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Heated seat wiring woes

Help, Advice and DIY Tutorials on Volvo's P80 platform cars -- Volvo's 1990s "bread and butter" cars -- powered by the ubiquitous and durable Volvo inline 5-cylinder engine.

1992 - 1997 850, including 850 R, 850 T-5R, 850 T-5, 850 GLT
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1997 - 2000 V70, V70 AWD
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tehniemer
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Heated seat wiring woes

Post by tehniemer »

I recently picked up a 96 NA 855 and am in the process of going through it to fix all of the issues. The one that had me stumped is the wiring for the seat heaters. The thermostat is missing from the driver seat and the plug for it is missing, looks like someone cut it off. The other odd things is that the color of the wires don't match the wiring diagram I have. The passenger seat thermostat is there, but it seems like the wiring for it is completely missing, not just cut out. Wondering if anyone can help me out. If like to get them wired back in.

Driver side
Image

Image

Passenger side
Image

Image

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rspi
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Post by rspi »

Chances are the car was not wired for heated seats. People swap seats, buttons, wiring, etc. all the time in old cars to satisfy their cosmetics.

The "winter package" has 3 primary features:
1. Heated seats.
2. Headlight wipers.
3. Traction control.

Are the other clues there?
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tehniemer
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Post by tehniemer »

It has all 3, switches and all.

Another note, the connector on the left side of the last picture was covered in adhesive backed foam, just swinging in the wind, never looked like it was plugged into anything.

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erikv11
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Post by erikv11 »

Here are the plugs from one of my 96 NA 855s with (working) heated sets:
driver's side
driver's side
image(1).jpeg (130.66 KiB) Viewed 2184 times
passenger side
passenger side
image(2).jpeg (130.37 KiB) Viewed 2184 times
Looks the same as yours, right?

Are the little silver circuit breakers in place in the fuse box?
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Ozark Lee
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Post by Ozark Lee »

There was a recall on the heated seats and the black box in the upper left hand corner of the picture is what replaced the seat heater thermostat that used to be pushed up from the bottom of the foam.

Most of the time the techs that did the recall left a bunch of chopped off wires under the seat, ignore them.

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tehniemer
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Post by tehniemer »

Awesome, I knew about the recall but didn't know about the replacement parts. I'll have to probe the connections when I get it all back together. Thanks.

kellyent
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Year and Model: 96 850 GLT
Location: Nebraska

Post by kellyent »

I have 2 broken wires under the driver's seat of my 96 850 that are supposed to be going to the thermostat. How can I tell which wire to put where on the thermostat? Or does it matter?

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