Front Air Bag Sensor Control problems of the 2006 Mini Cooper S

I am on my 4th passenger seat mat since purchasing this vehicle new in January 2007. In April I found a manufacturer recall part 573 safety recall report 15v-205 that listed the vehicles affected by this recall. My vehicle was manufactured on Nov 18, 2006 within the production date range. I have not received any information regarding this recall and can no longer find the recall on this site. As mentioned, this is my 4th front passenger seat occupant detection mat sensor. I would like information on what the procedure is to recover my costs associated with the last replacement of the sensor.

Recall notice no. 15v-205 was received June 2015 for front passenger seat occupant detection mat sensor. As of 24 September 2015, dealer still does not have parts or "information" on recall.

Airbag passenger seat sensor is bad $1500 to repair and no guarantee it will work correctly in the future. Why hasn't this been recalled??? BMW who owns Mini cooper recalled this sensor for their cars but why not the coopers? I'm so angry that they could care less about my families safety. Automobiles are required to have airbag systems but they aren't required to work properly??.

Passenger side seat weight sensor went bad. Srs light illuminated. $1,500 to have dealer repaired. Car is not repaired yet.

The passenger air bag sensor stopped working. Now, even when there is someone in the passenger seat, the airbag is deactivated. The air bag sensor in the seat needs to work in order for the airbags to deploy-- and all of these systems are down due to a faulty sensor!.

Passenger seat occupancy sensor inop rendering airbag unsafe. Requires replacement of passenger seat cushion with new sensor mat. 6 speed automatic transmission slipping and shifting hard. Occasionally, renders car powerless as in neutral even if in travel lanes making unsafe to operate. Requires replacement of valve block. Servicing of automatic transmission fluid is not required by Mini/BMW but same transmission in other brands do. Vw recommends atf replacement at 40k miles and doesn't have problems with valve block failure.

On my 2006 Mini Cooper S coupe, the passenger airbag off sensor light on the roof came on as well as the airbag sensor light in the center console indicating that the passenger seat could not detect the weight of a person in the passenger seat and therefore would not alert the airbag to turn on. My husband and I have both sat in the passenger seat and the light remained on. We then had a garage that specializes in imports look at the code, which is stating that there is an issue with the seat mat sensor and it is no longer recognizing the weight on the seat. This is a huge safety issue and a costly one at that. The seat cushion must be replaced and potentially the entire seat. I have noticed this same complaint on this site as well as other sites for models dating anywhere from 2002-2006. There is also a trend with this issue occurring when the car is 7 years old (2013 for 2006 models) regardless of the mileage. I have called Mini and while they were very nice and helpful, there is nothing they can do to help with the cost of repairing this factory issue. When I called our local dealer they had mentioned a type of assistance or warranty extended on the 2003-2004 models, but not 2005 or later. Is it possible that this is just now becoming an issue and should now be addressed or added to the extended warranty? is there grounds for a recall? there seems to be a trend of how and when this mat malfunctions. Please help those of us who have had this problem and are bound to have this problem in the near future get this fixed! thank you!.

The passenger seat occupancy sensor has gone bad according to the diagnose from the dealer. I'm told that this will either make the air bag deploy at full force or possibly not at all. There seems that this is a very common occurrence on both BMW and Mini's. BMW has addressed the problem, Mini has not. I have a car with an unpredictable air bag deployment and the dealer is telling me that it is a 1000 to make the car safe to put my family in. This seems like denial of a problem.

The passanger seat occupancy sensor is weak and prone to failure. Mini does not cover replacement and charges $1200-$2000 to replace the part leading many owners, including myself to drive the car in an unsafe condition (low speed or non deploying airbags).

The contact owns a 2006 Mini Cooper S. The contact was traveling 40 mph when the air bag warning light illuminated. The vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic who diagnosed that the air bag sensor needed to be replaced. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure. The vehicle was not repaired. The failure and current mileages was 42,000. Updated 08/29/lj updated 08/29/12.

The srs detector mat for turning off the airbags in the event of an underweight occupant is easily broken. When broken, sensors disable the airbags. This part is extremely expensive to replace and I can not afford it on a fixed income ($1600). This is a safety issue and should be a recall. The mat has issues: 1) very prone to failure and 2) integrated into the seat cushion so it can not be replaced itself, it must have the seat cushion replaced also. My model is a special edition and there are no parts in the USA. 11 in germany at a very high price.

Over the course of the past six months the srs light was intermittently coming on. In the past few weeks it finally came on and stayed on. I took to to the local BMW/Mini dealer and they assessed it for $167. 00. Then I was told it was a passenger seat sensor issue and the cost of the part and labor would be approximately $1100. I did some research on the matter and realized that dozens if not hundreds of Mini-owners have had the same problems with the sensors, seats and lights dating back to 2003+. Seems to me that if it's been an issue that their so called engineering department might resolve the problems without costing owners this kind of money. I think its a rip job by the dealers and a failure of the engineers at Mini to resolve the problem. Cost for such a repair should be on them. I will make sure to report to anyone that will listen to stay away from the purchase of these cars due to the potential for future problems.

The airbag sensor light along with the seatbelt light stays on constantly from startup. Tried to reset by instructions in the owners manual but didn't work. Mini service wants 100. 00 to just evaluate the problem. The problem is that Mini /BMW know there is default with the seat sensors but won't take on responsibility as the car owners are paying $1500-2200 + to have this repaired. This is a very serious safety issue as none of the airbags will work in the car at this point.

I complained with Mini cooper back in 2011 when my warranty expired and dealership said that replacement will be done out of pocket. I have been driving my car at risk; more often that not, I do not drive my car with a passenger in the front seat. Fast forward to 2015 with recall but unable to execute the recall due to lack of parts. Nhtsa should investigate what the cause of delay and since the original part works albeit bad durability, force Mini cooper/BMW to perform stop gap repairs with older parts, bypass sensor or change software code to disregard bad sensor input. The burden is too great for me to use my car with no passenger or passenger at risk. Stop gap repairs, including changing the software code and eliminate sensor input to disable the airbag can be a temporary repair. How hard is it for bmwq to short or "fake" the sensor signal, so the system would not disable the airbag; hence it would deploy when there's a passenger onboard. Put a sticker on the dashboard that says airbags are temporary active and child seats not allowed. My safety instinct tells me it is preferred to have the airbag active and deploy when needed. The number of potential child seat is most likely a very low number that most owners would prefer to have an active airbag. It is unacceptable that this is taking so long, and putting the owners at risk when there are stop gap measures available. Bypassing the sensor and having the airbags active seems to be the most logical one except NHTSA may be the problem for coming up with auto-sensors to prevent child seat activation. Nhtsa should make a choice and decide what is more important, safety of the passengers, or having to give BMW instruction and waivers to allow stop gap and not put me and my passengers at risk.

The passenger seat airbag weight sensor has gone bad and as a result, has rendered the entire airbag system inoperable. The vehicle is out of warranty by 4k miles and the local dealer and Mini USA have become non-responsive about fixing an obvious design defect. The replacement part plus labor and factory resetting were quoted at $1900. Searching other online postings reveals that this is a known problem not only for Mini coopers but for parent company bmws as well.

My 2006 Mini cooper s has a defective passenger seat air bag sensor, that I was quoted 16,000$to replace it. This is the exact same part that BMW recalled in 2008. BMW recalled around 150,000 vehicles in north America to fix a possible defect that may keep the front passenger airbag from opening in a crash, the recalled cars include 2006 3-series, 2004-06 5-series and 2004-06 x3 vehicles. Mini uses this same recalled part(Mini being made by BMW), yet has not recalled the part. I know many people that have had this part replaced at there own expense several times. It is a huge safety hazard.

Passenger airbag failure sensor show failure. Have had it "repaired" 3 times. Sensor shows problem within 3 weeks of repair each time. Does the passenger airbag work?.