Seat Belts

Seat belts help to decrease the possibility of severe injury during accidents and sudden stops. Mazda recommends that the driver and all passengers always wear seat belts.

(Mexico)

All the seats have lap/shoulder belts. These belts have retractors with inertia locks that keep them out of the way when not in use. The locks allow the belts to remain comfortable on users, but they will lock in position during a collision.

 

(Except Mexico)

All of the seat belt retractors are designed to keep the lap/shoulder belts out of the way when not in use.

The driver's seat belt has no provisions for child-restraint systems and has only an emergency locking mode. The driver may wear it comfortably, and it will lock during a collision.

However, the front passenger's seat and all rear lap/shoulder belt retractors operate in two modes: emergency locking mode, and for child-restraint systems, automatic locking mode. While we recommend you put all children in the rear seats, if you must use the front passenger seat for a child, slide the front passenger seat as far back as possible and make sure any child-restraint system is secured properly.

Emergency locking mode

When the seat belt is fastened, it will always be in the emergency locking mode.

In the emergency locking mode, the belt remains comfortable on the occupant and the retractor will lock in position during a collision.

If the belt is locked and cannot be pulled out, retract the belt once, and then try pulling it out slowly. If this fails, pull the belt strongly 1 time and loosen, then pull it out again slowly.

(Seat belt with automatic lock mode)

When the seat belt is fastened, it will always be in the emergency locking mode until it is switched to automatic locking mode by pulling it all the way out to its full length. If the belt feels tight and hinders comfortable movement while the vehicle is stopped or in motion, it may be in the automatic locking mode because the belt has been pulled too far out. To return the belt to the more comfortable emergency locking mode, wait until the vehicle has stopped in a safe, level area, retract the belt fully to convert it back to emergency locking mode and then extend it around you again.

Automatic locking mode (Except Mexico)

Always use the automatic locking mode to keep the child-restraint system from shifting to an unsafe position in the event of an accident. To enable seat belt automatic locking mode, pull it all the way out and connect it as instructed on the child-restraint system. It will retract down to the child-restraint system and stay locked on it. See the section on child restraint (Search).

Pretensioner system

If the vehicle receives a strong impact from the front or side of the vehicle, the system retracts the seat belts to increase their effect.

When a collision is detected, the pretensioners deploy simultaneously with the air bags.

The pretensioners deploy simultaneously with the air bags when a roll-over is also detected.

The seat belt retractors remove slack quickly as the air bags are expanding. Any time the air bags and seat belt pretensioners have fired they must be replaced.

A system malfunction or operation conditions are indicated by a warning.

Refer to Air Bag/Seat Belt Pretensioner System Warning Light (Search).

(With Driver and Front Passenger Occupant Classification System)

In addition, the pretensioner system for the front passenger, like the front and side passenger air bag, is designed to only deploy in accordance with the total seated weight on the front passenger seat.

For details, refer to the front passenger seat weight sensors (Search).

Load limiting system

If the vehicle receives a strong impact from the front of the vehicle, the load limiting system operates to prevent the seat belts from applying an excessive load. By maintaining the load applied to the seat belt to a specified level, the system reduces impact to an occupant's chest.

Even if the pretensioners have not fired, the load limiting function must be checked by an Authorized Mazda Dealer.