Seat Belt Buckle fault code
 

I was getting ready to take my car in this morning for a smog check and I thought I'd run a diagnostic to make sure that there wasn't anything that might make me fail and put me on the bad guys list.

The only codes that came up were Codes 18 and 19 (on a Peake R5 scan tool) which correspond to the driver (18) and passenger (19) seat belt buckles. The seats are the Vader style (obviously not stock) from an M3, and I've searched earlier threads on this issue and read that the seat belt buckles can cause the air bag light to malfunction- mine stays on for about 45 secs. to 1 min. before shutting off- but I'm not quite sure what portion of the buckle is faulty or is the entire buckle faulty? Could it be that the sensor wire was just not hooked up properly or hooked up at all? I'm afraid that I likely will not pass the visual inspection with the air bag light not properly functioning and I'd rather not waste my time until I can get the car dialed in.

If anyone has any additional info. or pictures of this, it would be greatly appreciated. In one of the threads I read, someone mentioned installing a resistor between leads to alleviate the problem- has anyone tried this? Thanks!

it's a sensor inside the buckle that goes bad, I have one in my drivers side buckle that's bad, only fix I know of is to replace the buckle, I haven't looked at how much it is for a new one since the light doesn't bother me and I have an inspection sticker hook-up, lol

I guess I'll have to just replace the buckles or see if I can sweet talk the tech. into letting me slide with the delayed shut-off on the air bag light. I've tried to reset it about 5 times now and the moment I restart it, it immediately trips the light.

I have a smog inspection hook up too, only problem is that he charges $100k (which is what he says the fine and loss of his license would approximately cost him...) It used to be pretty easy to fudge the numbers here in California, but they have become crazy strict in recent years and now the results are automatically sent from the diagnostic computer straight to Sacramento.