Airbags and Platinum?
Robert Celseti
One of my wives' friends read a story in a local news paper about Honda
cars that thieves had stolen air bags from. She also read that the air bags
contained platinum (a precious metal). She asked me if I could find out why
Air Bags contained the platinum.
I hope someone out there could shed some light on this issue.
Thanks :-)
Young Song
In article <01bbbeb2$0fe76660$40d1d49b@rcelseti>, "Robert Celseti" <rcel...@ids.net> wrote:
=One of my wives' friends read a story in a local news paper about Honda
=cars that thieves had stolen air bags from. She also read that the air bags
=contained platinum (a precious metal). She asked me if I could find out why
=Air Bags contained the platinum.
I think Catalytical converters contain platinum or some alloy/compound
containing platinum. As for airbags - I'm not sure if it's true that platinum
is used... I think either gold or copper would be the metal of choice for
conductors in the deployment circuitry and contact points.
Whatever platinum, if any, is used in the airbag mechanism, I'm sure that the
thieves have no interest in it. The airbag units themselves are the prize
since they cost a couple of thousand dollars to replace.
=
=I hope someone out there could shed some light on this issue.
=
It is part of a giant Japanese conspiracy to export platinum out of Japan.
=Thanks :-)
=
Young Song
University of San Francisco, School of Law
http://www.slip.net/~ysong
"Happiness is the full use of your powers along the lines of excellence" JFK
Rodney William Rudd
Honda airbags cost about $700. i work at an automobile safety
lab (at the University of Virginia) and we test all kinds of
things, including Honda airbags. as far as i know, once they
are deployed, they are not worth much at all, because we just
toss them. none of the staff fight each other over any
platinum. the theives want undeployed airbags due to their
$700 value
--
______________________________________
Rodney Rudd |
rw...@virginia.edu |
http://watt.seas.virginia.edu/~rwr4a |