Second hand car caught fire.

AdrianC

bigjl wrote: »

And if the airbag light doesn't function then there is no way to tell if there is a fault or not.

But you can certainly assume a fault is more likely than not.

Ah, but it isn't saying there IS a fault, so it passes. If it isn't in the "reasons for rejection" column, it isn't a fail. And "light not doing anything" is not in that column.

patman99

My mate had the same airbag light fault on his Picasso. Luckily, the indie gaage he took it to were able to diagnose the fault-code as being with the sensor. A quick trip to ebay to purchase a new switch cluster and fault was cured.

Might have been worth doing the same on the Vectra.

As you purchased the new car from a dealer, you need to inform him of the fault and give him a reasonable chance to rectify the fault or replace the vehicle, or refund you the cash.

If you are lucky he will be a sole trader rather than a LTD company. This means that if he fails to play ball, you can take him to Court for the cost of the vehicle AND all associatted costs such as fee to transport car back to his garage, travel expenses for the passengers (either to their final destination or back home) and any hotel costs incurred. With the peace of mind that if you name him as co-defendant along with his company, you will stand a high chance of getting your money back.

bigjl

AdrianC wrote: »

Ah, but it isn't saying there IS a fault, so it passes. If it isn't in the "reasons for rejection" column, it isn't a fail. And "light not doing anything" is not in that column.

Next time you have an MOT disconnect your Airbag light, which is diagnostic, and see if it passes.

Johnmcl7

bigjl wrote: »

Next time you have an MOT disconnect your Airbag light, which is diagnostic, and see if it passes.

AdrianC is correct - a missing airbag light is not an MOT fail on its own, it was going to be originally but then it was changed so that the only fail with regards to the light is if it's lit to show a malfunction:


http://www.honestjohn.co.uk/forum/post/index.htm?t=100425#m1105158


This is the current relevant MOT section:


http://www.motinfo.gov.uk/htdocs/m4s05000401.htm

bigjl

"An Airbag obviously missing or defective."

Seems fairly clear cut.

If you Airbag Check light is U/S then the only conclusion is that the Airbag is indeed either missing or defective.

As you can't strip the car apart to confirm if the Airbag is present, as people have been known to take the guts out an Airbag.

Or fail to replace them after deployment.

The link that has now been produced twice seems pretty clear.

No Airbag Light means possibly No Airbag.

Johnmcl7

bigjl wrote: »

"An Airbag obviously missing or defective."

Seems fairly clear cut.

If you Airbag Check light is U/S then the only conclusion is that the Airbag is indeed either missing or defective.

As you can't strip the car apart to confirm if the Airbag is present, as people have been known to take the guts out an Airbag.

Or fail to replace them after deployment.

The link that has now been produced twice seems pretty clear.

No Airbag Light means possibly No Airbag.

No, it's frequently the case that a sensor or electronics glitch causes the error light to come on despite the airbag being present. In the OP's case, the airbag is still fitted so it wouldn't fail for it being obviously missing or defective nor would it fail if the airbag light didn't come on so your statement 'Because if the car is fitted with Airbags then the light has to function.' is incorrect.


John

Westmead_Fan

what fault codes was their to bring the airbag light on & what did the 4 garages do to try & fix the fault.

on your new car what actually caught fire???

Johnmcl7

Westmead_Fan wrote: »

what fault codes was their to bring the airbag light on & what did the 4 garages do to try & fix the fault.

on your new car what actually caught fire???

I'm assuming it must have been something smoking or the OP wouldn't be here asking about the car, it would be useful to know though what was smoking, what car it is, age, mileage etc. as there's too little information to offer much useful advice.


John

EcoR1

bigjl wrote: »

"An Airbag obviously missing or defective."

Seems fairly clear cut.

If you Airbag Check light is U/S then the only conclusion is that the Airbag is indeed either missing or defective.

As you can't strip the car apart to confirm if the Airbag is present, as people have been known to take the guts out an Airbag.

Or fail to replace them after deployment.

The link that has now been produced twice seems pretty clear.

No Airbag Light means possibly No Airbag.

No SRS light can mean all sorts of things, it won't fail an MOT for it though.

One of us in this conversation is an MOT tester.

AdrianC

bigjl wrote: »

Next time you have an MOT disconnect your Airbag light, which is diagnostic, and see if it passes.

Apart from the subtle detail that I don't own any vehicles with airbags, you've already been given the link to the official online version of the tester's handbook.

The last airbagged car I had was a twin-bagged one. On that, the airbag light was on the dash. But if it had been built a month or three earlier, it'd have been a single-bag car, and the light would have been just a small LED on the otherwise-interchangable steering wheel. If I'd swapped the wheels over between them, the single bag car would have had no airbag light, but the airbags would still have worked just fine. Or maybe the dash light had just blown... Absence of a light does not indicate a malfunction.