palidanx

In my 1st gen (woot) 04 tsx, my airbag indicator light intermittently goes off. I'm now out of warranty, and was wondering what things I can do to troubleshoot this problem (worst case I have to take it back to the dealer?)

thanks!

nbtx

Airbag system is still under warrantee - check it out, it's not part of the 4/50000.

Simba91102

He may find that the idiot light is not part of the "air bag system". I wonder if at any time there was any front end damage. Even a slight tap might be enough to put one of the the sensors in "confused" mode.

Chelsea John

Also take note that the seatbelt can also cause the airbag light to come on.

vthree

iTrader: (1)

hmmmm so what's the best way to go about this while being out of warranty?

LuvMyTSX

I can't imagine it would cost a lot to fix a light at the dealer, but if you are worried about cost, call the dealer and a private mechanic and get quotes from each. It's hard to say exactly what you should do since no one is positive what the problem is (if it's just the light/sensor, or something else).

HoRRo

Is it the Red or Yellow air bag light?

ggarding

My 2005 airbag light sometimes comes on when I start my car an it STAYS on. I turn car off and then bag on and it only comes on for a few seconds then goes off like it is supposed too. Don't really know why it does this...

ggarding

Mine is the Red light above E-Brake

Mr. DB2

My 04 had this issue and it was the seatbelt buckle. Warrantied for the life of vehicle as long as the vehicle has a clean title.

Sharyehi

Similar issue with my 05 - the red airbag light (the one with the person sitting and the circle infront of them - dealer description, not mine) came on twice about a month apart. Would go away by turning off the car and restarting. Occured around 40K miles, but 4.5 years old. They said to first bring it in and they would dump the codes from the computer. The code (don't remember what it was at the moment) indicated a problem with the driver's seatbelt mechanism. They checked something like resistance in the mechanism and it was off, so they cleared the code on the computer and restarted the car and the code reappeared. They replaced the buckle/mechanism under the lifetime warranty and the code did not come back. Dealer said the "lifetime" warranty does not apply on newer model years as Acura has changed it - can't remember what year the change was made.

I've done all service at dealer so he did not indicate that he would charge to check the codes and diagnose the problem. So even if you are out of warranty it can't hurt to see if they will check the codes for free.

Also, dealer explained that whenever the light is on, the system is shut off. Explained that the system detected a problem so it shuts off and will not trigger the airbags in a collision.

sukemecuke

Bringing this back from the dead. What was the resolution? How do you find out if you have this "lifetime" warranty? We are the original owners and we have a 2005 TSX that we bought brand new in the tail end of 05(Oct). My wife's TSX has recently started doing this after she tugged really hard on the seat belt trying to get to the ATM. grrrrrrrrr So now it's on/off all the time.

palidanx

my dealer said its probably not worth checking this unless the light is on all of the time.. my red airbag light still turns on intermittently.

Boulder TSX

My airbag light was coming on too, (and seemingly dimming the lights on the dash at the same time). I took it into the dealer, and after lots of diagnosis, they replaced the driver's side airbag and the electrical cable reel in the steering wheel, saying the codes indicated a short circuit.

A week later, I was back again with the same problem. This time they replaced the alternator. (All under warranty, since my car is a CPO.)

A week later, it still had the problem. I was at wits end.

I did some searching here, and found some threads describing the cause of that problem as a bad battery ground cable. It made no sense that it would be that simple, but I went to Checker Auto parts and bought a new ground cable for $5 & installed it.

-- That was it! The problem is gone.

I'd say try that with yours. For $5, it's cheap fix worth trying.

palidanx

Whoa! i'm going to try this. worth a shot for 5 bucks.

spoolinq

Bringing this back. I have an 05 with the exact same problem at 61k miles. It's out of warranty and the dealer wants $120 to even check it. Does replacing the driver seat buckle work? Anyone have the part # for it? This seems to be a common problem.

awinn

iTrader: (7)

^^agreed. i have the same problem on an 04. any help?

spoolinq

i believe this is the part number. Part# 04816-SEC-A11ZD. Can anyone confirm?

trsman

I had the problem in my 06. Was coming on and off when I bought it. Got the dealer to replace the passenger side airbag sensor.

fade06

ive had the same proble mine in intermittent

rockstar143

iTrader: (6)

I have the same problem on my 3G TL...
I click and unclick the seatbelt repeatedly and it'll go off the next time I turn on the car. I tried blowing compressed air in there too. I think it's the seatbelt assembly sensor...sometimes when I undo my seatbelt the "little buckle up guy" light doesn't come on right away.

Miamicarfan

How long is the warranty on the airbag system? Does anybody know?

hi_Life

gots a similar problem but its the passenger side airbag light, goes on once in awhile.. this is from my 07

ATLwxgal

Same just happened with my '04. It ended up being the seatbelt buckle, which the dealer replaced. I'm almost positive it was warrantied...and I was at 97K mi when done.

Audioserf

This happens on my 04, first started a couple months ago. I'm at 63k. It's annoying but not a big enough deal to me to take it to the dealership, which I absolutely hate doing.

spoolinq

this is for all the guys who are out of warranty and/or their dealerships refusing to replace the part. i ordered the seat belt buckle ($60? @delray acura) on my 05 tsx w/ 63k miles. total time took about ~15 mins. it was a pretty straight forward.

tools needed:
-socket wrench + 14mm + extension(for leverage)
-flat head screw driver (to take out the plastic clips holding the harness, there's 3 of them)

Process:
1. make sure key is NOT in the ignition. move the seat all the way forward.
2. peel off the two black clips covering the rear screws holding the seat down and remove screws.
3. move seat all the way back and remove the two screws holding the front part of the seat down.
4. pull seat outwards (towards the left car door) and remove the 14mm bolt holding the seat belt buckle.
5. (here's the tricky part and probably the best way to remove the harness) since the seat is really heavy, i flipped the seat backwards instead of pulling the seat out of the car. make sure to put the steering wheel tilt all the way up. remove clips and unclip the blue harness (blue harness for 04-05, grey harness for 06+).
6. reverse order.

So far the airbag light light has not been on since. we'll see though...

nmso4

i have the same problem with my airbag light coming on in my 04' TL, hopefully the dealership will fix it.

thunder04

iTrader: (1)

I had my drivers side seat belt buckle replaced at 147k miles under the unlimited mileage/year SRS warranty.

My air bag light would come on intermittently. Narrowed it down to the buckle as unbuckling my seat belt would not result in the "unbuckled seat belt" dummy light coming on...and a few second after the air bag light would come on.

When I had the power steering feed hose recall done I told them about the seat belt buckle. The dealer replaced it with zero hassle.

dime5150

Hi All,

I have a 2005 TSX with 59,959 miles. Started getting the intermittent SRS light. Took it to Honda (Acura is 150 miles away), and the code read was 61-1 stored. Drives seat belt buckle. Acura says they won't cover (outside warranty). Here and others say yes it's for lifetime. Honda was sure about it being covered but I don't know. I figure i'll take it to Acura and if they don't i'll talk to client services. Seems like something that should be covered.

Thought i'd revive this thread because it was very useful for me. Oh and the owner of the dealership wanted my car (said they were hard to find and get at the auction) lol.

dime5150

PS. Had a bit of a tiff with Acura dealer. The kept telling me that it is NOT covered by the Warranty. They said it's very common to have this happen, (lots of instances on the RL's), but Acura cracked down and said they won't cover it until the seat beat buckle doesn't latch.

So after they repeatedly beat this into the ground I said "Ok. I'll have Honda do it instead.."

palidanx

Hmm.. so for me, I called my acura dealer and asked them if they could take a look and pull off the status codes from the light. They said if it was their problem, then they would fix it. Otherwise they would charge me a $120 examination fee... sounds like I'm playing the lotto here..

enzojr

Thanks spoolinq for the instructions. I had an issue with my airbag light for a while now where it would come on under two situations: a) if I start the car without buckling, or b) if I unbuckle with the engine running. The light would not come on if I buckle up before I start the engine, which is why I managed to put this repair off until now.

BTW, for the record, US TSXs have a lifetime warranty on seat belt components, while Canadian TSXs don't. That's why I replaced the buckle myself.

I bought a new buckle from my local Acura dealer ($115CAD +tax!) which was a special order, no refund item. It came with some detailed instructions inside too which were a bit different than what spoolinq suggested. I found spoolinq's to be a lot simpler and easier. Based on my experience, I have a couple of suggestions that might make it a bit smoother:

Process (quoted from spoolinq's post):
1. make sure key is NOT in the ignition. move the seat all the way forward.

2. peel off the two black clips covering the rear screws holding the seat down and remove screws.

3. move seat all the way back and remove the two screws holding the front part of the seat down. Move the seat back all the way forward and then disconnect the car battery to avoid any issues. It's probably fine if you don't, but I was afraid some electrical glitch might cause an airbag to explode in my face.

4. pull seat outwards (towards the left car door) and remove the 14mm bolt holding the seat belt buckle. I tried pulling the seat outwards but the seat track started scratching the center console plastic. Instead, I moved the seat as far back as I could, then put it on an exhaust finisher (you can use anything else) to prop up the seat. this allowed me to access the seat belt buckle bolt from the rear seats.

5. (here's the tricky part and probably the best way to remove the harness) since the seat is really heavy, i flipped the seat backwards instead of pulling the seat out of the car. make sure to put the steering wheel tilt all the way up. remove clips and unclip the blue harness (blue harness for 04-05, grey harness for 06+). Flipping the seat backwards worked great for me. I found the 3 little harness clips to be a pain to remove though - I ended up using a long nose plier to get them out.

6. reverse order.


Difficulty: Newbie - It's just unscrewing bolts and unplugging/replugging a harness and 3 clips. Just make sure you have the tools that spoolinq quoted AND a long nose plier.

Total time spent: 1 hr 45 minutes (it took that long because I'm clumsy with tools and I took my time)

Ck98vteC

Mine is throwing the drivers (red) light. It is a CPO at 89k so I hope the dealer won't give me any shit about it when I take it in Thursday.

cruiserchuck

The air bag light has been coming on intermittently on my 04 TSX for the last few months. It appears to be a seat belt problem, since undoing the seat belt and restarting the car usually fixes it. The seat belts have a lifetime warranty, so hopefully Acura will fix it for free. As set forth on page 349 of the owner's manual: "Seat Belt Limited Warranty - a seat belt that fails to function properly is covered for the useful life of the car."

Ck98vteC

The dealer said the front airbag sensor was out, they did reset the ecu but wouldn't replace anything said it has to go to some district manager for review(?) so I am stuck.

mr2core

I'm starting to have this issue too. Sometimes it comes on and stays on, sometimes it won't. I will try buckling the seatbealt before I start to see if it will go off. I really hate having to call/take it to the dealer smh.

cruiserchuck

I took the car into the local dealer, and they replaced the seat belt buckle under warranty. That fixed the problem.

palidanx

Update on this. When i was doing some service at my mechanic the error codes pointed to the buckle. I took it to the dealer and they replaced the seat beat buckle like most of you on this thread.

thanks guys!

rockstar143

iTrader: (6)

interestingly enough the salesman at the dealership near mine says he sees it all the time and it's fine...
I normally just keep clicking it until the light turns off. Normally when the airbag light comes on, my seatbelt won't recognize that I'm not strapped in.

dmbfan36_23

For anyone that's done this on a 2005, I assume this is the only part we need, right?

BUCKLE SET, L. FR. SEAT BELT *NH167L* (GRAPHITE BLACK)
04816-SEC-A12ZB