Air bag light came on so I took the car in for service at 38247 miles. The notes on the Volkswagen service invoice stated: "tested module response and wiring. All ok performed guided fault finding. Determined that the airbag in the drivers seat needed to be replaced. Estimate $443.43". I asked them to explain why the airbag had to be replaced. Response: "a wire got to hot and fried a component in the air bag." Then I asked how a "hot wire" was not a manufacture defect and why it wasn't covered by the warranty. Response: "it just isn't covered and it's not our fault". the end result was they didn't want to fix the problem with out charging me the full price, the best they could do was charge me half price on the labor to find the problem.

- Salem, OR, USA

Loose airbag igniter connection under the steering wheel, causing the airbag system to deactivate. This incident is frequent as reported by many owners on various online forums (audiworld, vwvortex, usenet newsgroups, etc). An internet search on "airbag igniter: Driver side resistance too high" on google returned numerous reporting on this issue. In my particular instance, this has happened on both a 1999 VW passat 1.8T/20V and a 2000 VW Golf 1.9L tdi.

- Alexandria, VA, USA