SEATBELTS make our car journeys far safer. In fact, we now have laws that require their use. However, as seatbelts get older, they don’t work quite as well as they used to. For seatbelts to work properly, they must retract and lay snug on your body. If they’re loose, they can’t effectively restrain your body from flying forward in the event of a collision.
You will notice this looseness when you put on your seatbelt. Newer ones retract quickly and pull the belt snugly across your torso. Even when you take them off, you will notice that newer seatbelts retract quickly into the receptacle. Older ones, however, will have a bit of lag when retracting. Some can get so old that they don’t even retract at all, and when you wear them, they just fall loosely on your lap. A loose seatbelt is an ineffective one. It may be enough to comply with the law that requires you to wear your seatbelt, but it won’t keep you safe.
This can be fixed. The cause of slow or non-retracting seatbelts is quite elementary – they’re simply dirty. To fix them, you just need to clean them.
The simplest way to do this is by washing them. Get a deep bucket, fill it halfway with water, and put some clothing detergent in it. Pull out as much of the seatbelt as you can and put a binder clip at the end where it hangs from the car’s C-pillar to prevent the belt from reeling back in. Now that you have most of the belt out, you can place a towel on the seat you’re working on. Then set the bucket on the seat protected by the towel. From there, you can now put as much of the belt as you can into the bucket to let the belt soak in as much of the soapy water as possible.
After 20 minutes of soaking, you will see that the soapy water will have released much of the grime from the belts. Take a soft bristled brush and start brushing the belt to remove the accumulated grime. Once you get it clean, you can start wiping the belt dry. But don’t let it reel back in yet. Let the belt air dry, which should take a few hours. Once it’s dry, you can start testing the retracting function and you will see that it will reel in much faster, like new.
Not only is it important for your safety and that of your passengers to wear your seatbelts while riding in your car, it is also wise to maintain their proper operations. Remember: Dirty seatbelts are ineffective seatbelts. (Topgear)
