By Michael Ellis
DETROIT, Oct 25 (Reuters) - A U.S. alliance of automakers has warned that many of its members will be unable to meet a government mandate requiring a percentage of all new vehicles sold after September next year be equipped with so-called "smart" passenger-side air bags.
The auto industry is rushing to meet federal rules requiring sensors that detect whether a child weighing less than 56.5 pounds (25.4 kilograms) is sitting in the passenger-side front seat and turn the airbag off to prevent injury. The regulations follow the death of more than 200 people, mostly children, from airbags in the United States.
The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration has proposed that 20 percent of all vehicles sold by an automaker after September 2003 be equipped with the airbags, down from its original goal of 35 percent.
But the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers said in a letter to the NHTSA on Thursday that many automakers would be unable to meet the regulations because of the sophisticated technology in the airbags. The alliance proposed that NHTSA cut the requirement to 10 percent of vehicles sold.
"Not every manufacturer can accede to a phase-in percentage greater than 10 percent," the alliance said in a letter to NHTSA chief Jeffrey Runge.
The penalty for failing to meet the requirement is automakers must stop selling vehicles until they can reach the required volume, a NHTSA spokesman said.
Chrysler, a unit of Germany's DaimlerChrysler AG said it was still determining whether it could meet the 20 percent threshold. "It's premature to give a yes-no on that," spokeswoman Ann Smith said. "We're still working on developing the technology."
GM ALREADY USING NEW AIR BAGS
General Motors Corp. , the world's largest automaker, said it has already sold 112,000 model year 2003 full-size pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles with the air bags, and will have no trouble meeting the 20 percent threshold.
"We've got 112,000 of these in the field now and have received no complaints," Terry Woychowski, chief engineer of GM's full-size trucks, told reporters on Friday.
GM said it was the first manufacturer to have the smart air bags that complied with the new regulations. Sensors under the front passenger seat measure the weight of the occupant, while other sensors detect whether the seat belt is latched and the position of the seat. The system then decides whether to turn the air bag off.
GM, which had been working on the technology for a decade, decided to come to market first with a system co-developed with with automotive supplier Delphi Corp. . Delphi has also agreed to supply the system to Ford Motor Co and one other major automaker which it declined to identify, a spokesman said.
The automotive alliance also fears that the airbag sensors may not always be able to tell the difference between an adult and a child, said spokeswoman Gloria Bergquist. For example, an adult could lean forward, taking their weight off the seat and causing the airbag sensors to misclassify the passenger as a child and turn the airbag off.
"We still have concerns about what could happen in various scenarios for misclassification," Chrysler's Smith said.
Ford will offer smart airbags next summer on many of its popular cars, trucks and minivans.
Ford was among some automakers who have nevertheless expressed concerns that the new airbags could send the wrong message to parents.
"We've done so much in the industry to convince parents to put kids in the back seat, and now we're going to tell them we've got this new, high-tech stuff and we're able to detect them sitting there." Sue Cischke, Ford's vice president of environmental and safety engineering, said in August.