards being set and demanding the manufacturers adhere to them, but that was already decided years ago, and I'd think they'd be leaning on the manufacturers (Ford, GM, Honda, etc) to get it done rather than let people get mangled potentially...

houtex

That is not the government causing the backup. The things are faulty, they gotta be replaced. That there were so many made badly (however the fault happened) is the problem. What would you have the government do? Takata, Ford, GM, Honda, Toyota, et al, would *ALL* rather not bother with the dang things, because it's just as much a pain in the (insert alternate word for donkey) for them to get all that done, and someone has to pay for the labor and parts involved... you're technically not paying, and definitely hitting their bottom lines.

But honestly, it's the government trying to avoid someone (you or me, in effect) dying because of a defect, something that they've been doing on for years and years. Or would you rather ride around in a '59 Bel Air?


I know I'd rather not, if a crash happened anyway. Them were some deathtraps made back in the day, cheaply as possible and still be decent. You can thank the governments that made sure the safety standards are not only installed, but adhered to AND retroactively fixed (recalled) when needed. Seatbelts, crumple zones, safety cages, and yes, airbags and much much more, and today, head ons don't mean you're going to be maimed really badly if not outright dead on impact.

Any one of those safety items therefore can't be allowed to stay on the car if faulty, so good on Australia and the US (and other countries) for being thorough. And not just on airbags, so many other things... there's rolling recalls on many vehicles just about any day of the week. There's still a frame rail recall on older Tacomas that are still being done. You don't hear about them because it's not as many cars, and it's an older recall, but it's just as deadly. The frame rails will crack in half, do that on a freeway, it's going to be a real bad time. So the ENTIRE TRUCK has to be rebuilt literally from the frame down and up. The body has to be removed, the drive train has to be removed, everything removed from the old frame, and then replaced on the new frame. It's expensive, time consuming, and STILL going on...

And that's just one of them like that. There's recalls everywhere. The airbags are just another one, it's just that it's that massive a problem, and so it'll just take that kind of time.

And no, that $130 million isn't going to keep Takata going. It's already cost them their existence. There'll be no more contracts to keep the inflator business going. The rest of Takata is/are divisions of KSS, and not related. Takata is a dead company walking, the name living on, the products still sold, just not Takata's company products anymore.

Finally, the government shutdown doesn't do anything to the manufacturers, the parts shipping, the labor to replace the things, any of it. It's an inconvenience if you use government services, but the reality is that the dealerships aren't going to stop because the government decides to make an unpaid unscheduled holiday for its workers.

So... yeah. I'm confused why you'd say contrarian things on this matter, except maybe...

m05fastbackGT

You're exactly 100% spot on in regards to Takata being a dead company walking in which I couldn't agree with you more. According to the included link, here's a list of the key airbag vendors for 2017-2021. I also added Key Safety Systems below from another list as well.

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...300580760.html

http://valientmarketresearch.com/ind...rket-research/

Autoliv Inc.
Continental AG.
Denso Corporation.
Freescale Semiconductor.
Key Safety Systems.
Mitsubishi Electric Co., Ltd.
Robert Bosch Corporation.

stang09

I went to the dealer too and got a recall card from ford they told me that they would order it so far no avail since the airball manfacturer while for bankruptcy. good luck with that Ford does not care about safety.

stang09

anyone looking for a 2004 Ford Mustang radio with a single CD player

m05fastbackGT

On the contrary, it's Takata who's at fault for the defective airbag inflators. Ford had no way of knowing about the inflators rupturing until it was reported to them. Also, it wasn't just Ford that was affected by the defective Takata inflators, GM, Honda, Toyota, Nissan, Fiat/Chrysler, BMW, VW, and Audi have all been affected by the inflator recalls as well. That being said, you should be putting the blame on the airbag manufacturer towards their lack of caring about safety rather than putting the blame on Ford!

Scarpi

Update on the passenger airbag recall. I got tired of waiting to hear from Ford about parts availability since it's been about a year and a half or so, so I called the Ford customer service number on the Ford owner website. I talked to a very nice representative and she told me that parts were available for my car and then she even called my dealer to check to be sure they have the parts while I was on hold. She then gave me a case number and who to talk to at my dealer. They will have the parts in April and all I have to do is make an appointment and bring it in. I was amazed because the last I heard was that Ford will send me a letter when parts were available. I never got one, so I decided to make this call and Ford came through for me.

m05fastbackGT

Glad to know the service rep at Ford got the ball rolling for you. Looks as though I'll be contacting them next, as I still haven't received any notification update regarding the passenger side replacement parts yet!

houtex

I just... Yeah. Well, there's no saving this silliness, time to stop.

Can someone tell me when the S197 passenger airbags are being fixed at a decent rate, thanks in advance. That's all I was really in here for, and got sidetracked. Again. Sorry 'bout that.

hits eject button