I am here because I recently bought an incredibly cheap second hand Ypsilon to use as an infrequent run about and have a question about whether it has an airbag that might have been deployed. The car is a 2014 1.2s petrol manual with (I think) 4 airbags, 2 front and 2 side.
My question and the reason for posting this thread:
The fabric on the front passenger arm rest in the front passenger door is loose, with a floppy section that can be stretched out easily. On the driver side it's not floppy at all, and fits closely to the door (as you'd normally expect). Is there a risk there is an airbag under the passenger arm rest that has been deployed and then been amateurishly recovered? In addition, the bar to slide the front passenger seat forwards and back is missing. Should I be suspicious?
Is there anything I can do to check? Would the warning panel let me know if the airbag had been deployed and was no longer active? Is there any way of running a more detailed check to see if there are any error codes? There is no air bag warning light when the engine is running so I hope I have nothing to worry about but it has been bothering me (I wouldn't want to risk driving an unsafe car with no airbags). I'm hoping the fabric in the door arm rest was just pulled loose by something (e.g. an unruly dog) - any ideas as to what can cause this? I can't see an airbag symbol in the door arm rest whereas there is one at head height.
Background to car:
The car has been "cat s"'d (i.e. written off for insurance purposes due to structural damage) which is why it was so cheap. As far as I can tell (based on what the dealer told me and my own checks), the only reason it was Cat S'd is that it had a small bump on the rear bumper. There is a 10cm long shallow dent in the rear boot door consistent I think with the kind of damage you'd get from reversing at walking pace into a pole or being hit from behind by another car at very low speed. The boot door still opens and closes fine, albeit you have to slam it a bit harder than normal to get it to lock. There is also a small 5cm medium dent in the front driver side door that doesn't affect the door opening and closing at all. I can't imagine how both the front door damage and rear bumper damage could have happened at the same time, so suspect the door might have been damaged in a separate incident perhaps caused by scraping a wall or similar.
I can't see any bends to the frame or any inconsistent gaps between panels suggesting any other repaired damage. The dealer says that nothing has been done to the car since it was declared a Cat S, and the fact I can see limited damage which would have been easy to hide reassured me that there was probably no other hidden damage. I did a very thorough inspection myself prior to buying and couldn't see anything suggesting any other hidden damage. The panels all look original and unrepaired. I was a bit confused as to why it was cat S (and not cat N) but my limited research suggests damage to the rear boot door would be considered structural and the rear boot door would probably need to be replaced to make it look completely new, so it (hopefully) makes sense and shouldn't affect safety. The car does appear to drive perfectly nicely, with no warnings on the display, and has since passed an MOT with flying colours. The engine, transmission, clutch, wheel bearings and alignment all appear to be fine. I also ran an HPI check and that didn't flag anything else.
Question
jimster99
Hello,
First time post! Great forum.
I am here because I recently bought an incredibly cheap second hand Ypsilon to use as an infrequent run about and have a question about whether it has an airbag that might have been deployed. The car is a 2014 1.2s petrol manual with (I think) 4 airbags, 2 front and 2 side.
My question and the reason for posting this thread:
The fabric on the front passenger arm rest in the front passenger door is loose, with a floppy section that can be stretched out easily. On the driver side it's not floppy at all, and fits closely to the door (as you'd normally expect). Is there a risk there is an airbag under the passenger arm rest that has been deployed and then been amateurishly recovered? In addition, the bar to slide the front passenger seat forwards and back is missing. Should I be suspicious?
Is there anything I can do to check? Would the warning panel let me know if the airbag had been deployed and was no longer active? Is there any way of running a more detailed check to see if there are any error codes? There is no air bag warning light when the engine is running so I hope I have nothing to worry about but it has been bothering me (I wouldn't want to risk driving an unsafe car with no airbags). I'm hoping the fabric in the door arm rest was just pulled loose by something (e.g. an unruly dog) - any ideas as to what can cause this? I can't see an airbag symbol in the door arm rest whereas there is one at head height.
Background to car:
The car has been "cat s"'d (i.e. written off for insurance purposes due to structural damage) which is why it was so cheap. As far as I can tell (based on what the dealer told me and my own checks), the only reason it was Cat S'd is that it had a small bump on the rear bumper. There is a 10cm long shallow dent in the rear boot door consistent I think with the kind of damage you'd get from reversing at walking pace into a pole or being hit from behind by another car at very low speed. The boot door still opens and closes fine, albeit you have to slam it a bit harder than normal to get it to lock. There is also a small 5cm medium dent in the front driver side door that doesn't affect the door opening and closing at all. I can't imagine how both the front door damage and rear bumper damage could have happened at the same time, so suspect the door might have been damaged in a separate incident perhaps caused by scraping a wall or similar.
I can't see any bends to the frame or any inconsistent gaps between panels suggesting any other repaired damage. The dealer says that nothing has been done to the car since it was declared a Cat S, and the fact I can see limited damage which would have been easy to hide reassured me that there was probably no other hidden damage. I did a very thorough inspection myself prior to buying and couldn't see anything suggesting any other hidden damage. The panels all look original and unrepaired. I was a bit confused as to why it was cat S (and not cat N) but my limited research suggests damage to the rear boot door would be considered structural and the rear boot door would probably need to be replaced to make it look completely new, so it (hopefully) makes sense and shouldn't affect safety. The car does appear to drive perfectly nicely, with no warnings on the display, and has since passed an MOT with flying colours. The engine, transmission, clutch, wheel bearings and alignment all appear to be fine. I also ran an HPI check and that didn't flag anything else.
Thanks for any hints / tips!
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