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The seat heater kit was purchased from Check Corporation. The kit,
UNV-27, was $75 for each front seat, including two elements (one for your butt,
one for the small of your back), switch, relay, harness, and all kinds of fuse
taps/tie wraps/doodads. The elements are very thin and have an adhesive to
hold them in position. Removal of the upholstery is only required for the
butt cushion - but it's a bitch! Many little hogrings that need to be
split open w/ pliers and a screwdriver!
The heaters take about 3 minutes to reach full temp, not as fast as I had
hoped, but WOW! do these things get HOT!!
There is a Hi/Low setting w/ a timer that turns off the
heater after 10 minutes.
Some folks may consider it a waste of money, but I like them. $150 is
steep though for butt warmers.....
 
Installation is as follows: 4 hrs / 6 beers (It was
cold...)
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Remove the seats from the vehicle
Two bolts in front, two bolts in back, and the seat motor
wiring connector in front
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Remove the butt cushion from the seat frame
There are two large retaining bolts in the rear and two in
the front
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Install the back element
Release the tension on the lower upholstery by pulling
down at the bottom of the map pocket.
The fastener is held by a lip/J-channel at the bottom.
Pretty easy - no hogrings to remove.
Just peel and position the elemen in place and stick!
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Turn over the butt cushion and begin removing the hogrings
around the front, back, and
sides. Pull loose the cover
from around the edges to expose the hogrings that hold the seating area
seams down. These are really tough to get free. They run
lengthwise and transverse across the seating area. Take only one
side and the transverse section free. There is no need to
remove
the entire seat cover from the cushion when it's not entirely necessary.
-
Peel the backing off the element and place it on the cushion
making sure the opening in the element corresponds w/ the crease in the
cushion. Route the harness to the rear of the cushion.
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Begin the arduous task of re-attaching the hogrings on the
seat cushion. Be careful not to pull the steel reinforcement rod out
of the seat foam molding!
-
Reattach the hogrings around the perimeter of the seat
cushion.
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Mount the relay/timer in an unobtrusive location, making
sure the movement/travel of the seat will not come into contact w/ the
module. I found a spot under the seat attached to the frame that
cleared the seat and also my CD changer mounted underneath.
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Connect the back element connector to the butt element
connector and then to the relay/timer
module. The main power connector attaches to the relay/timer module as
well, and does the switch.
-
I ran the power wiring under the carpet to the fuse block
under the drivers dash. I ran each seat to a different
fuse. Each seat has a 7A fuse and I did not want to combine both seats
for a 14A load on an existing 15A fuse, instead I used the supplied fuse
taps on the "Accessory" and "Wiper" fuses. Both of
these are only hot when the ignition is ON, so I don't have to worry about
forgetting to turn off the heaters and draining the battery!
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Reinstall the seats.
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I chose to move my ECT switch on the console to an upper
position across from the rear window switch, which opened up the two lower
positions for the heater switches. The switches are not quite factory
sized, but close. They are slightly wider, but about 1/2" shorter
that the Toyota switches (Landcruisers have nice lighted factory switches
that I'm going to see if they fit) Using a Dremel tool w/ a small fine
sanding drum, I carefully narrowed the switch to fit the console
opening. I then took the factory "blank" and cut it to fill
in the gap left by the shorter switch. I was careful to slowly adjust
the length of the filler piece in order to have a tight, almost seamless
fit.
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