randomwalk101

okay, just got finished openning up the driver side seat (TL, not TL type s)...it is a b*tch..i think the "S" is easier but the regular TL seat is a pain....arghhh...saw the broken wire..going to solder the broken wire and probably will do the other one as well just in case since openning them up is a major pain. man if I know the regular TL is this much trouble, I would leave that sh*t alone Took 2 hours so far..going to take another 2 hours to put it back at least

t0ast

wow impressive. does anyone know where to get heating elements in case the actual elements are gone?

randomwalk101

okay, finished putting it all back ...took me 4 hours ..when I had it opened, saw the burned out wire....so I replaced with a stronger wire and soldered it back...took the one on the other side out and replaced that too...
anyways, put it all back and everything...turn it on....wait..wait....and still didn't work....man that bites. Local dealer wants $140 for replacement part...i think I'll leave it alone now...arghhh....

randomwalk101

EDIT/UPDATE: Took the car out today..actually the fix works. I guess I didn't leave it on long enough before. Anyways, great news that it worked. 4 hours of labor didn't go in vain....but if it breaks again, I probably won't mess with it...just takes way too long.

kevin0171

hahahaha, good for you. did you use some bigger wire, because i did, hahaha.

btw, how's the weight of that stupid seat? heavy? hahahaha

randomwalk101

Seat must be 150 lbs or so....trying to pull it out/put it in by myself and not having scratch the car is a pain...my back is killing me now...I think I am OD on Tylenol now

bigdo26

I had the same problem with my heated drivers seat. Neither the butt or the back heated up, so following the advice above I took the seat apart found that the same wire had burnt out.

I wired in a new little wire, just finished putting the seat back in the car and voila! Heat is back!!

Took ~1.5 hrs start to finish, most annoying part was getting the leather peeled away to access both the heating elements. Simple and straightforward, just those little rings are a bitch.

Sure gonna be nice to have a hot butt for the winter though, this will be my first winter with a car that has heated seats

kevin0171

hahaha, that's why this TL can't accelerate very fast. the seats are too heavy, do the math. but i assume it gets potential to do the modifications. hahaha, anyway, good good good

kevin0171

I think dealers will kick my ass. because everyone is DIY the heated seat by themself. the dealers can't make money on that, which is very good.
anyways, glad to hear you brought it back. hahaha

bigdo26

Yeah, the fix really isn't bad if you're mechanically inclined. When I test drove the 2007 TL-S 2 weekends ago, I asked on my way out about getting my heated seat fixed and got roughly quoted for $300. I asked the mechanic guy if it was something I might be able to do, mentioning that I'm fairly good with car stuff, and he was like "no, I've seen people do it here and its a huge ordeal. You wouldn't want to try."

hmmm seems it was a ploy to scare me into bringing the car to the dealer. Don't anyone go to the dealer for this, the fix is not that hard!

mezzerTL-S

yeah I'm doing this soon, its already dipping below 0'C (32F) in the mornings up here and I'm freezing my ass off for the first 10 minutes to work!!!

kevin0171

WOW, I saw you are in GTA, and I am in Toronto and not that bad, still above 0'C.

mezzerTL-S

work in GTA live in Aurora and belive it or not the temp drops a couple of notches and freezes my car, and the fact that I don't have a garage doesn't help either

Tom Blasing

The larger guage wire you just put in there has less resistance than the factory one. And that's what the heating element is afterall....a big resistor. So, yea, it'll take longer to heat up now.

Also, the burning could be from someone leaving the heat on "high" toooo long. The manual says to only leave it on "high" for a little while; until you start feeling the heat. Then kick it down to "low".

bigdo26

The bigger wire he was talking about is just a connecting wire between the two heating elements (or at least thats the only piece that I replaced). Using a larger wire to connect the two heating elements should not change the heating rate, if anything it should increase the heating because there will be less electrical energy loss through the connector wire, i.e. more current reaching the heating element.

Not sure how hot the wires get under the leather skin, but from sitting on it while on high, that thing heats up pretty good, wouldnt be surprised if leaving it on high for too long caused the burnout.

Tom Blasing

But yet it is used to complete the circuit, no? So it's still carrying all the current needed and not paralleled from it's source.

All the current in the world can move through that wire and not heat up unless it has some sort of resistance. Think of something that uses a lot of energy, say, a large air compressor. I have mine on a dedicated 20 amp line while the unit itself has a 10/3 cord from the motor to the outlet. Why not use 14/3?? Because it would melt the wire's insulation in a heartbeat. All those electrons bouncing against each other are going to do so even more rapidly if their being pushed through a smaller guage conductor and create more heat. In this case that's the desired result.

bigdo26

Yeah, thats what I meant, its an electrical connection between the two heating elements (and it is wired in in series).

The short wire connecting the two heating elements doesnt look like its designed to heat up. The original was of larger diameter, which leads me to believe its sole purpose in life is to be a minimal resistance electrical connection (current carrying) between the two sets of heating element wires (which are small and of high resistance). I wired in a copper wire for that connector, as it provides minimal resistance to electron flow and *thereby increases the current (I=V/R) delivered to the 2nd heating element by reducing the loss due to wire resistance (in the form of heat).

*edit - not increase current, but prevent excess loss of current delivered to the 2nd heating element.

Da_iLLeZt_TL973

dam so finally someone figured it out.....the burned wires have to be cut and new ones have to be soldered on right??.....sorry im a big dum dum when it comes to electrical stuff

bigdo26

haha yep, that seems to be the typical problem. taking the seat apart to get access to the burnt out wire is the fun part tho!

kevin0171

I think should be ok, because my seat gets warm up in 1 min, totally same as before.

hinesktchp

do you guys think this is possible on a first gen? my seats barely warm up anymore

bigdo26

if your seats "barely heat up," I'm gonna take that as they still heat up some, and therefore the wire we've been talking about must still be intact. If the seats do not heat up at all, then yeah, I'll bet its the same problem with that connector wire.

SwampGas

I read this thread over the weekend. On the way to work this morning, my back heated up but the ass of the seat was still cold.

You cursed me

Da_iLLeZt_TL973

lol thats cuz when u were reading this thread i bet u were thinking..."hmmm this will come in handy when mine goes out"....or something along the lines of that lol but sorry to hear that man it sucks mine has been bad for such a long time now i dont even care lol but i will be attempting this DIY hopefully all turns out well goodluck

kevin0171

WOW,at the very beginning, i thought not many people has this problem, only mine sucks, but finally, hahaha, feel much better, common problem
hope my DIY can help your guys out there

mezzerTL-S

this is the second time mine has burnt out the first time I took it to the dealer and paid through the nose... this time I fix myself and pay next to nothing except for a couple of pinched fingers (f*cking hog rings and reg pliers), very helpful DIY wouldn't have attemped otherwise
Thanks, Jeff

randomwalk101

Curse you damn heat seat!!!!!
After spending about 3-4 hours fixing the driver side....now my passenger complained to me yesterday "hey how come my seat doesn't heat up"
Anyone fixed the passenger side yet? I'm hoping that it'll be a little easier than driver side.

mezzerTL-S

probably exactly the same

kevin0171

it might be a little bit different, cz there is SRS sensor in that passenager seat, handle with care man.

t7n7

HEY!! My Drivers side cushion does not heat AT ALL! Only the back does... I noticed you live in the TOronto Area, any chance we can meet up... I dont mind paying for your humble service... i dont have the tools to fix the seat!

mezzerTL-S

After a couple of days of enjoying a nice warm ass I've noticed that the seat back isn't getting warm, anyone have any experience with that or would it be pretty much the same as the seat bottom.

Jeff

kevin0171

haha, i won't charge for it. buy me a good dinner i'll help you with it...
just kidding, the thing is, you need to find a place, warm and bright. I parked my car in underground parking, then took the seat out of the car and carried it to upstairs. that's why i was noticed that stupid seat is pretty heavy. flash light is required.

randomwalk101

have anyone done the BACK?

t7n7

Well.. I do have a place that is a huge HEATED GARAGE where not only u can wash cars but has suffcient lighting to work on stuff like this. Now... for hte privacy of the person who works there.. i wont' mention it here however, definetely if u can help me out... that would be the perfect place.. and money or dinner.. I shall reward u for ur time. I believe in compensation

kevin0171

sorry for relying so late, just came back from business trip. I have time in this following weekend, but i'll leave Toronto and head to States on 20th, back on 3rd Jan. send me a email if you still want to do this. my email: li0171@hotmail.com

Vijay TL

I'm going to try and attempt this..thanks for all the tips..hope it works..

bangumandoo

my friend and i spent about 4 hours taking apart the chairs and all that good stuff listed in this great DIY. too bad for us we didnt find any broken or burned out wires. we were so disappointed. anyone know what i should check and how to go about doing so? fuses switches or anything else our newbie minds couldnt think of

Seotaji

if your element hasn't burnt out, its usually either the thermostat or the high limit switch. each heater has a separate circuit. if you pull the selector switch out for the drivers side, you should have +12V on the white wire with the blue tracer with the lower heater on. if someone here has alldata or a factory service manual, would they be kind enough to post the wiring diagram?

this thread should be made a sticky if it's not already.

i was looking for something like this just the other day.

diggerdave

Has anyone had the seat back element go out in addition to the seat element? I wonder how bad a DIY it would be to fix the seat back element. My passenger seat has both heating elements out; my driver seat has only the seat element out. It's a shame that they couldn't have issued a service bulletin or a recall on this issue.

02type-s

the backs of our seats are supposd to be heated too??