2001 Mercury Sable Owner Guide 3rd Printing - Page 82

Seating and safety restraints How does the personal safety system work? The Personal Safety System uses a collection of sensors to gather information about the driver's seat position, driver and front outboard passenger's safety belt usage and accident severity. Then, dual-stage inflating air bags are combined with safety belt pretensioners and energy management retractors to help provide enhanced occupant protection in frontal crashes. The driver's seat position sensor determines if the seat is fore or aft of a reference position. Similarly, the safety belt usage sensors determine if the driver and front outboard passenger safety belts are fastened. These sensors provide the ability to tailor the air bag deployment based upon how close the driver's seat is to the steering wheel and whether or not the safety belts are fastened. The dual-stage air bags offer the ability to tailor the air bag inflation with two energy levels. A lower, less forceful energy level is provided for more common, moderate-severity impacts. A higher energy level is provided for the most severe impacts. Whether or not the air bag deploys at all can also be different for the driver versus the passenger based upon driver's seat position and safety belt usage allowing further tailoring of the system. Determining if the personal safety system is operational The Personal Safety System uses a warning indicator light in the instrument cluster or a back-up tone to indicate the condition of the system. Refer to the Restraints Warning Indicator section in the Instrumentation chapter. Routine maintenance of the Personal Safety System is not required. The RCM (restraints control module) monitors its own internal circuits and the circuits for the air bag supplemental restraints, crash sensor(s), safety belt pretensioners, front safety belt usage sensors and driver's seat position sensor. In addition, the RCM also monitors the restraints warning indicator light in the instrument cluster. A difficulty with the system is indicated by one or more of the following: • The indicator light will either flash or stay lit. • The indicator light will not illuminate immediately after ignition is turned on. 82