Rear Seat Seat Belt Alerts Behaving Oddly?

[Jimrpa]

Here’s a new one for me: myself and two buddies go out to dinner. On our way back, I drop off one guy at his house. He’s sitting in the back passenger seat. After he exits the car, I get a Seatbelts Warning dialog with the two front seats (Driver and front passenger, which was occupied) green with check marks and the rear passenger seat, which my friend just exited now red with an exclamation point. This persisted all the way home. The next day, I had a friend repeat the issue, in both rear seats. We got in the car, drove off, stopped, he hopped out, and that seat went to red with an exclamation point until a “key cycle”. Any ideas? See the pictures below.

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[BMT1071]

Yep. That's the way it works. Press the OK button on the steering wheel to clear the message.

 

[macchiaz-o]

Yep. I really dig clean UI design with lots of white space, but this is an example of where the designers may have gone too far. It'd be helpful to see a note in the corner of that alert, roughly like this:

 

[DaMeatMan]

As stated above, you need to actually hit the OK button on the right side of the steering wheel to acknowledge and dismiss any warning messages that come up on the screen, otherwise it will sit there until the car is power cycled.

This is not a bug, just a misunderstanding of how the warning messages are handled.

 

[Jimrpa]

Ok then, why doesn’t it behave that way when a passenger exits the front passenger seat? The behavior is inconsistent (and stupid).

 

[ARK]

Ok then, why doesn’t it behave that way when a passenger exits the front passenger seat? The behavior is inconsistent (and stupid).

Perhaps they think if it's a child back there, the kid could hop down and stand up in the aisle out of their seat, and the alert stays to potentially warn the driver?

When I was 5, my mom had a Ford Aerostar, a three row minivan. As she was driving, I unbuckled and got out of the third row to come up to the second row. She happened to brake as I was moving up and went head first into the center console and then to the ER to get stitches.

The Mach-E is clearly not three row, but it may be by design that if a rear passenger unbuckles, because they can stand in the row, that alert will go off.

 

[djett]

Timely post. We were literally sitting in the drive way trying to figure this out at around the time you posted this. Didn't know there was an ok button on the steering wheel. Learn something new everyday with this car!

 

[Jimrpa]

Perhaps they think if it's a child back there, the kid could hop down and stand up in the aisle out of their seat, and the alert stays to potentially warn the driver?

When I was 5, my mom had a Ford Aerostar, a three row minivan. As she was driving, I unbuckled and got out of the third row to come up to the second row. She happened to brake as I was moving up and went head first into the center console and then to the ER to get stitches.

The Mach-E is clearly not three row, but it may be by design that if a rear passenger unbuckles, because they can stand in the row, that alert will go off.

Ok, let’s follow the logic: the vehicle is halted, the rear passenger seatbelt is unbuckled, the passenger gets out of the vehicle (obviously there are weight sensors), then the passenger door closes. Why would the alert persist? Clearly, whatever condition that could have triggered it is no longer present. I still think that this is poor design if this is intentional behavior.

 

[ARK]

Ok, let’s follow the logic: the vehicle is halted, the rear passenger seatbelt is unbuckled, the passenger gets out of the vehicle (obviously there are weight sensors), then the passenger door closes. Why would the alert persist? Clearly, whatever condition that could have triggered it is no longer present. I still think that this is poor design if this is intentional behavior.

If it is intentional, I think it may be because there is no way for the vehicle to know that for sure someone left the car even if that door opened. I agree that if this is intentional, it should be something that could be disabled.

 

[machefan]

Timely post. We were literally sitting in the drive way trying to figure this out at around the time you posted this. Didn't know there was an ok button on the steering wheel. Learn something new everyday with this car!

This also stumped the dealer tech and the Ford Engineer during a test drive. The Ford Eng sat in the back and the same thing came up after he exited, they both were puzzled by it.

 

[Jimrpa]

This also stumped the dealer tech and the Ford Engineer during a test drive. The Ford Eng sat in the back and the same thing came up after he exited, they both were puzzled by it.

Ok, so I’m not the only one who’s observed the behavior. I still think it’s inconsistent behavior. If there’s a reason for the behavior, the alert on the display should be more informative. Right now, I’d be tempted to take my vehicle in for service, suspecting a defective seat sensor or cable harness.

 

[BMT1071]

Ok, so I’m not the only one who’s observed the behavior. I still think it’s inconsistent behavior. If there’s a reason for the behavior, the alert on the display should be more informative. Right now, I’d be tempted to take my vehicle in for service, suspecting a defective seat sensor or cable harness.

There are no sensors in the back seat. All the car knows is that the buckle was buckled and now it's not. The front passenger seat does have a presence sensor for airbag deactivation purposes. So the car actually knows if someone is sitting there or not.

 

[Jimrpa]

There are no sensors in the back seat. All the car knows is that the buckle was buckled and now it's not. The front passenger seat does have a presence sensor for airbag deactivation purposes. So the car actually knows if someone is sitting there or not.

Ok. That’s good to know.

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