The seat airbag is the side torso bag built into the outboard edge of a front seat back. It moves with the seat, it comes out through an engineered seam in the cover, and the trim on the seat matters as much as the part number.
The seat airbag is the side torso bag built into the outboard bolster of a front seat back. Outboard means the door side, so on the driver seat that is the left edge and on the passenger seat the right edge. Packed, the module is about the size of a rolled hand towel. When it fires it comes out through a seam in the seat cover and fills the gap between your ribs and the door panel.
Manufacturers put it in the seat instead of the door for one reason: it travels with the seat. Slid forward or racked back for a tall driver, the bag stays lined up with the occupant's chest. A crash sensor in the B-pillar or inside the door reads the impact, the control module makes the call, and the bag is out and doing its work in a few dozen milliseconds. On most vehicles it fires together with the roof curtain on the same side.
Systems split two ways. Some vehicles use a torso-only bag in the seat and cover the head with a separate roof curtain. Others use a larger combination bag that comes out of the seat and protects head and chest together, and those cars may have no roof curtain at all. Know which one your vehicle uses before ordering, because the combo module is physically bigger and carries a different bracket.
Start at the outboard edge of the seat back. Factory seats with a side bag carry a small tag sewn into the seam or a molded SRS AIRBAG mark on the plastic trim panel, right over the deployment seam. That seam is engineered. It is sewn with breakaway thread or built on a pre-weakened tear line so the cover splits in the same place every time under the same pressure. Behind it, the module bolts to the outboard side of the seat back frame with two or three studs and nuts, and a pigtail runs down the frame to a connector under the seat cushion.
The part number is on a label on the module can. Reading it means pulling the seat cover, which is why most listings key off the donor vehicle rather than the number alone. Airbag squib connectors on the pigtail use a locking tab plus a separate connector position assurance slide, so check that both are present and unbroken on any unit you are looking at.
LH and RH on a seat bag mean the seat it belongs to, driver or passenger, and not which side of the seat it mounts on. A driver module will not bolt into a passenger seat frame. The stud pattern is mirrored and the bag folds to deploy the other direction.
These get sold two ways. Sometimes it is the bare module. Sometimes it is the entire seat back, frame, foam, cover, and bag together, which is often the practical buy because a deployed bag takes the cover with it. Trim material and color get called out in the listing for that reason. A black cloth seat back and a gray leather one are identical electrically and completely different parts to somebody looking at their own interior.
A fired seat bag is obvious once the door is open. The outboard seam is split, the cover is blown open along the tear line, and the deflated bag hangs off the bolster. There is no repacking an inflator that has burned. The module gets replaced, and on most vehicles the cover and often the foam go with it, since the tear seam is used up.
A side airbag code with no deployment usually points somewhere else. The connector under the seat is the classic one, knocked loose by cargo or a floor mat bunched under the rails, which throws an open-circuit code on that squib. Pull the code and look it up on our airbag code lookup before buying hardware. Keep in mind that installing a good bag does not clear a dash light on a car that has already deployed. The crash record stays locked in the control unit until it is cleared, which is what an airbag module reset handles. The same collision that fires a seat bag usually fires the belt pretensioner in that seat too, so plan on seat belt repair in the same round of work.
Seat configuration drives most mismatches. Power, heated, and ventilated seats add connectors and change the frame, so a heated leather seat back off a loaded trim will not drop into a base cloth car even when the module itself is the same part. Sport buckets with deeper bolsters use their own frames.
Honda and Acura add a wrinkle worth knowing. The front passenger seat carries an occupant position detection system, a capacitive sensor mat under the seat trim cover that watches how close the passenger's upper body is to the deployment zone and can disable the side bag. Honda's own procedure requires the system to be initialized whenever the seat-back cover or seat-back cushion in that seat is replaced. Swap a passenger seat back on one of these without initializing and you get a light and a stored code. More on how that brand handles restraints sits on our Honda page.
One thing that has nothing to do with buying used and everything to do with safety: aftermarket seat covers. A cover that runs over the outboard bolster without an airbag-compatible seam blocks the tear line the bag is designed to open. If your seats have side bags, the cover has to be built for that seat with a matching breakaway seam, lined up correctly.
An undeployed seat airbag holds a live pyrotechnic inflator, which makes it regulated hazardous material. It ships ground only, to a street address, anywhere in the lower 48 states. No shipping to Alaska or Hawaii. No air, no overnight, and that is federal transport law rather than a shop rule.
Installation runs through the seat cover. The seat usually comes out of the car, the cover comes off the back, the module unbolts from the frame, and the cover has to go back on with the tear seam seated exactly where the factory put it. Disconnect the battery and let the control module's reserve capacitor bleed down before unplugging anything, then scan afterward to confirm nothing is stored. A body shop or upholstery shop that handles restraints regularly is the right call.
Restraint parts are final sale unless what arrives is not what was pictured or described, which our returns page covers. Photograph the part before you open the packaging. Call 501-988-0611 with your VIN and we will confirm the right module before you order.
No. The inflator is a single-use pyrotechnic charge and the bag is stretched past its packed shape once it fires. It gets replaced. On most vehicles the seat cover goes with it, because the tear seam is designed to split once.
It depends on the vehicle and on what the deployment damaged. Some manufacturers call for the complete seat back assembly when the side bag fires, since the cover, the foam, and sometimes the frame all take the hit. Others allow the module alone with a new cover. Buying a complete seat back is often the simpler route because the trim already matches.
It tells you which seat, driver or passenger, not which side of the seat the module bolts to. The bag always mounts on the outboard edge facing the door. Driver and passenger modules mirror each other in stud pattern and fold direction, so they do not swap.
Electrically it usually will. Visually it will not match, and heated or ventilated seats carry extra connectors and different frames that a base cloth seat does not have. Match the trim material, the color code, and the seat features from the donor vehicle, not the year and model alone.
Only covers built specifically for that seat with an airbag-compatible breakaway seam, installed so the seam lines up with the module. A standard cover across the outboard bolster blocks the factory tear line and can keep the bag from opening the way it was designed to.
Other parts in the catalogue:
Driver airbag: the module in your steering wheel Passenger airbag: the module behind your dashboard Knee airbags: what they do and how to buy the right one Side curtain airbags Seat belt retractors Seat belt pretensioners All part types
Our staff has handled these parts since the nineties.
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