1995 Buick LeSabre Owner's Manual - Page 32

How does an air bag restrain? In moderate to severe frontal ornear-frontal collisions, even belted occupants can contact thesteering wheel or the instrument panel. The air bag supplements the protection provided by safety belts. Air bags distribute the forceof the impactmore evenly over the occupant's upper body, stopping the occupant more gradually. But air bags would not help you in many types of collisions, including rollovers and rear and side impacts,primarily because an occupant's motion is not toward the air bag. Air bags should never be regarded as anything more than a supplement to safety belts, and then onlyin moderate to severe frontal ornear-frontal collisions. What will you see afteran air bag inflates? After the air bag inflates, itquickly deflates. This occurs so quickly that some people may not even realize theair bag inflated. Somecomponents of the a r bag module in i or the steering wheel hub forthe driver's air bag, the instrument panel for the right front passenger's bag, will be hot for a short time, but the part the bag that comes of into contact with you will not be hot to the touch. There will be some smoke and dust coming from vents in the deflated air bags. Air bag inflation will not prevent the driver fromseeing or from being able to steer the vehicle, norwill it stop people from leaving the vehicle. 0 The air bags are designed to inflate only once. After they inflate, you'll need some new parts for your air bag system. If you don't get them, the bag system air won't be there tohelp protect you in another crash. A new system will include air bag modules and possibly other parts. The service manual for your vehicle covers the need to replace other parts. 1-20