2007 Mazda MAZDA3 Owner's Manual - Page 30

Mazda3_8V66-EA-06F_Edition2 Page29 Friday, May 26 2006 10:53 AM Black plate (29,1) Essential Safety Equipment Seat Belt Systems Front Seat Belt Pretensioner and Load Limiting Systems For optimum protection, the driver and front passenger seat belts are equipped with pretensioner and load limiting systems. For both these systems to work properly you must wear the seat belt properly. Pretensioners: In moderate or severe frontal or nearfrontal accidents, the front air bag and pretensioner systems deploy simultaneously when the seat belt is worn. If the front seat occupant is not wearing a seat belt, that person's pretensioner will not fire even if the air bag does. The front seat belt retractors remove slack quickly as the air bags are expanding. In addition, the pretensioner system for the front passenger, like the front passenger air bag, is designed to only deploy in accordance with the total seated weight on the front passenger seat. Any time the air bags and seat belt pretensioners have fired they must be replaced. For details, refer to the front passenger seat weight sensors (page 2-49). Load limiter: The load limiting system releases belt webbing in a controlled manner to reduce belt force on the occupant's chest. While the most severe load on a seat belt occurs in frontal collisions, the load limiter has an automatic mechanical function and can activate in any accident mode with sufficient occupant movement. Even if the pretensioners have not fired, the load limiting function must be checked by an Authorized Mazda Dealer. WARNING Wear seat belts only as recommended in this owner's manual: Incorrect positioning of the driver and front passenger seat belts is dangerous. Without proper positioning, the pretensioner and load limiting systems cannot provide adequate protection in an accident and this could result in serious injury. For more details about wearing seat belts, refer to "Fastening the seat belts" (page 2-13). 2-15 Form No.8V66-EA-06F