Worth Reconnecting Airbags?

[doctorj357]

Looking for opinions here

Bought a 95 GTS back in July and am the third owner. Got in touch with the original owner and come to find out that the airbags were stolen once upon a time like 10-15yrs ago when he still owned it. He later pulled two un-deployed ones from a junk yard donor. But was reluctant to reconnect them. So now the air bag light is on.

IF proper procedure is followed - Is there any safety concerns about reconnecting 23yr old airbags? Is it like handling old dynamite where the older it gets the more sensitive the charge can be to unexpected deployment? Or are these things pretty fool-proof and work like they were built? Also I know the whole federal law about disconnecting them, but what about reconnecting? Are there any legalities involved?

My goal here is to get the light off, but also make sure I'm being safe about it. I know the shortcut way would be to just remove the light bulb from the cluster, out-of-sight-out-of-mind. But at the same token, if I get into a accident and got injured from the airbags NOT deploying, I don't want to deal with a insurance battle for looking like satey equipment on my car was tampered with.

 

[Texas_Made]

I am not responsible for any personal/property damage or injuries that may happen while working on your SRS systems. Persons working on these systems should be trained. I am only giving guidance so you will be doing this work at your own risk.

I have had mine in and out of the car with no issues. I would scan SRS system just to see if there is any codes other then the air bags not being plugged in. If you do have other issues fix then first. If there are no other issues I would disconnect the battery (both leads) and wait about ten minutes to let everything discharge. Plug In you air bags and reinstall everything. Reconnect your battery and you see what happens. The systems have fail safes built in and if there is an issues they disarm and wait to be fixed.

Kris

 

[Chythar]

I've also had the airbags out without issues, even with the battery connected, and replaced a set that blew due to a minor front-end accident. You will likely have to replace the airbag module, I believe they sh!t themselves when they blow the airbags. The module is under the radio, a blue box right above the transmission tunnel. You should use electrical contact cleaner on the connectors, as you can get an error code that basically says "high resistance on connector X".

There are instructions online on how to pull airbag codes. If the module is bad, I picked up a box of them on eBay. Any airbag module from 1994 to 1998 will work, it can be from a V6, GT or Cobra they're the same. The box I got had several bad ones before one worked.

Good luck!

 

[Mustang5L5]

I've pulled airbags and seats with airbags and replugged them in without issue. Usually I just disconnect the battery and go make a sandwich and then come back and do what I need to do. Never had an issue.

 

[jozsefsz]

FYI if you just remove the bulb the darned control unit will beep at you relentlessly because it's missing the bulb. Worth it to try to safely reconnect things. Old airbags (provided they're not all corroded) are no more dangerous than new ones.