Seatbelt Repairs

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1987 GMC Jimmy

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Got a ticket the other day from the Lake Ponchartrain Causeway Police for no seatbelt. These money grubbing pricks were going completely bananas pulling people over, and this guy pulled me over going into the Walmart parking lot. Anyway, I don’t wear the seatbelt because it doesn’t work. Neither one of the front ones do actually. They’ll extend and buckle, but they won’t tense and retract. When it’s supposed to tension, it’ll just make a crunch noise. I’m going to (at least try to) fight this ticket, and I was playing with the belts a second ago and noticed that they work perfectly fine with the doors open and that button not pressed. Close them and depress the button, and they don’t work. Does this button enable the tensioner to work? How would this be repaired?

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bucket

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The drivers belt in my Celebrity coupe did the same thing, I just disabled that portion so it acts as if that button is always out. The downside is, the shoulder strap can no longer ratchet out to leave slack when desired.

And technically, my coupe has a little flip lever with a cable drive that works the bits on the retractor mechanism. But a sedan has the retractor mounted right to the pillar with a button sticking through, just like yours. They serve the same purpose.
 

1987 GMC Jimmy

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Mississippi
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Jesse
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1987
Truck Model
V1500 Jimmy
Engine Size
350
The drivers belt in my Celebrity coupe did the same thing, I just disabled that portion so it acts as if that button is always out. The downside is, the shoulder strap can no longer ratchet out to leave slack when desired.

And technically, my coupe has a little flip lever with a cable drive that works the bits on the retractor mechanism. But a sedan has the retractor mounted right to the pillar with a button sticking through, just like yours. They serve the same purpose.

Okay, so that controls retraction. So when you’re strapped in, that’s pretty much it. No adjustment, right? And the tensioner still works with the button gone? I’m sure I can crack it open and figure it out, but if you had some literature on that, that’d be awesome.
 

bucket

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No, it will still move freely when you lean forward or otherwise pull the belt out. It just will always be trying to take up the slack in the belt.

When working properly, you can pull the belt away from your chest and 'ratchet' it out so it stays loose and gives you some slack. Removing that button will disable that feature. It may also keep it from locking up in a wreck with that button removed/disabled. Not to sure about that part.
 

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