Last year Ford announced inflatable rear seatbelts, a new safety feature to appear in the 2011 Ford Explorer. Ford brought its demonstration module for the seatbelts to San Francisco, and we gave them a try.The module included one seat with an undeployed seatbelt airbag and the other seat with the demonstration seatbelt. We sat in that seat and fastened the shoulder harness. Instead of the explosive deployment that would happen in a real crash, the seatbelt airbag gently inflated until it rested like a giant yellow slug across our chest. Deployed, it felt quite comfortable.The airbag resides inside the seatbelt strap. In an accident, the airbag fills with gas fed through the seatbelt latch, causing the strap to open up.
Ford says the seatbelt airbags are programmed to inflate at a lower impact force than would cause the front airbags to deploy, although the seatbelt airbags are also much less traumatic than the front airbags. After a deployment, getting the seatbelt airbags restored to usable condition involves a trip to the dealer. But Ford pointed out that any time the seatbelt pretensioners activate the dealer also has to restore them to operating condition.
