SRS airbag warning lights

[voiceinsideyou]

The SRS airbag warning light has been coming on on my Altezza every now and then lately - vaguely concerning. Basically, if it comes on when I start the car, it doesn't turn off... but other times it won't be on at all. I can't seem to find a pattern to it at all.

Toyota had the car today and I asked them to take a look at it, but they didn't have anything inspiring to say - in fact, they were blimen useless, didn't even give me any assurances as to whether my airbags were functioning or not! Apparently they cleared the codes and "road tested", but I have no idea what I got for my 3/4 an hour of labour (other than them smashing my bodykit's bumper into something causing $500 damage... but that's another story...)

All they said was "to replace the component would be $614 + $150 labour". I have no idea even what component they're talking about, and how they know it's the problem... any ideas?

Are there any common reasons for these warning lights to come on? Ways of diagnosing the problem? Not sure what to do now.... but I sure as hell aint paying Toyota $750 until I know more!

[matt dunn]

We have had quite a bit to do with air bags systems at work and actually do a bit for the local toyota/subaru dealer.

Intermittant faults that occour like that we have found only ever two possibilities.

1 The clock spring in the steering column can be damaged. We strike this on lots of different vehicles and have actually stuck it on a toyota.
Fault can be very random and the ECU is not capable of determing the difference between a wirng fault, a clock spring fault, and an actual air bag assy fault so the codes that it will bring up are not always too helpfull.

2 This is the less common fault and have only ever struck it on lexus based toyota's such as windoms and soarers and the altezza is lexus based so it may apply. The ecu itself. Even thought the car has not been in an accident the ecu can play up. I have personally had to replace 3 windom ECU's in three different cars over the last few years.

So this is my experience with air bags and it may be helpful and it may not.

My money would be on the clock spring.

Matt

[voiceinsideyou]

Interesting - thanks heaps for your reply. I guess I'll see how it goes over the next few weeks - I'm pretty happy if it's really intermittent and just a wiring type fault (which sounds like it's the case) so I guess it depends if it annoys me.

Doesn't quite seem like it warrants a full ECU replacement just yet - I wonder if that's what Toyota were suggesting when they talked about replacing "the component"? Not too sure.

As long as I'm still going to have a bag explode in my face on any serious collision, I'm all good. :p

[Farmer_dave]

Yea I dont suggest driving into a tree at 80 k's to test it out!!!

[Mr Revhead]

based on that price it looks like the 'clock spring' its ex japan by the way (i looke dupan sxe10 so if its a diff model it could be different)

vcv10 windoms are extra flash/crap camrys
quite possibly the worst car ever made by toyota!

[Leon]

as I discovered, some cars don't have airbag lights!

I have a 1998 Kiwi built Corolla wagon, that just failed a WOF for having no airbag light.

Auto sparky pulled the instrument panel out, to discover that there is no airbag light in there at all.

They rung Toyota, and discovered that a limited run of cars actually has an exemption for not having an airbag light.

They then charged me two hours labour... er, no, I don't think so.

[anthonym]

The SRS airbag warning light has been coming on on my Altezza every now and then lately - vaguely concerning. Basically, if it comes on when I start the car, it doesn't turn off... but other times it won't be on at all. I can't seem to find a pattern to it at all.

Toyota had the car today and I asked them to take a look at it, but they didn't have anything inspiring to say - in fact, they were blimen useless, didn't even give me any assurances as to whether my airbags were functioning or not! Apparently they cleared the codes and "road tested", but I have no idea what I got for my 3/4 an hour of labour (other than them smashing my bodykit's bumper into something causing $500 damage... but that's another story...)

All they said was "to replace the component would be $614 + $150 labour". I have no idea even what component they're talking about, and how they know it's the problem... any ideas?

Are there any common reasons for these warning lights to come on? Ways of diagnosing the problem? Not sure what to do now.... but I sure as hell aint paying Toyota $750 until I know more!

Finding good technical assistance in Wellington is next to impossible and the Toyota dealers appear to be particularly poor in this regard, just ask harmony, he gets his Toyota serviced at a Subaru dealership because it's the only place he's found where the technicians are not trucked back to the zoo at night. If they've narrowed it down to a particular component they should be able to tell you what the fault code was, armed with that you might be able to get more relevant information on the internet. Another cause of intermittent faults I know of is the passenger seat pressure sensor, don't know about Toyotas but it's a known and expensive fault on the BMW 5 series.

[Mr Revhead]

quite often a fault light will only tell you the system that is causing the fault. and it can quite often be several components for the one code...
faults lamps are there to tell you of as fault not what causes it. (this may be different for other makes)

for example my tvis 4age manual lists up2 5 parts that can cause one fault code

[anthonym]

quite often a fault light will only tell you the system that is causing the fault. and it can quite often be several components for the one code...
faults lamps are there to tell you of as fault not what causes it. (this may be different for other makes)

for example my tvis 4age manual lists up2 5 parts that can cause one fault code

I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to say but fault codes are always triggered by a particular electrical signal going out of range. For example the output of a sensor, which could be due to 1 of 3 causes; the sensor, the wiring between the sensor and the ECU generating the fault code or the ECU itself (which will all be listed as possible reasons in the manual). A mechanical component like the TVIS system naturally has more points of failure, but since the ECU only interfaces with the solenoid, the information available to it is limited to the fact that the solenoid is not working. Nevertheless, knowing the actual fault code tells you exactly where to look and it is a simple matter of elimination to identify the problem. In my experience Toyota fault codes are pretty granular with only a limited number of possible causes. If it was harder than that it would be beyond the skill of most technicians.

[Mr Revhead]

what i meant was the fault code may highlight 5 different parts that could cause that code. the code will not identify an exact part (well it will in some cases)
so you cant always just look up the code and it will say "tps at fault", it will quite often list several other components that could be at fault. you then have to sort through them.
when i said tvis i was mearly stating the manual i have at home, not referring to faults in the tvis system