bella11356

ok so i just wrecked my 05 tc...i mean smashed the front end it bad! couldnt open the passnger door...my radiator was all pushed back and all the fluid ran out. My hood was crunched along with my passenger light. You can see on the passnger side the floor board doesnt look right. Its worse on the passenger side but i hit the corner of the car infron of me pretty dead center on mine.

I didnt have the chance to hit the breaks so i hit my head on the stearing wheel and my left sholder hurts like hell. Any clues as to why my air bag didnt go off? this wasnt just a fender bender...

engifineer

It is hard to tell without seeing the damage, most times they dont go off, they shouldnt have.. were you wearing a seatbelt? It sounds like you flew forward a littl far to have been wearing one.

Glad you are ok though.

bella11356

Yes i was wearing my seatbelt, I was looking to the left to turn right, so i was kinda leaned forward a little closer to the seating wheel then i am when i drive.

anyways i was just wonder if there was some sensor that had to be hit or something...or a certain speed, over 30 or something maybe...i dunno i'm a girl who doesnt know much about these kinda things

theblue

Yeah there are sensors that need to be hit. Do you have any pictures?

OuterHeaven

Well sometimes if an airbag were to deploy during an accident it will actually make it worse so they try and control when it goes off. It is a compromise they make as in it goes off a lot less when it shouldn’t but then sometimes it will not go off when it should. Now how it goes off is probably something none of us on here know. Maybe a picture could help.

bella11356

i didnt have a camera with me, im gonna go to the dealer tomorrow and see it...i'll take one then

untill then i guess i'll just have to wait

engifineer

It isnt the sensors that have to be hit.. it is the decelleration. The car has to decellerate at a rate quick enough for the system to trigger. So, front damage isnt a very good judging factor in that area.

mike6789k

if the airbags went off, would it have helped much? (i.e., whats more money, fixing the damage to your shoulder or paying for new airbags)

Otocan

be glad it didn't go off, or you'd be in the hospital. an airbag isn't some nice little fluffy pillow that appears in front of you for you to rest your head on, it's a violent explosion that expands at the speed of a bullet, and will break limbs and rip little appendages off like fingers if they get in the way.

If your airbag went off, and your shoulder was closer than 14" from the steering wheel, it could have killed you.

mike6789k

truth

mianvi

i got in a crash and my airbag didn't go off either. i was going about 50 and a guy who was turning left at maybe 15 or 20 hit my front end. i slammed on the brakes and my airbag still didn't go off. it was definately a pretty damaging crash, almost totaled my tc. weird.

mike6789k

were you seriously hurt BECAUSE they didnt go off?

if not, you would have probably been more hurt if they did...

krdshrk

was it a head-on frontal crash or was it a partial impact? The type and position of the impact can affect whether or not the airbags deploy.

If your car's not totalled, be glad! it doesn't take very much to total tC's.

paul34

did your head hit or almost hit the steering wheel?

mianvi

no i wasn't hurt or anything and yes an airbag may have done more damage than good, but still i was very suprised it didn't deploy. my head may have been close to the steering wheel i'm not sure, it didn't hit though. i guess it would be considered a partial impact. it was on my left front side. pretty bad. i dunno. opinions?

krdshrk

If it's a partial impact, then the bags may not deploy.

Scion_South

Airbags are a "last resort".

The newer airbags are designed to only deploy if there is a chance the seatbelts alone will not save someones life or prevent serious injury.

The airbags system looks at rates of deceleration, force of impact, angle of impact, seat position, seat belt use and several other factors to determine whether or not the airbags will help or hurt.

The bottom line is each accident is different but the new advanced airbag technology can and will save lives, when it is needed.

dannygenio

hmm i don;t know cause my airbags did explode when i hit a wall at 40mph.. all the airbags exploded...waste of money cause i was the only one in the car and i had to fix the car without insurance

Scion_South

That whole statement is a little shady.

1. Were you driving a new tC without any kind of insurance?

2. You hit a wall at 40mph? I'd say there is a good chance that all of the airbags would go off.

3. If the accident was severe enough to set off all the airbags there is good chance it would be to expensive to repair, yet you claim to fix it after the accident.

4. You said the airbags were a "waste of money". How much do you think you are worth? Less than the $650 for the side airbag option I guess.


BTW, bella11356 I'm glad to hear you are ok.

engifineer

danny:

Well, I would say a wall at 40 mph would definitely set them off .

If you have a 20,000 dollar car without insurance.. then the waste wasnt the airbags.. it was your fault.

And as mentioned... why would you repair it? I can garauntee that if you ran head on into a wall at 40mph in a tC it would be more than totalled. There is no way you hit the wall still running 40 and ended up with a non-totalled car.