News article - Mercedes-Benz joins deadly airbag recalls

[PearlJam]

http://www.drive.com.au/motor-news/mercedesbenz-joins-deadly-airbag-recalls-20140805-100k7n.html

 

Mercedes-Benz joins deadly airbag recalls

Motor News

Date August 5, 2014 - 5:05PM

 

Mercedes-Benz has become the seventh car maker in Australia to recall cars fitted with potentially deadly airbags.

The manufacturer has recalled just 20 convertible SL and SLK models sold in May 2014, as its contribution pushes locally recalled cars closer to 100,000 as car makers struggle to handle the problem.

Two people have died and others have been injured in the US, allegedly as a result of shrapnel propelled by airbags built by the Japanese supplier Takata.

Popular car manufacturers have addressed the issue by recalling more than 10 million cars worldwide, including more than 96,000 local models such as the Toyota Corolla and Honda Civic.

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There are no recorded Australian injuries caused by ruptured airbags as a result of faulty Takata products.

In the US, 18-year-old student Ashley Parham was behind the wheel of a Honda when its airbag ruptured in 2009.

Oklahoma City police chief Brandon Clabes told local media Parham was fatally wounded when her Honda Accord bumped into another car.

“The airbag deployed, shards of metal exploded from the airbag mechanism, and that’s what penetrated her neck and caused her fatal injury,” Clabes said.

Australian safety recalls warn that flawed production and storage of explosive propellant in airbags has the potential to hurt motorists.

An ACCC recall notice for the Mazda6 and Mazda RX-8 states “the airbag might not deploy as designed and therefore may not reduce injury to a passenger, or fractured parts might fly apart and cause injury to a passenger”.

Mercedes-Benz says small pieces of its side airbag modules could break free in a crash, which could injure occupants.

The brand will contact customers affected by the recall to arrange free repairs.

Honda has been the worst-hit manufacturer locally, recalling 43,414 examples of cars such as the Jazz, Civic, CR-V and Accord, in 2013 and 2014.

Nissan follows with 25,900 cars including Pulsar, Navara, Patrol, Maxima and X-Trail models built between 2001 and 2003.

Toyota and Lexus have pulled in 19,600 Corolla, Avensis Verso and Lexus SC430 models sold over the same period, BMW has moved to contact 3300 3-Series owners to arrange replacement airbags and Mazda has recalled more than 4000 Mazda6 and RX-8 cars in Australia.

Ford, Holden and Chrysler have recalled cars overseas but not locally.

Toyota’s Australian arm bore the brunt of poor bookkeeping by Takata, recalling the same batch of vehicles twice in two years as the supplier could not say exactly which models had faulty airbags.

Keno Kato, corporate vice president of product planning for Nissan, said the recall illustrates a glaring flaw that could bring the car industry to a halt.

Along with TRW and Autoliv, Takata is one of three major suppliers of airbags to the car industry.

Mr Kato says it has a monopoly, and a share of the market large enough to threaten companies dependent on its products.

“Fundamentally their share is very big,” he says.

“Monopolies are sometimes very dangerous.

“There is a tendency that monopolies can become some sort of risk - until we can fix fundamental issues for the quality, we will be at risk not to make our cars... if we have an issue or limitation point in parts, then we cannot make a car.”

Takata published a loss of about 45 billion yen (A$470m) in the April to June Quarter following the latest round of recalls.

Takata has been contacted for comment.

[PearlJam]

OK, so this is the first time I know that Mercedes uses Japanese-made parts, in this case Takata air bags.