04 D2,
Long story short, removed rear side panels/storage bins, and unbolted left and right rear seat belts from the fender wells.
Now, the seat belts are both locked.
I can pull about an inch of slack, and the belts reel back.
The belts will not unlock to pull slack.
They have rolled up over a foot and will not reach to bolt back down.
I removed the black cap on one end of the driver's side reel, which has plastic teeth and the mechanism in it.
This allowed me to pull slack.
Only apparently I don't have the teeth meshed in the correct spot, as now the belt is very slow to retract.
I've yet to open the other side, but it rolled up too far and is locked too.
It makes no sense to me why neither will release.
They both worked fine before being unbolted.
There are no sensors connected to either belt. Just 2 bolts on each fender well, and the visible top belt hangers. No battery in the truck.
The problem is just like pulling a shoulder belt too fast.
It moves a foot or so, locks, let go and let some slack reel in, pull slowly, and the belt rolls out as it should.
The problem is like that, only just an inch of pull, and it never unlocks to pull any slack.
Does this make any sense to anyone?
Anyone had this problem.
I have to be overlooking something.
If it was just one side, I could understand, maybe it broke.
But nothing is broken, and both belts went from working to locked.
?????
Any ideas?
Thanks

 

You can get them to release it’s just tricky/time consuming. You do a pull/yank technique and it will release like 1-2 inches at a time, just keep tension on the part your extending and it will eventually come all the way out.

 

They also have to be sitting oriented the same way as they would be sitting in the truck. There are all kinds of little inertia weights inside them that move around to activate the lock, and if it's not sitting properly they will prevent you from being able to pull the belt out.
Be careful! I ended up having to replace an entire centre belt because I couldn't get it to release.

 

I've tried countless ways.
Neither will release.

 

It's kinda like a 12 year old boy finding out about his manly parts for the first time (with all the tugging) lol....

It goes like this (I've also dealt with the center seat belt when the plastic clip went past the trim). You hold it like it's oriented in the LR, you tug it, let it go back a hair, while keeping tension on it a little bit of slack should release. You keep that technique up (takes a while) and eventually you will get more and more to release.

I got all the way thru getting the center seat belt released, put it all back together, went to test it, and by god if the trim wasn't fully tightened and the seat belt went to far again..... It took me 30min if not longer each time, but in the end I won and it is possible. Just takes the above technique and lots of patience.

You could ship em to me & I could sit there and try my best to get em.

 

Thank you sir, I'll keep trying then.

 

If its unhood or unbolted form the frame
Set it up in a vise to hold it tight.
You have to pull the belt really really really hard to release it
It wont take a while but pull the belt out hard and it will release.
then slightly roll it back and pull again.
Its not broken, it just went pass fat the locks
Cheers

 

Thank you sir.
I'll unbolt the top and try it in the vice.
That had crossed my mind.