Seat Belt fraying

[johnswlondon]

volvos problem is that the shape of the groove is intended to be a safety feature.it is intended to provide automatic height adjustment for the driver and passenger,with the belt moving up and down the groove to adlust to the occupants height.to be fair,this movement will involvo some rubbing to the belt.

if you are the only driver,you can buy a clip which prevents the inertia feature operating,but be warned ,this may hinder the seatbelt pretensioners in the event of an accident

[mag]

I have a V40 and recently bought an S40. Both suffer from the same problem. To cure the V40 (for which I had to replace a seat belt for the MOT test as it was frayed) I followed the groove caused by the seatbelt making it bigger by using a Dremel and a small round abrasive piece that comes with the Dremel and that has cured the problem. I'm about to do the same with the S40. Don't want the same to happen with that.

Mag

[KiwiJock]

Same thing happens in NZ as well. Just failed the WOF( Warrant of Fitness), same as MOT, due to fraying on belt from the litle groove. Not so many V40's in NZ so couldn't get second hand one here, was going to be charged $1000 for new belt, about 400 quid and $150 to fit. May have been in NZ for 8 years but still too Scottish to pay that much, only paid $5,500 for car(T4 '99). Got one off Ebay for 25 quid + 10 quid post, sent to Dad in Dingwall, posted to NZ 54 quid(sorry, no pound sign on keyboard) and got it 10 days later. Fitting pretty easy following Haynes and taking care of SIPS sensor, about 1 hour and happy to be quids and dollars in.

[coupeboy]

Seat belt fraying? Same problem with my wife's car - she's 5'2" and obviously the B pillar trim has done all the damage. £175 from Volvo for a new one! Tried looking through breakers but they all pretty manky and you need to see the car they came from! The label on the firework says don't fit in another car! Thanks Volvo for not recalling this as it's clearly a design fault and for the replacement being so expensive!

[ShaunieS40]

I just bought a new belt from ebay 9.99 and 7.99 for posting to ireland!! sorted try ebay i think the seller has more . . .

[duggers1954]

Hi. yeah had the same problem with the passengers took back to volvo main dealer. no joy but then thought i will send and email to customer services stating that this should not happen after all the car is only 4year old. They replaced the seat belt free, but now the drivers seem to be fraying now.
Worth a try!!!!

[newvolvos40owner]

My S40 driver belt is fraying as well. I have an mot coming up so i went to a breakers yard yesterday to see what they had. Seemed fairly straight forward to remove one if you uncoiled the belt at the top and removed the pin that is slotted into the belt end. You could then just remove the belt leaving the tensioner and other stuff in place. Is this the best way to go about it? I am a bit concerned about compromising the safety of the system. Also the passenger side belt seemed to be interchangeable with the driver one. They didnt have my colour so I still dont have one to replace mine yet.

[960kg]

.....yes, same here with the plastic being worn away by the seatbelt BUT i have just looked through the gap where the seat belt goes and although i have this wide worn slit in the plastic there is a shiny part on the metal bracket that holds the seat belt unit to the pillar and mine wears on this as said because it gave the game away by having a shiny high spot......so whatever we do the belt will still fray on the metal as it is harder than the belt .....the plastic wears because it is softer than the belt.....

[timmybrick]

i had this problem on my s40 it was an advisery on the mot then all of a sudden the belt just wouldnt roll back in. Any way i got a good clean one from a scrapyard it came off a o3 plate car. Fitting it wasnt to hard you just have to be carefull removing trim.