Saab 2006 9-7X - Manual (Page 63)

When Should an Airbag Inflate?
The driver’s and right front passenger’s frontal airbags
are designed to inflate in moderate to severe frontal or
near-frontal crashes. But they are designed to inflate
only if the impact exceeds a predetermined deployment
threshold. Deployment thresholds take into account a
variety of desired deployment and non-deployment
events and are used to predict how severe a crash is
likely to be in time for the airbags to inflate and help
restrain the occupants. Whether your frontal airbags will
or should deploy is not based on how fast your vehicle is
traveling. It depends largely on what you hit, the direction
of the impact and how quickly your vehicle slows down.
In addition, your vehicle has “dual stage” frontal airbags,
which adjust the restraint according to crash severity.
Your vehicle is equipped with electronic frontal sensors,
which help the sensing system distinguish between a
moderate frontal impact and a more severe frontal
impact. For moderate frontal impacts, these airbags
inflate at a level less than full deployment. For more
severe frontal impacts, full deployment occurs. If the
front of your vehicle goes straight into a wall that does
not move or deform, the threshold level for the reduced
deployment is about 9 to 16 mph (14 to 26 km/h), and
the threshold level for a full deployment is about 18 to
25 mph (29 to 40 km/h). (The threshold level can vary,
however, with specific vehicle design, so that it can be
somewhat above or below this range.)
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