Mav

Hi,
Is that legal to replace 993's airbag steering wheel with a non-airbag steering wheel? I mean legal to drive on the street not on the race track in United State. <img src="graemlins/r.gif" border="0" alt="[king]" />
BTW where can I find a good alighment shop around Los Angeles area in US. <img src="graemlins/offtopic.gif" border="0" alt="[offtopic]" />

STLPCA

Yes - it is legal.

Viken

[quote]Originally posted by Mav:
<strong>BTW where can I find a good alighment shop around Los Angeles area in US.</strong><hr></blockquote>

Johnson's Alignment
19056 Hawthorne Blvd
Torrance, CA 90503
(310) 370-6301

Flying Finn

If I take airbag steering wheel of, are there any issues when putting it back?

Or is it just matter of connecting the wire & bolting the wheel back? No warning light issues etc?

Mav

Hi Viken,
What is your suspension setup? M030 ROW? Did you upgrade your suspension at the shop your recommanded?

Robin 993DX

[quote]Originally posted by Flying Finn:
<strong>If I take airbag steering wheel of, are there any issues when putting it back?

Or is it just matter of connecting the wire & bolting the wheel back? No warning light issues etc?</strong><hr></blockquote>

As soon as you disconnect the factory air bag steering wheel, the Air bag warning light will light up when the ignition is turned on.

I believe even if you install the air bag steering wheel back you'll still have to bring the car to the dealer to have them reset the warning light.

Viken

[quote]Originally posted by Mav:
<strong>What is your suspension setup? M030 ROW? Did you upgrade your suspension at the shop your recommanded?</strong><hr></blockquote>

Mine is ROW M030. No, I had my suspension done by Andial long before I knew of Johnson's.

Robin 993DX

Kim,

You might be right. I forgot about the disconnecting the battery part.

Thanks

Flying Finn

Thanks Robin & Silver.

So I could do it? (I'm thinking of installing momo steering wheel to my car, a bit smaller diameter would suite better for me).

Are there any issues when connecting the battery again? (Alarm, OBD etc.)

Robin 993DX

KIm,

I don't think there is a solution that I know of to fool the computer to think that the air bag is still there. Me and Hank have talked about this subject in length and have not figured out a way yet. The worst part is that once the driver's air bag is found in error the passenger side air bag is disabled at the same time.

The leads that connects to the air bag requires a unusal resistance. We (me and Hank) would be very interested to find out if anyone have sucessfully "fooled" the computer.

BTW, I believe removing a factory equipped air bag from a street use motor vechicle is against the law. But who's checking?

KC993

WHO'S checking is right. this is the same issue with the 3rd brake light. Here in Texas the state inspection DOES check them. I know there are some cars that have the 3rd brake light removed and have no problem passing the inspection(maybe lucky!!) so is the airbag. I noticed that Hank's RS DOES NOT have a 3rd brake light, right? No problem with state inspection or any? <img src="confused.gif" border="0">

fc-racer

Your 993's are likely similar in design to my 964 Turbo's airbag. I took mine out and replaced it with a 360mm Momo Runner. I can't stand doing a half-baked job so I researched this quite indepth.

To keep the passenger airbag enabled, you need to trick the computer into thinking the driver side airbag is still there. All the sensors do is measure resistance it seems. You can get a tool from Porsche for testing the airbag system. This tool, when plugged into the airbag connector turns the light off and simulates the airbag being there so the passenger airbag remains on. Upon opening this relatively big C$90 box, we found a very small wafer board with a few resistors on it. We took the internals out and stashed it under the dash. We now don't need to worry about the light and the passenger airbag is still enabled preventing any liability issues from passengers.

In Canada, it is legal to remove your airbag if you go through Transport Canada. I did all the paperwork and did it the proper way. I now have a proper steering wheel and I feel far more comfortable when I auto-x the car and sit within 30cm of the steering wheel.

It freaks me out when you think that there are 10-12 year old electronic devices designed to explode hooked up in a car that sees so much vibration pointed at your face

fc-racer

Robin 993DX

FC,

That's interesting information, thank you for responding.

We were aware of the "AIR BAG" box that Porsche uses to test air bag systems, but we were not aware that it was so cheap. $90? Where did you purchase it from?

It might just save much hassel to buy the box do what you did.

KC, in Georgia we have a bi-yearly inspection, but mainly for emission testing only and are done at privately owned inspection stations. Typically the inspector wants you to get in and out as fast as possible (For profit reaons).

One time when I took my 993 in for her regular emission check up, the testing guy couldn't get a good signal from the ignotion source (993's dual ignition system), after fiddling with it for some time he wanted to pass me by hooking up the "sniffer" to the exhaust of another car.... I stopped him and told him that's was not right, and played around with the SMOG machine and found out that the setting was set wrong.

Sorry about the unrelated story, but from that story you can imagine what the inspection is like here.

Flying Finn

That box thing sound good, I'll have to look into it if/when I get the new steering wheel. Momo wheel I'm looking at doesn't have an airbag.

J-McDonald

As for the 3rd brake light issue, I had the "ET-head" third brake light removed from my '91 C2 cab when I had the RS America tail put on the car (I've always thought the light was ugly and disrupted the car's flowing lines).

FWIW, I spoke with an autobody guy who works on lots of Porsches (and has for a number of years) and he said that removing the ET-head brake light from 911 cabs for aesthetic reasons was VERY common in the late 80's and early 90's. This is supported by the number of 1989 and up 911 cabs without third brake lights that I've seen advertised.

Since my car won't come up for inspection until April 2003, the lack of third brake light won't be even a potential issue for quite some time. Also, the car is old enough that I doubt that a police officer would be sure enough to write me a ticket for not having a third brake light.

I figure that, in the unlikely event that the inspection agents do fail the car for the lack of third-brake light (or a police officer tickets me), I'll have a 993-style "hoop" light put on it at that time.