2009 KIA Sorento Owner's Manual

Knowing your vehicle56
3
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NOTICE• If luggage or other objects are placed
on the front passenger's seat or if the
temperature of the seat changes while
the seat is unoccupied, the "PASSEN-
GER AIR BAG OFF" indicator may
blink. These conditions do not indi-
cate a problem.
• Do not put heavy objects on the front passenger's seat. This may cause front
passenger air bag deployment in the
event of an accident, thus increasing
your repair costs.
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- Always sit in a proper seatingposition.
- Never place feet on the dash-
board.
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Do not modify or replace the front
passenger’s seat. Don't place or
attach anything on the front pas-
senger’s seat. This can adversely
affect the occupant classification
system.
Do not place sharp objects on the front passenger seat. These can
damage the occupant classifica-
tion system, if they puncture the
seat cushion.
Do not install accessory seat cov- ers on the front seats, since these
will interfere with proper sensor
operation.

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Knowing your vehicle
Curtain air bagCurtain air bags are located along both
sides of the roof rails above the front and
rear doors.
They are designed to help protect the
heads of the front seat occupants and
the rear outboard seat occupants in cer-
tain side impact collisions.
WARNING
The front seat passenger air bagis much larger than the steering
wheel air bag and inflates with
considerably more force. It can
seriously hurt or kill a passenger
who is not in the proper position
and wearing the safety belt prop-
erly. The front passengers should
always move their seat as far
back as practical and sit back in
their seat.
It is essential that the front pas- sengers always wear their safety
belts when vehicle is in motion,
even when the vehicle is moving
in a parking lot or up a driveway
into garage.
If the driver brakes the vehicle heavily prior to an impact, unbelt-
ed occupants will be thrown for-
ward. If the front passenger is not
wearing the safety belts, they will
be directly in front of the air bags
when deployment occurs. In that
situation, serious injury or death
is possible.
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Never allow front passenger toput their hands, feet or face on or
close to the instrument panel. In
the event of air bag deployment,
such a mispositioned occupant
would be likely to suffer severe
injury or death.
Never allow children/old and fee- ble persons/pregnant women to
sit on the front passenger’s seat.
They may be seriously injured by
the air bag inflation when air bag
deploys.
Do not put objects or stickers on the instrument panel. Do not
apply any accessory to the front
windshield. Do not install after-
market mirrors or accessories on
the factory-installed rearview mir-
ror. Any of these could interfere
with the deployment of the air bag
or could hit your body at high
speed and cause severe bodily
injury and even death.
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Knowing your vehicle58
3 The curtain air bag deployment occurs
only on the side of the vehicle affected
by the impact.
The curtain air bags are not designed to deploy during collisions from the
front or rear of the vehicle or in most
rollover situations.
The curtain air bags are designed to deploy only during certain side-impact
collisions, depending on the crash
severity, angle, speed and impact.
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Do not allow the passengers tolean their heads or bodies onto
doors, put their arms on the
doors, stretch their arms out of
the window, or place objects
between the doors and passen-
gers when they are seated on the
seats where curtain air bags are
equipped.
Never try to open or repair any components of the curtain air bag
system. This should be done only
by an authorized Kia dealer.
Failure to follow the above men-
tioned instructions can result in
severe injury or death to the vehicle
occupants in an accident.
WARNING
In order for the curtain air bags to provide its best protection, both
front seat occupants and both
outboard rear occupants should
sit in an upright position with the
safety belts properly fastened.
When children are seated in the rear outboard seats, they must be
seated in the proper child
restraint system. Make sure to put
the child restraint system as far
away from the door side as possi-
ble, and secure the child restraint
system in position.
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Knowing your vehicle
Why didn’t my air bag go off in a
collision? (Inflation and non-inflation conditionsof the air bag)There are many types of accidents in
which the air bag would not be expected
to provide additional protection.
These include rear impacts, second or
third collisions in multiple impact acci-
dents, as well as low speed impacts. In
other words, just because your vehicle is
damaged and even if it is totally unus-
able, don’t be surprised that the air bags
did not inflate.
Air bag collision sensors(1) SRS control module
(2) Front impact sensor
(3) Side impact sensor
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Knowing your vehicle60
3
WARNING
Do not hit or allow any objects to
impact the locations where air
bag or sensors are installed.
This may cause unexpected air
bag deployment, which could
result in severe personal injury or
death.
If the installation location or angle of the sensors is altered in
any way, the air bags may deploy
when they should not or they may
not deploy when they should,
causing severe injury or death.
Therefore, do not try to perform
maintenance on or around the air
bag sensors. Have the vehicle
checked and repaired by the
authorized Kia dealer.
Problems may arise if the sensor installation angles are changed
due to the deformation of front
bumper, body or B pillar where
side collision sensors are
installed. Have the vehicle
checked and repaired by the
authorized Kia dealer.
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Your vehicle has been designedto absorb impact and deploy the
air bag(s) in certain collisions.
Installing aftermarket bumper
guards or replacing a bumper
with non-genuine parts may
adversely affect your vehicles
collision and air bag deployment
performance.
Air bag inflation conditionFront air bag
Front air bags (driver’s and front passen-
ger’s air bags and driver’s knee air bag)
are designed to inflate when the impact
is delivered to front collision sensors
depending on the intensity, speed or
angles of impact of the front collision -
generally from an area a little to the left to
a little to the right of straight ahead.
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Knowing your vehicle
Curtain air bag
Curtain air bags are designed to inflate
when the impact signal is delivered to the
side collision sensors, depending on the
severity, speed, and/or angle of the
impact or rollover.Although the front air bags (driver’s and
front passenger’s air bags and driver’s
knee air bag) are designed to inflate only
in frontal collision, it may inflate in any
collision if front impact sensors detect a
sufficient impact.
Curtain air bags are designed to inflate
only in side impact collision, but may
inflate in any collision if side impact sen-
sors detect a sufficient impact.
If the vehicle chassis is impacted by
bumps or objects on unimproved roads
or sidewalks, air bags may deploy. Drive
carefully on unimproved roads or on sur-
faces not designed for vehicle traffic to
prevent unintended air bag deployment.
To protect occupants, front air bags and
pre-tensioner safety belts may deploy in
certain side impact collisions.
Air bag non-inflation conditions In collisions, the vehicle safety belts
are sufficient to protect the vehicle
occupants and the air bags may not
deploy. In some cases, deploying air
bags in low-speed collisions can cause
a secondary impact to the occupants
(light abrasions, cuts, burns, etc.), or
loss of vehicle control.
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Knowing your vehicle62
3 Air bags may not inflate in rear colli-
sions, because occupants are moved
backward by the force of the impact. In
this case, the air bags do not provide
protection. Front air bags may not inflate in side
impact collision, because occupants
move to the direction of the collision,
and thus front air bag deployment does
not provide proper protection.
However, curtain air bags may inflate
depending on the intensity, vehicle
speed and angles of impact. In a slant impact or collision, the force
delivered will be relatively weaker than
that of frontal or side collision. So, the
air bags may not inflate.
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Knowing your vehicle
Just before impact, drivers often brakeheavily. Such heavy braking lowers the
front portion of the vehicle causing it to
“ride” under a vehicle with a higher
ground clearance. Air bags may not
inflate in this "under-ride" situation
because deceleration forces that are
detected by sensors may be signifi-
cantly altered by such “under-ride” col-
lisions. Air bags may not inflate in rollover acci-
dents. Air bag deployment would not
provide proper protection to the occu-
pants.
However, curtain air bags may inflate when the vehicle is rolled over by a
side impact collision. Air bags may not inflate if the vehicle
collides with objects such as utility
poles or trees, where the point of
impact is concentrated to one area and
the full force of the impact is not deliv-
ered to the sensors.
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