2013 VOLKSWAGEN BEETLE CONVERTIBLE Owners Manual

Safety belts

WARNING
Not wearing a safety belt or wearing an improperly positioned safety belt increases the risk of
severe personal injury or death. Safety belts offer optimum protection only when they are
used properly.
x Properly worn safety belts are the single most effective means of reducing the risk of
serious injury and death in a collision or other accident. For this reason, always wear your
safety belt properly and make sure all passengers wear their safety belts properly as well
whenever the vehicle is moving.
x The driver must always make sure that every person in the vehicle is properly seated on a
seat of his or her own, properly fastens the safety belts belonging to that seat before the
vehicle starts to move, and keeps the belts properly fastened while riding in the vehicle. This
applies even when just driving around town. Therefore, always wear your safety belts and
make sure that everybody in your vehicle is properly restrained.
x Always secure children in the vehicle with a restraint system appropriate for their age,
weight and height
x Always fasten safety belts correctly before driving off and make sure that all passengers
are properly restrained.
x Never attach the safety belt to the buckle of another seat. Attaching the safety belt to the
wrong buckle will reduce safety belt effectiveness and can cause serious personal injury.
x Never let any objects or liquids get into the safety belt latch and prevent it from working
properly.
x Never remove a safety belt while the vehicle is moving. Doing so will increase your risk of
being injured or killed.
x Never strap more than one person, including small children, into any single safety belt.
x Never let children or babies ride sitting on your lap, and never place a safety belt over a
child sitting on your lap.
x Never wear belts over rigid or breakable objects in or on your clothing, such as eyeglass-
es, pens, keys, etc., as these may cause injury.
x Several layers of heavy clothing (such as a coat worn over top of a sports jacket) may
interfere with proper positioning of the safety belt and reduce the overall effectiveness of the
system.
x Never use comfort clips or devices that create slack in the shoulder belt. However, special
clips may be required for the correct use of some child restraint systems.
x Safety belts offer optimum protection only when the seat backrest is upright and belts are
correctly positioned on the body.

WARNING
Damage to safety belts reduces their overall effectiveness and increases the risk of serious
personal injury and death whenever the vehicle is being used.
x Never let safety belts become damaged by being caught in the door or seat hardware.
x Torn or frayed safety belts can tear, and damaged safety belt hardware can break in an
accident.
x Inspect belts regularly for damage. If webbing, bindings, buckles, or retractors are dam-
aged, have the belts replaced immediately with the correct replacement belts approved by
Volkswagen for your vehicle, model, and model year.
x Safety belts that were subject to stress in an accident and stretched must be replaced with
a correct, new safety belt, preferably by an authorized Volkswagen dealer or authorized
Volkswagen Service Facility.
x Replacement after a crash may be necessary even if a safety belt shows no visible dam-
age. Anchorages that have been loaded must also be inspected.
x Damaged safety belts must be replaced; they cannot be repaired.
x Never try to repair a damaged safety belt yourself. Never remove or modify the safety belts
in any way.
x Have safety belts, bindings, retractors and buckles replaced by an authorized Volkswagen
dealer or authorized Volkswagen Service Facility.
x Always keep the belts clean. Dirty belts may not work correctly and can impair the func-
tion of the inertia reel.
Warning light

Fig. 45 Warning light in the instrument cluster.

A warning chime also sounds.
The safety belt warning light ª comes on for 6 seconds when the ignition is switched on. A warning
chime also sounds for up to 6 seconds if the driver's safety belt is not buckled. The chime stops soon-
er if the driver buckles his or her safety belt. The warning light and the chime go out when both driver
and front passenger have bucked their safety belts.
If the driver and front seat passenger do not both fasten their safety belts within about 24 seconds
after the chime stops and the vehicle is moving at a speed of more than about 15 mph (25 km/h), the
chime will again sound for about 6 seconds, then go off for about 24 seconds, then sound again for
about another 6 seconds. The same thing happens if one of the safety belts is fastened and then
unfastened while the vehicle is moving. The safety belt warning light ª also flashes. The warning
chime continues to sound at 24 second intervals for up to 2 minutes. No chime sounds at speeds of
less than about 5 mph (8 km/h).
If the ignition is switched on, the safety belt warning light ª stays on until the driver and front passen-
ger have both buckled their safety belts.
WARNING
Not wearing a safety belt or wearing an improperly positioned safety belt increases the risk of
severe personal injury or death. Safety belts offer optimum protection only when used cor-
rectly.
Frontal collisions and laws of physics

Fig. 46 A vehicle with passengers not wearing safety belts approaches a wall.

Fig. 47 A vehicle with passengers not wearing safety belts hits a wall.
Please first read and note the introductory information and heed the WARNINGS

The physical principles of a frontal collision are simple. Both the moving vehicle and the passenger
possess energy ⇒ fig. 46, which varies with vehicle speed and body weight. Engineers call this energy
“kinetic energy.”
The higher the speed of the vehicle and the greater the vehicle's weight, the more energy has to be
“absorbed” in a crash.
Vehicle speed is the most significant factor. If your speed doubles (for example, from 15 mph to
30 mph – 25 km/h to 50 km/h), the energy increases 4 times!
Because the occupants of the vehicle in the above example are not using safety belts, they are not
“attached” to the vehicle. In a frontal collision, they will keep moving at the same speed the vehicle
was moving just before the crash, until something stops them - here, the inside of the passenger
compartment. Because the occupants of the vehicle in the example are not wearing safety belts, their
entire kinetic energy will be absorbed by impact with the wall ⇒ fig. 47.
The same principles apply to people in a vehicle that is in a frontal collision on the highway. Even at
city speeds of 20–30 mph (30–50 km/h), the forces acting on the body can reach one ton (2,000 lbs or
1,000 kg) or more. At greater speeds, these forces are even higher.
Of course, the laws of physics don't apply just to frontal collisions; they determine what happens in all
kinds of accidents and collisions.
What happens to passengers not wearing a safety belt

Fig. 48 The unbelted driver is thrown forward.

Fig. 49 Unbelted passengers in the rear seats are thrown forward on top of the belted driver.

Although these examples are based on a frontal collision, safety belts can also substantially reduce
the risk of injury in other kinds of crashes. So, whether you're on a long trip or “just going to the corner
store,” always buckle up and make sure that others do, too.
Accident statistics show that vehicle occupants properly wearing safety belts have a lower risk of being
injured and a much better chance of surviving a collision. Properly using safety belts also greatly
increases the ability of the supplemental airbags to do their job in a collision. For this reason, wearing
a safety belt is required by law in most countries including the United States and Canada.
Although your Volkswagen is equipped with airbags, you still have to wear the safety belts provided.
Front airbags, for example, are activated only in some frontal collisions. The front airbags are not
activated in all frontal collisions, in side and rear collisions, in rollovers, or in cases when the condi-
tions for deployment stored in the electronic control unit are not met. The same goes for the other
airbag systems on your Volkswagen.
So always wear your safety belt and make sure that everybody in your vehicle is properly restrained!
Using safety belts

To see whether a safety belt is lockable, pull the safety belt all the way out of the safety belt retractor.
You should then hear a “clicking” sound as the belt winds back into the retractor reel. Test the switch-
able locking feature by pulling on the belt. When the switchable locking feature is active, you should
no longer be able to pull the belt out of the retractor.
The locking feature must be deactivated when a vehicle occupant uses the safety belt.
WARNING
Improper use and care of safety belts increases the risk of severe personal injury or death.
x Regularly check safety belts and related parts for damage.
x Damaged safety belts must be replaced; they cannot be repaired.
x Always keep safety belts clean.
x Never catch, damage or chafe safety belt webbing on sharp edges.
x Always keep objects and liquids away from the belt buckle and buckle opening.
Fastening and unfastening safety belts

Fig. 51 Inserting the buckle tongue into the belt buckle.

Fig. 52 Releasing the buckle tongue from the belt buckle.