Lazy Seat Belt Fix ?

I just straight out replaced my driver's side seatbelt with a brand new one from Camelback Toyota since the webbing was all torn up. I paid $149.02 shipped from Camelback Toyota.

Massive improvement over the old one.

 

I had a similar problem in my Miata. Learned that washing it with Woolite solved the retraction issue. http://sos-inspections.com/car-safety-tips/

 

I have two problems with my seatbelt, and they directly oppose each other.

1) as show here, the seatbelt doesn't retract sufficiently.

2) while wearing the seatbelt, it constantly pulls tighter and quickly becomes uncomfortable across my lower abdomen.

I'm fairly typical, 20lbs overweight with a bit of a gut. Sitting down and having the seat belt constantly putting more pressure where my belt is requires me to manually pull out the seat belt and hold onto it, forcing me to drive with one hand.

So I'm thinking about NOT fixing my seat belt. Is there another solution?

 

Have you tried cleaning it?

 

Mixed results here, mine wouldnt retract, messed with em, still nothing. So i bought two new ones, their still "lazy", They roll up I'd say about 90% of the time, still not acceptable to me. These are OEM also.

 

My seatbelt is pretty oily/dirty so maybe I should give this a shot.


I've also put "universal replacement" seatbelts in my Jeep and they retracted fine so that will be my next choice

 

I've cleaned my seat belts using a bucket of hot soapy water. I usually do them at the same time when I shampoo my carpets.

For soap I use 1/4" cup of Oxy-Clean, mainly for getting rid of smells, I use a couple ounces of a degreaser concentrate (any will do, I use the purple colored Simple Green HD), and a few ounces of carpet cleaner concentrate (any carpet cleaner, I get my concentrate at Home Depot in a gal). Mix it up in a bucket with 2-3 gallons of hot water until the oxy clean dissolves.

If you are super lazy, you can just do this without disconnecting the seat belt, but it's harder to do the whole seat belt that way. If you can disconnect one end it's easier. I just pull as much of the belt out as I can, and clamp it off as close to the retractor or trim as you can so it doesn't retract. Then put the loose end that you pulled out into the bucket of water right on the seat - let the degreaser soak in for a several minutes. Then pull the belt out, lay it across the seat and scrub like hell with a super stiff nylon brush. Get both sides of the belt. Put it back in the bucket again if it's really nasty, another soak... more scrubbing. Rinse it off good with some fresh water from the hose. When you're happy with how clean it is, you can just leave it pulled out until it dries. I use squeeze clamps (like for wood working) to keep my belts from retracting while I clean them / dry them.

The belts come really clean and slide much better through the seat belt retractors after being cleaned like this.

BTW, I use the exact same mixture right on my cloth seats and carpet to clean them. But when doing carpet, instead of a bucket, I mix it in a 1 gallon container, like a milk jug. Drill a hole in the lid and you can just shake it upside down to spread it around on your carpet or seats. Scrub with a brush like hell. Don't worry about making a puddle. Get the dirt nice a loose, adding water from a hose sprayer. Then vacuum up the mess with shop vac, and repeat until super clean and good smelling. On a warm day, everything dries in an hour. I even pull up the threshold trim at each door to vacuum under the carpet. It's super clean under there and my Taco always smells nice!