From digest.v6.n299 Sat Mar 1 17:56:35 1997
From: "Brett Anderson" <bretta_at_webspan.net>
Date: Sat, 1 Mar 1997 13:03:24 -0500
Subject: Re:seat modification, SRS light

> From: Nobuya Higashiyama <nobuyah_at_MICROSOFT.com>
> Date: Fri, 28 Feb 1997 15:00:41 -0800
> Subject: RE: <E36> M3 Sport Seat -- What a pain!
>
> Thanks to all who have responded to my inquiry!
>
> I just had the driver's seat re-contoured by an upholstry shop
> recommended to me by my BMW dealer. They took out the seat, stripped
> it, bent the "wings" back to widen the bottom, then reassembled the
> whole thing. 3 hrs work _at_$50/hr, not too bad.
>
> The good news is that the seat is *much* more comfortable now. No more
> pain in my thighs, and the seat looks great; you can't even tell that
> it's been altered. Hurray!
>
> The bad news is that the shop may have broken something in the process;
> the air bag light in the dash now stays lit. The car is going to the
> dealer for diagnosis in a few days. Because the dealer works closely
> with this shop, they said that they'll bill the upholstry shop directly
> if it's caused by something the shop did.
>
> All in all, except for this last glitch, I'm very happy with the
> modification.
>
> Nobuya Higashiyama
> Microsoft Corp.
> nobuyah_at_microsoft.com

Undoubtedly the only thing the upholstery shop is guilty of is turning on the ignition with the seat out of the car, this will set a seat belt switch fault, It has no effect on the deployment of the airbag, It will however, prevent the seat belt tensioner from firing. Dealer should not charge anyone for the 3 minute fix of clearing the codes, make sure you remind them of the fact that the seat was out, so they don't go changing the switch thinking it has a problem.

Brett Anderson

BMW and ASE master technician

Bretta_at_webspan.net