Found the solution. There is a connector at the base of the seatbelt receiver. It's difficult to reach, wedging your hand between the seat and the center console. I disconnected it, and no more alarm.

I was expecting to have to short it to ground, or otherwise confuse the computer somehow, but just disconnecting it did the trick...no seatbelt light on the dash, and no annoying alarm.

Saved myself the $92 that the dealer was going to charge me.

I like my Mazda 6 again.

Mark in MA

 

Ahhh, Spark has finally found peace......

 

i cant find this place your talking about
i followed my wire and unhooked it but all i got was a blinking airbag light ??

 

ooooooohhh !! not good !!!

 

Sitting in the driver's seat, put your right hand down between the seat and the center console. There is a connector in "mid air". That's the one. To confirm, follow the wire, it should go to the base of the seatbelt receiver.

I've experienced no problems since I disconnected mine. I get no seatbelt alarm and no seatbelt idiot light. I'm very happy.

Mark in MA

 

I think you probably disonnected the side air bag module or seat track position sensor instead of the seat belt switch. It should be a two wire connector with one wire being White with a Green stripe and the other wire is Black. PLEASE BE EXTREMELY CAREFUL WHEN DISCONNECTING ANYTHING HAVING TO DO WITH THE AIR BAG SYSTEM. The wires have voltage running thru them and disconnecting without first unhooking the battery and waiting 5-10 minutes for back up battery to drain off can cause a voltage spike when connection is broken and cause the air bag to deploy. I guarantee you will crap the drawers when you are only trying to disconnect a connector and the equivalent sound of a 12 gauge shotgun going off next to you happens. Not to mention the expense of having to replace the deployed air bag and seat back fabric. They are very spendy items.

 

Babyhuey,
I while back the engineer in me got curious and I wanted to find out what signals an airbag to deploy. It's my understanding that it compares the output of two accelerometers. One is located near the front bumper, and one near the cowl. When the front accelerometer signals more deceleration than the rearward one, it means the vehicle is crashing (bumper has slowed to zero, but the cowl is still moving). The difference in accelerometer outputs tells the airbag to deploy.

1) Im curious if that system has changed, especially with side airbags now, etc. Do they put accelerometers in different locations?

2) I would be uncomfortable thinking that a spike from a connector could deploy the airbag. Have their been cases where this has happened?

Mark in MA

 

There is a weight sensing system in the pass seat (to detect smaller occupants and child seats.) The driver seat is equipped with a sensor that detects seat track location (the airbag either deploys at a lower rate or not at all depending on the proximity of the occupant to the wheel.)

 

Spark
The principle is still the same. Front crash zone sensor is up from by the hood latch and the SRS control module is the second crash sensor. The second acts not only as a redundancy to ensure correct signal but for comparison as well to determine degree of impact. A light frontal impact and the control module will give deployment signal for the #1 inflator only and deployment force is reduced to 70% or so. A stronger frontal impact will deploy both #1 and #2 inflators with resulting 100% deployment force. Things such as an unbuckled seat belt or seat moved to forward position are detected by the buckle switch and seat position sensor (driver side only) and these two will change the deployment forces. Seat belt pretensioner deployment dependent on same inputs. The seat weight sensor in passenger front seat is really only used to turn the passenger air bag on or off. I believe the required weight is around 65 pounds for the passenger air bag to be turned on. If the seat is empty you will notice that the air bag off light is not illuminated but system is still deactivated. Why explode a perfectly good air bag when no one is there??
The side air bags are almost a separate system. Same control module is used with crash sensor but the side impact sensors are bolted to the B-pillars behind the trim and control deployment of the side modules in the seat back and curtain modules above the doors. I do not belive the side air bags would deploy on a frontal impact unless was severe enough for the sensors to detect it.
I doubt you will get an airbag deployment disonnecting a wire but better safe than sorry. I have inadvertantly unplugged a drivers module with it pointing right at me not realizing that I had forgot to disable system and nothing happened so far.
All kinds of warnings in the manual about disableing before doing any work to system but that mainly applies to us when working on it. I have heard " stories " of side air bags going off when an impact gun was used to remove front seat attaching bolts as well as a story of drivers air bag deploying on a test drive because the tech had the diagnostic computer resting on the steering wheel. He supposedly did not survive the experience. Story or method of trying to keep us safe. Does not really matter. Only takes 10 seconds to disconnect the battery and by the time you have things together to start working on the sytem it is ready.

 

Thanks BH, that's a wealth of information.

I'm curious, you said the deployment changes according to whether the seat belt is connected, among other things. Does it increase deployment level with no seatbelt, or decrease?

With my seatbelt receiver wire disconnected, yet me wearing a seatbelt, what will act differently with the system if I were in a crash?

Thanks

Mark in MA