Sods law isn't it? you save up for a nice car then 18 hours after buying the bloody thing someone goes and gives it a slight tap, nothing too serious, just a little bit of creasing on the rear bumper paint but on top of that I went to start the thing and the airbag light now stayed on on the driver side yet there is nothing wrong with the airbag system. However if anyone is also having this problem and can't afford jaguars stupendous prices to get the problem amended and the light reset; there is a relatively easy fix which (provided you can live without your ' you've left your lights on pinger') will save you a lot of money. First, remove the wooden dash panel by simply pulling it off then unscrew the instrument panel (eight screws all told). you'll then need a star screwdriver to pull the instrument panel apart. when you've done this remove the instrument needles (remember where they were first though) and pull the clips on the back to remove the white back panel. By looking through the front part of the dash you'll be able to determine which diode is for the airbag. once you've done this using a pair of pliers simply twist it off. the only problem now is the ecu will detect that there is a stray current in the car and after starting the engine after 2 minutes a beep noise will start to sound. the ecu for this is located below the driver side (UK model , i presume on US models it will be located on the left hand side). there are 6 cable clusters attatched to the box that need removing. Take a picture of these first to remember which way they clip back in. Once you've removed the cables, the box simply clicks out. this black box will thenpull apart, revealing a circuit board. The round black circular speaker with a hole in the top is what needs removing so, using a solder iron, heat up the solder on the back of this (it's easy to determine which pins need heating) and pull it away from the board. Then simply put everything back together, problem solved. I was thinking that maybe the need to remove the speaker could be also be amended by replacing the LED on the instrument panel with a resistor equivalent to the power consumption of the LED to trick the ECU into thinking the LED is still attached ( i had neither the time nor patience to find out though)either that or a black marker pen or piece of gaffa on the back of the airbag symbol may work too. Hope this helps if anyone has the same problem. Tim

 

what is the correct procedure?

I dont think pulling warning indicators from airbag systems is very intelligent.

I think that you should have the fault diagnosed before you give up on it. Maybe fixing it properly would have been easier?

 

Already tried that. 100 bucks maybe in america but in england they took two hours at £120 pounds per hour thats what? 200 'bucks', only to be told that they couldn't diagnose the problem and get it to switch off. Their exact words were 'it's probably cheaper to live with it'- and that was a dealer saying that. They tested the airbag system and it was fine and besides you've got the passenger airbag warning light as a secondary. This is only for people who can't locate and amendproblems as is oh so common on the early model x types (in the UK anyway). Fartoo many computers messing things up, if onlywe could revert to old fashioned car engineering where the driver's fully in control things would be alot more fun, especiallyseeing as we have the kinds of roads to enjoyproper drivers cars.It would have been way too costly to amend the problem properly seeing as the car's only worth £3000 because they're so common here yet people can't afford to run them and I've just spent £700 on a new transfer box; so, this was my solution. I'm selling the bloody thing now anyway, It's lovely when it works properly but our petrol's £1.10 a litre, well over £5 a gallon or roughly 9 dollars a gallon and it drinks, plus, I've had nothing but trouble with it. Going to get an MG TF, just me and themachine and noflaming computers.

 

p.s my apostrophe button"s broken on my keyboard.

 

120 quid an hour.. !
is that a typo?

Go to a different dealer, that is horrible trouble shooting, horrible service and a dumb assed proposal.
I would not blame the computers or anything else, the car is as you say decent. ( I cant believe I am saying that) Clearly your problem is a bad dealer. I am sure if you brought your MG to the same dealer, they would extract equal cash from you or more!

If you are referring toa modern TF,, it for certain has some computers in there as well.

 

it is i agree and the rest all charge the same. specialists can do the main ecu but not the airbag one for some reason. thecar's only worth 3000 now anyway (depreciation huh?) so i'm not throwing more money at it. mgtf only has an engine ecu but i'm thinking more along the bgt line either that or a triumph tr6 or tvr tasmin. i tried to convince myself to get something sensible but it's just not happening. ps i apologise for any spellng errors and the lack of capitals but i've just written all this with the onscreen keyboad as the proper on's packed in. may try aking the bulbs out to see if that fixes it lol.
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