2007 legacy wagon-The dog chewed the front right seatbelt up so I bought a new belt with hardware. I am looking over the service procedures that came with the belt. It seems doable for a home mechanic. But it says, 'Disconnect the tension reducer connector for the seat belt retractor with a tension reducer function." That part sounds a bit confusing. Also, is there danger of damaging the air bag? I have not removed the plastic trim yet so not peered inside there. The shop claimed it took two hours to replace it so I was wondering what is so complicated.
Once you remove the trim, it will be obvious what to do to replace the seat belt. Above sounds like engineer speak for “unscrew the old parts”.
I highly doubt the airbag system is connected, but you could remove the positive battery connection just in case. On second thought, check your owner’s manual on that one.
Once you get the trim off you’ll see where everything is attached.
The sentence you quoted is applicable to retractors that have the tension reducer function, which is probably the front seat belt retractors. The instructions are probably printed to go with any seat belt, regardless of position in the car.
You may need a special tool to remove the bolts holding the seat belt mechanism to the car, but you’ll see that when the trim is removed.
If you decide to disconnect the battery (probably a good idea) make sure you have the security code for the radio if your car has such a system. Radios that need a code won’t work after the battery has been disconnected.