How to disable Ford Expedition Side Airbags?

[Zubail]

Hi everyone, 

New to desert, newbie driving maybe is ok, but for future I want to be 100% sure they will not blow. Googling not helped, hope here will find answer.

Will be happy to here any help, cause in manual I didn't find any fuses and relays regarding airbags

 

@TIMMY if you can share experience about same model - would be great

[Islam Soliman]

Hi @Zubail, it’s highly recommended to disable airbags in American SUVs as specially the side curtain airbags are very sensitive and can deploy by mistake when your are doing sideys mistaking it for an accident. The fuse box under the hood is usually where these fuses will be hosted and also usually there is a diagram in the cover of that fuse box with all details. If not, you need to check with your garage and they should be  able to point out the relevant 1 or 2 fuses to disable the airbags and you can take them out before the drive while deflating and then put them back in while inflating by end of the drive. Also check which fuses will kill the traction control and ABS and do the same.

If you want more convenience and willing to spend a couple of hundreds, the garage can install kills switches for the same so you avoid the process of taking out the fuses and putting them back each drive.

[TIMMY]

Hi Zubair,

Congrats on your new drive. The Expedition is a definitely a fun car to drive for a newbie level and hoping it will be more exciting in Fewbie and higher levels. 
 

It is not advisable to install a kill switch if the car is still under warranty and service of the dealer as the would generally void the warranty. For the airbags the relay switch is under the driver seat. It is a yellow connection and can be located without much effort. The lock is a 2 fold red color lock. If you remove this yellow connection before your the start of the drive then the airbags should not work and you will get a warning symbol in your instrument cluster. 
 

Further please ensure to drive in sand mode with 4H configuration. Please do let us know which trim is your expedition?

[Zubail]

5 hours ago, TIMMY said:

Please do let us know which trim is your expedition?

Timberline .

So I need just disconnect these 2 yellow connections both under mine and passenger seat? 

[Zubail]

So I have to disconnect that yellow connection fully or have to smth with red lock? @TIMMY

[TIMMY]

Yes, this is the yellow connection plug which needs to unplugged. The red button is the lock that will need to be first pulled and then pressed to unplug the yellow connection. This will disable the airbags completely. 

However, being a newbie myself I haven’t had a fellow passenger on my off road drives and I believe the airbags module is completely switched off after removing the driver side yellow plug. You can try seating someone in the passenger seat, buckled in and check if the passenger airbags ON light switches on the top sunroof instrument cluster.  

Let me know how it goes. 

[Zubail]

6 minutes ago, TIMMY said:

Let me know how it goes.

Thanks a lot, sure, will update!

[Gaurav]

Just to clarify the real concern, every American brand need to disable the side airbags aka curtain airbags, as they deploy on side sloping and crisscrossing the dune very quickly. 

One should "not disable" the main airbags, as they are meant to keep you safe, in case of a real accident.

Please speak to Ford to find a solution to just disable side airbags, they must be well aware of these incidents.

[Zubail]

I went to Al tayer, they said noway to disable, on precious generations possible with the fuse, here - system is together working with main. I wrote to main Ford to ask them, let's see.

But what I found, is description of sand mode, that it's disabling traction control etc. to make driving on sand comfortable in get tested in UAE and created mainly for UAE and desert
 

https://media.ford.com/content/fordmedia/img/me/en/news/2018/11/19/the-2018-ford-expeditions-sand-mode-secrets--fords-first-full-si.html

[Gaurav]

Why don't you get them to write in an email if the side airbag gets deployed "without an accident" will they cover this in the warranty?

Now they will help you with all the support, data, and spec sheet you might need.