(T) new sei - abs prob,no airbag or p/s light!

hi all, my cousin has just bout a t reg seicento sporting but once we had it home we noticed a couple of things.
p.s. it has been stood for couple of months!

1.it is fitted with abs which u rarely see but even though the abs light comes on and goes off as normal, compared to my non abs sei the brakes seem awful.


2.the airbag light doesnt come on when the ignition first comes on so i believe there maybe a fault there or maybe the bulb has blown cus as i thought, if there was a fault the light would stay on all the time maybe?

3.the power steering light doesnt come on either and there is no power steering whatsoever!

ive checked the fuses and cant see a problem there, so i was wondering if anyone knew if a relay or anything else was rtesponsible for these systems as the abs thing is new to me and ive never had a p/s problem.

any help would be very appreciated as he is very upset that he sold his previous car and really wanted this one only to find that it had problems

plus forgot to add, i looked at the engine when he got it back and noticed a heater pipe had split from rubbing and so had the map sensor pipe

The ABS doesn't actually improve the braking (some people have removed it!) but I suspect the issue is with the condition of other parts of the system.

For the PAS, check the maxi fuses behind the battery.

The MPIs don't have -- or shouldn't have -- a MAP sensor pipe (the MAP sensor is on the plenum chamber). I wonder if it's the servo pipe that's fubared?

1) If you've got bad brakes then ABS won't make them perform any better, what you need to do is work out why the braking system isn't up to scratch and fix it. If it's been standing a while I'd be tempted to go for new discs/pads up front and renew the brake fluid, also you'll probablly want to give the rear drums a damn good service too.

2) You'll almost certainly have a mechanical airbag which doesn't have a light on the dash, iirc only the MK2 Sei's with the MPI engine (and PAS as standard) had an eletrical airbag.

3) PAS wasn't standard on the Mk1 Sei and in all honesty it doesn't need it, the steering is light enough unless you're trying to turn the wheel when stationary and that's a recipe for messed suspension up geometry.

fingers, surely T is to early for an MPI Sei? I thought they started with late Vs?

Sorry -- I'm hopeless with registration letters. With a T it must be SPI, so it does have a MAP pipe.

it is a mk1 sei but i have noticed that even though it has the airbag it does have the light on the circular part of the speedo dash for an airbag and pas.

ill check the fuses behind the battery for the pas fuse but even without it it feels very heavy even when driving.

if it does have an airbag system, does anyone know if there is a fuse/relay anywhere that could be blown/damaged?

It's a generic part, that light exists on Sei's without airbags too. As I said all SPIs (RHD, the LHD continental ones are a different matter) as far as I'm aware use a mechanical airbag mech, that's a standalone item with no contact to the wiring loom.


Well check, with your head in the foot well looking up if you pull back the wiring so you can see up towards the dipped beam headlight adjuster if you can see a silver metal thing pointing up towards the rev counter you have PAS, if you don't you there's no PAS.

EDIT: tried getting a photograph but couldn't get the camera into a useful position with enough light

not speaking for all 98 t's but dont think it even came with air bags or abs mine never had either fitted
unless it was an extra i never noticed just wanted too get out and drive the car lol

im thinking the car might have both as its had the abs system fitted so im thinkin maybe it might be the pads or caliper seizing as the fluid looks all cooshty.

why would they fit an airbag steering wheel though if the car didnt have an airbag system fitted????

It could just be the rugby ball wheel without the airbag.

Cheers

PD

Probably. The SPI Seis, for the most part, had the rugby ball wheel (the late Cinq one) without air bag. I have one lying around...............