gmartin

Will be ordering 545 in a few days. My dealer says that rear seat airbags should not be ordered if kids will be in the back. Mine are 7 and 9 thus are not too short.This seems to be somewhat of a contradiction safetywise as long as they are not resting their heads on the door. Any opinions would be appreciated.
I am looking at jetblack/black interior sports,Nav,comfort seats, cold weather, rear heated seats and fold down. Iam open to HUD if anyone can convince me. What NAV directions or anything else shows up there? My salesman wasn't too helpful with this.
Happy I found this thread!!!!!I will never set foot on RF again!

Guest

The rear airbag question is a good one. The only issue I've seen is that if a kid were sleeping or leaning against the door and the bag would deploy, the kid could be injured.

Having said that, I still got them on my 2001 E39 and my 2004 E60. Bottom line, I don't allow my kids to sit any way but upright with proper restraints. I think the whole "don't get them if you have kids" line is typical for the American market. Everyone is afraid of being sued. If you are the type of person who lets their kids sit unrestrained in the back, then don't get them. If you're like me and you feel your kids won't be leaning up against the door and you feel better if the bags were there in case of an accident, then go ahead and get them.

On the subject of HUD -- if you getting Nav -- get HUD!! I thought it would be a cool little toy/gimmick but once I started using it, I realized it's one of the most useful options available.

You get the nav arrow display along with speedometer, cruise (regular or active), and check control messages.

Good luck with the car! Good riddance RF!!

Rudy

Whoops! Changed computers and forgot to login before posting the above "guest" post.

DavidNJ

We got on our last two E39s. They are standard on the MB cars. And they include pretensiors on the outboard rear seats (a feature that is standard on a wide variety of cars).

As I said we got twice, and would get them again without thinking. If you are leasing, and bought the car at a fixed amount of invoice, the rear bags will cost $50-75/year.

gmartin

THanks rudy. Being a relative newbie what are the check control messages that pop up on the HUD. I need more ammo to pitch the extra $1K to the wife!

rollee

hi, i would consider sapphire black metallic to be a much better choice than jet black.
I wouldn't worry too much about the rear airbags as long as your children are properly buckled up. your responsibility is always to be alert and trust your judgement.
I agree NAV with HUD is a must.
your choices for options are excellent, but i prefer the sports seats. rollee

gdavis

I ordered the rear seat air bags and have 2 kids- 14 and 9. I know someone who said that the side airbags saved their life from a side impact hit (an adult).

The US gov. is going to require side airbags in ALL cars in a few years.

I am not certain, but I think that the air bag concerns for kids had to do with the front airbag hitting a child in the face and injuring the neck. The rear ones come down from above and must have been designed with children in mind, since kids are nearly always in the back seat.

If they are made with weight sensors in the seats, then they are most probably for kids as well.

Rudy

The bags you are referring to are part of the HPS (head protection system) and are in addition to the bags in the doors.

The main concern for children in the rear is that they may be leaning or sleeping against the door. The front seat issues are primarily for rear-facing infants. Never put a rear-facing child seat in a front seat with airbags. In addition, it's simply safer to always put children in the rear seats on cars with airbags in the dashboard.

Rudy

Check control messages are things like "fasten seat belts", fuel range, any malfunction messages, etc. that show up on the bottom of the iDrive screen and sometimes in between the speedo and tach. It's nice to have them in the HUD.

Trust me -- the HUD is worth the money for nav alone. All the other stuff is just icing on the cake.