LOVE this car! But, 2 design flaws

[Tatohead]

Just being a little tongue-in-cheek in complaining about this awesome car, but here are my two gripes:

1. No disconnect for the seat belts on the door side. Other passive restraint systems often have this. I sometimes use my front seat to haul boxes, etc, and the belt is a pain.

2. That darn rotary knob to recline the front seats! You'd better have all day if you'd like to recline the seat and nap. I guess the brightside is if I have to do this more often I'll end up with forearms like Popeye.

[Darwin686]

Originally Posted by Tatohead

Just being a little tongue-in-cheek in complaining about this awesome car, but here are my two gripes:

1. No disconnect for the seat belts on the door side. Other passive restraint systems often have this. I sometimes use my front seat to haul boxes, etc, and the belt is a pain.

2. That darn rotary knob to recline the front seats! You'd better have all day if you'd like to recline the seat and nap. I guess the brightside is if I have to do this more often I'll end up with forearms like Popeye.

I don't mind the know so much or the seat-belt. What I don't like about the design is the low radio placement and the cup holders

[hairball]

And I agree with BOTH of you on everything mentioned!

1. The seat belts suck.
2. The recliner knobs suck even more!
3. The low radio placement sucks even more than #2!

In fact, I just got rid of my stereo because of that issue! It's almost impossible to find a coffee cup that doesn't hit the radio and turn the station or turn it on!!! Both my Kenwood AND Alpine would turn on, or turn the station if it was already on, when I hit a bump just right because they could both be turned on by touching a channel button.

No stereo? No problem!

But let me help you with that seat belt problem! I got both of mine all the way back manually because I was having so many issues with them not going back by themselves.

See the next post by me, below...

[hairball]

I was so tired of mine not going back that I found out about the manual thumbwheel that allows you to put the belt in the back or front position by hand and I put mine back. It takes about 10 minutes of rotating the wheel because of the gearing inside it, but it is back all the time now. I just have to grab the belt from behind me and manually move it around to the front. Sure, it's a hassle, but at least I'm legal and safe because I'm belted in. The passenger side had not come back for about a month after I fixed the drivers side, so I moved it back too. It used to come back if I made a left turn (very strange) or hit a bump.

It's really a simple fix. You just have to pull your trim panel off between the doors on that side. Once inside, you MUST unplug the motor (or risk it going back forward again).

Unplug this blue connector:


Then look for the small black thumb wheel at the bottom (sorry, I forgot to take a picture of it). Turn that wheel by hand (it will take forever it seems due to the gear ratio of the motor and the teeth the gear grabs). But after 10-15 minutes (I'm probably exaggerating) your shoulder belt will be all the way back!

Again, I can't stress the importance of unplugging that blue connector! I forgot to do it the first time, then after putting everything back together and closing my doors and going in the house, the first time I opened my door it went forward (but wouldn't go back again!). With this unplugged, it will stay back like both mine have for over 6 months now.

I wish I could just remedy the issue and have them work again, but the seat belt circuit seems to complicated.

Good luck. Let me know if this was what you were talking about, and if it works for you.

[Tatohead]

Hairball,

Perfect. I know about the manual wheel, but the thought never occurred to me to just disable the darn thing. Thanks