1997 CADILLAC DEVILLE belt

Downloaded from www.Manualslib.com manuals search engine @ what’s wrong with this?
A: The belt is twisted across the body.
You can be seriously injured by a twisted belt. In
a crash, you wouldn’t have the full width of the
belt to spread impact forces. If a belt
is twisted,
make it straight
so it can work properly, or ask
your dealer
to fix it.
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Downloaded from www.Manualslib.com manuals search engine I I Safety Belt Use During Pregnancy
Safety belts work for everyone, including pregnant
women. Like all occupants, they are more likely to be
seriously injured if they don’t wear safety belts.
To unlatch the belt, just push the button on the buckle.
The belt should
go back out of the way.
Before you close the door, be sure the belt is out of the
way.
If you slam the door on it, you can damage both
the belt and your vehicle.
A pregnant woman should wear a lap-shoulder belt, and
the lap portion should be worn as low as possible, below
the rounding, throughout the pregnancy.
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Downloaded from www.Manualslib.com manuals search engine The best way to protect the fetus is to protect the
mother. When a safety belt is worn properly, it’s more
likely that the fetus won’t be hurt in a crash. For
pregnant women, as for anyone, the key to making
safety belts effective is wearing them properly.
Right Front Passenger Position
The right front passenger’s safety belt works the same
way as the driver’s safety belt. See “Driver Position,”
earlier in this section.
When the lap portion of the belt is pulled out
all the
way, it will lock.
If it does, let it go back all the way
and start again.
Supplemental Inflatable Restraint
(SIR) Systems
This part explains the frontal and side impact
Supplemental Inflatable Restraint
(SIR) systems or air
bag systems.
Your Cadillac has four
air bags -- a frontal air bag for
the driver, another frontal
air bag for the right front
passenger, a side impact air bag for the driver, and
another side impact air bag for the right front passenger.
Here are the most important things to know about the air bag systems:
A --
You can be severely injured or killed in a crash if
you aren’t wearing your safety belt
-- even if you
have an air bag. Wearing your safety belt during
a crash helps reduce your chance of hitting things
inside the vehicle or being ejected from it. Air
bags are “supplemental restraints” to the safety
belts. All air bags are designed to work with
safety belts but don’t replace them.
Frontal
air bags for the driver and right front
passenger are designed
to work only in moderate
to severe crashes where the front of your vehicle
hits something. They aren’t designed to inflate at
all in rollover, rear, side or low-speed frontal
crashes. The side impact
air bags for the driver
and right front passenger are designed to inflate
only
in moderate to severe crashes where
something
bits the side of your vehicle. They aren’t
designed
to inflate in frontal, or in a rollover or in
rear crashes. Everyone in your vehicle should wear
a safety belt properly -- whether or not there’s an
air bag for that person.
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Downloaded from www.Manualslib.com manuals search engine I /11 CAUTION:
I
Both frontal and side impact air bags inflate with
great force, faster than the blink
of an eye. If
you’re too close to an inflating air bag, it could
seriously injure you. Safety belts help keep you in
position for air bag inflation before and during
a
crash. Always wear your safety belt, even with air
bags. The driver should sit as far back as possible
while still maintaining control of the vehicle.
Front occupants should not lean on or sleep
against the door.
I /i CAUTION:
An inflating air bag can seriously injure small
children. Always secure children properly in your
vehicle. To read how, see the part of this manual
called “Children” and the caution label on the
right front passenger’s safety belt.
AIR BAG
There is an air bag readiness light on the instrument
panel, which shows AIR BAG.
The system checks the
air bag electrical system for
malfunctions. The light tells you if there is an electrical
problem. See “Air Bag Readiness Light” in the Index
for more information.
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Downloaded from www.Manualslib.com manuals search engine How does an air bag restrain?
In moderate to severe frontal or near frontal collisions,
even belted occupants can contact the steering wheel or
the instrument panel.
In moderate to severe side
collisions, even belted occupants can contact the inside
of the vehicle. The air bag supplements the protection
provided by safety belts.
Air bags distribute the force of
the impact more evenly over the occupant’s upper body,
stopping the occupant more gradually. But the frontal
air
bags would not help you in many types of collisions,
including rollovers, rear impacts, and side impacts,
primarily because an occupant’s motion is not toward
the
air bag. Side impact air bags would not help you in
many types of collisions, including frontal or near
frontal collisions, rollovers, and rear impacts, primarily
because an occupant’s motion is not toward those air
bags. Air bags should never be regarded as anything
more than a supplement to safety belts, and then only in
moderate to severe frontal
or near-frontal collisions for
the driver’s and right front passenger’s frontal air bags,
and only in moderate to severe side collisions for the
driver’s and right front passenger’s side impact air bags.
What will you see after an air bag inflates?
After an air bag inflates, it quickly deflates, so quickly
that some people may not even realize the air bag
inflated. Some components of the
air bag module -- the
steering wheel hub for the driver’s
air bag, the
instrument panel for the right front passenger’s bag, the
door for the driver and right front passenger’s side
impact air bags
-- will be hot for a short time. The parts
of the bag that come into contact with you may be
warm, but not too hot to touch. There will be some
smoke and dust coming from the vents
in the deflated
air bags. Air bag inflation doesn’t prevent the driver
from seeing or being able to steer the vehicle, nor does it
stop people from leaving the vehicle.
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Downloaded from www.Manualslib.com manuals search engine A CAUTION:
When an air bag inflates, there is dust in the
air. This dust could cause breathing problems
for people with
a history of asthma or other
breathing trouble.
To avoid this, everyone in the
vehicle should get out
as soon as it is safe to do so.
If you have breathing problems but can’t get out
of the vehicle after an air bag inflates, then get
fresh air by opening a window
or a door.
Your vehicle has a feature that will automatically unlock
the doors and
turn the interior lamps on when air bags
inflate
(if battery power is available). You can lock the
doors again and turn the interior lamps off by using the
door lock and interior lamp controls.
In many crashes severe enough to inflate an air bag,
windshields are broken by vehicle deformation. Additional windshield breakage
may also occur from the right front
passenger air bag.
Air bags are designed to inflate only once. After an
air bag inflates, you’ll need some new parts for your
air bag system. If you don’t get them, the air bag
system won’t be there to help protect you in another
crash. A new system will include air bag modules
and possibly other parts. The service manual for
your vehicle covers the need to replace other parts.
0 Your vehicle is equipped with a crash sensing and
diagnostic module, which records information about
the frontal air bag system. The module records
information about the readiness of the system, when
the sensors are activated and driver’s safety belt
usage at deployment.
1-2s

Downloaded from www.Manualslib.com manuals search engine Center Passenger Position
n
U
Lap Belt
If your vehicle has a front split seat and a rear bench
seat, someone
can sit in the center positions.
When you sit in a center seating position, you have a lap
safety belt, which has
no retractor. To make the belt
longer, tilt the latch plate and pull it along the belt.
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Downloaded from www.Manualslib.com manuals search engine Buckle, position and release it the same way as the lap
part of a lap-shoulder belt.
If the belt isn’t long enough,
see “Safety Belt Extender’’ at the end of this section.
Make sure the release button on the buckle
is positioned
so you would be able to unbuckle the safety belt quickly
if
you ever had to.
Rear Seat Passengers
It’s very important for rear seat passengers to buckle up!
Accident statistics show that unbelted people in the rear seat are hurt more often
in crashes than those who are
wearing safety belts.
Rear passengers who aren’t safety belted can
be thrown
out of the vehicle in a crash. And they can strike others
in the vehicle who are wearing safety belts.
To make the belt shorter, pull its free end as shown until
the belt
is snug.