Swivel seat with seatbelt tensioner below

[wandrly]

Hi all,

New guy here. Getting a SMB pop top in May and got a swivel seat base from them recently, so hopefully I’m putting this in the right place.

I’ve searched the web for what to do about this issue, but apparently there are a lot of variations to this setup. Beneath my stock passenger side seat base is a box which I gather is the seatbelt tensioner. It says “do not move or tamper with.” But it prevents the swivel base from going into place. Two bolts that are quite difficult to remove hold it to the floor.

My van is a 2006 Ford E350, originally a passenger van.

I travel with my wife and kiddos. I suppose I’d prefer not to remove seatbelt or airbag stuff (I hear this box connects via a cable with a yellow connection to tell the van if someone is in the seat or not for the airbags.) anyone know of someone who’s dealt with this before?

Thanks I’m advance!

[carringb]

The pretensioner is attached to the hip point on the seat belt receptacle, not to the floor. The "do not tamper" box is probably a data recorder for fleet use. The SRS control module on your van should be under the driver side seat. You may need to have a custom swivel made, using a driver side base on the pax side (offsets are different so you can't just buy 2 drivers). Or temporarily un-install it, and mount it on top of the standard pax side swivel base.

[Houstonredrider]

My old 2000 not my newest 2010 had any box under the passenger. As Carringb mentioned is probably aftermarket tracking. Pictures will help.

[JWA]

FWIW my '05 E350 has the air bag module under the driver's seat, nothing at all under the passenger's. With more than a little care the chassis wiring to the module could be extended to re-locate it somewhere more convenient to a swivel seat base.

Needless to say extending the wiring would require nothing less than soldered and shrink-wrapped extension connections. Done one at a time AND with the battery disconnected for at least 15 minutes before working on that device this shouldn't be too difficult.

[1der]

I think Darkstar had a box under the passenger seat that was some type of inertia sensor. It had to be mounted in a certain orientation. As carringb said, he remounted it on top of wood block attached to the swivel seat floor plate.

Found it: post#107 and #108 in this thread
http://www.sportsmobileforum.com/for...tml#post220710

[wandrly]

Okay thanks for some clues there guys. I have the seat back in as we’re halfway through a trip, but will check it out again and post pictures when I get home to more tools.

And thanks also for the notice on it being a good idea to unplug the battery before messing with these wires in general. My relation to the airbag would be a helluva right hook.

[JWA]

Originally Posted by wandrly

And thanks also for the notice on it being a good idea to unplug the battery before messing with these wires in general. My relation to the airbag would be a helluva right hook.

I'm sure you meant that in humor but please know should an air bag deploy and strike you the wrong way it could result is a very serious body injury---to the head has the potential to be fatal. I'm not trying to be scary but those things deploy faster than you can blink with considerable force as a way to counteract a body's motion during a collision.

Plus they're expensive as hell to replace. Be careful for chrissake!

[wandrly]

Yes I was being a bit humorous but also realize how very dangerous it could be.

[wandrly]

The part indeed seems to be the same one mentioned and linked above, where 1der points to Darkstar’s thread of pictures showing how he removed and relocated it.

Working on the same but curious what a “yaw” is and whether it’s necessary.

I also had to cite the carpeting away as it seemed to have been either created with bulge to accommodate that yaw, or somehow fluffed up over the years in a way that made it impossible to get the swivel down flush enough.

[wandrly]

Okay internetted it and this piece seems to be a serious piece of machinery. Or better described as an evil robot. We’ve had trouble in the past driving, often on winding roads with deadly drop offs where the local DOT must have been hungover from the Christmas party when they decided where to put the guard rails, but anyway, this “yaw sensor” in my picture and as defined as such by Darkstar in his thread (http://www.sportsmobileforum.com/for...tml#post220710) basically controls when the van thinks it should start locking up certain brakes. Ours has gone bad twice in the past, and when you’re driving down the road and suddenly one of the wheels locks up, there’s a grinding noise, and you have to correct the wheel to keep straight, it’s super frightening. I don’t know if removing it completely would stop that from ever happening (this is the evil robot, my van braking for me like some Terminator AI is living in the electrical system), which may be a bad thing on snowy roads but when it happens out of nowhere, again, very scary. Or if removing it entirely would cause the problem to reoccur. I mounted mine on a block of wood, as per Darkstar’s post, for now. Won’t have a chance to drive it again for a couple of months since we’re snowed in now, but will report back in case this is if I retest to anyone else.