Date:         Sun, 29 Apr 2001 09:53:35 EDT
Reply-To:     EdVF1000R@aol.com
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         "Ed @ Automotive Consulting" <EdVF1000R@aol.com>
Subject:      Re: lawsuits
Content-Type:  multipart/alternative;

There have been cases against the big 3 that revolved around the lack of
airbags in certain early 90s cars that has active (mouse-track) seatbelts
instead.
     The plaintiff usually has a severe accident, most times forgetting to
connect the manual lap belt part, then sues because the car didn't have an
airbag, even though the car was not required to be equipped with one by law.
     Note that they don't sue NHTSA for mandating flawed designes, like
early, overpowered airbags that hurt or kill people and poor powered belts,
with manual lap belts.Ford lost one of these recently (Escort); the case is
on appeal.
    GM  has a Data-recording feature in the ECM on most of it's 1995 and
newer vehicles that records data for 10 seconds before any airbag deployment.
Things like vehicle speed, brake application, RPM, driver's seatbelt latched
or not, ABS activation, etc. are recorded constantly in temporary memory in
real time. If the airbags are set off, the last 10 seconds prior are held in
memory. AFAIK most other manufacturers have a variant of this too.
     All this is C.Y.A. for the manufacturers. The level of lawsuits we have
here is stunning, and personal responsibility seems to be a thing of the
past...   - Ed

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