'98 V70 -- Seat Swap Questions

Post by **E Showell** » 10 Jun 2015, 09:36

I know seat swapping has been covered here ad infinitum, but I think I've got a question that I've not seen come up. I recently acquired a power passenger seat. The existing seat is a manual. I do not see any wiring pre-installed in the vehicle to accommodate a power seat. Recall my V70 is a base model.

I'll lift the carpet when I get the seat out, but I do not expect to find any wiring there. If I do, I'll see if I can make it work as a power seat by adding some auto-resetting circuit breakers to the auxiliary fuse box (I know they are tucked away under the edge of the panel).

Here goes the real question. Rather than de- and re-skinning the seats, is it possible to just swap the bolsters while leaving them fully-upholstered. In other words, can I just swap backs and bottoms, foams and leathers, without worrying about the power/no power options? Both sets of seats are heated and the wiring is in place for that.

Thanks for any insight. I am particularly interested in hearing from anyone who's actually done what I'm proposing and has been successful with it. Thanks again.

Post by **abscate** » 10 Jun 2015, 10:20

Ill bet the wiring is there. I suspect the base model is a small percentage of production and that it made sense to make a single part wiring loom.

My 2005 P2 has power seat driver, manual passenger seat, and a bunch of connectors underneath it that I assume are power seats. Connectors for the SIPS and the seat heater are all plugged in.

This does not constitute binding car advice and past performance is no guarantee of future results, except when turbo boost is full on.

Post by **dosbricks** » 10 Jun 2015, 12:13

I'm with abs' on this one--the wiring is probably there. My S70 base has a power seat but seems to be pre-wired for a lot of other stuff.

I've had seats out and re-skined and rebuilt seat cushions. It's time consuming. So the answer to whether the backs and cushions can easily be swapped is no. By far the easiest route is to swap the entire seat. In process, be sure to disconnect the battery and under no circumstances put the key in the ignition and turn it or you will get an SRS light.

obayha · Post by **obayha** » 10 Jun 2015, 12:13

Not sure what you are asking fully, but here is what I did.
I did swap backs for backs without removing any skin, just unbolt/rebolt. I had one bottom skin off already and decided to switch it from the driver side to passenger side as to lessen the wear start on the one area. So on that one I had to hog nose the entire seat. I then had to remove some of the hog nose rings from the passenger seat, the area that holds the material to the frame, but was still able to retain the seat to foam with the hog nose still in place. The hog nose is a learning curve, as I tried to put the ring in place and then put the pliers on the ring. the way to do it is to load the pliers with the ring and hook the two wires together and squeeze it/done.
The zip ties sound easy, but worry about wear down the road.
I can let you borrow my pliers and enough rings to do the job, if you want to go that way.
Hope the info helped.
Shane

Post by **kahl** » 10 Jun 2015, 12:37

As an option I have the car side plugs I can send you if you wanted power on the passenger side. Jump wires from the driver side if your passenger side does not have seat wiring.

Post by **abscate** » 10 Jun 2015, 14:27

kahl wrote:As an option I have the car side plugs I can send you if you wanted power on the passenger side. Jump wires from the driver side if your passenger side does not have seat wiring.

Great solution for twins...

obayha · Post by **obayha** » 10 Jun 2015, 14:32

I have the seat wiring on my '98. Don't know how far it would need to be pulled to find a plugin.
Shane

Post by **E Showell** » 10 Jun 2015, 18:49

After some investigation, I report my findings:

Shane's right, the backs will bolt up, like for like. The bottoms, however, are a different story (and, it is, of course, the bottoms I need). Due to differences between power and manual seats, the seat frames do not interchange. Thus, hog rings must be clipped and skins removed and replaced.

Additionally, there is absolutely no wiring present for power seats in at least one base model manual trans., non-turbo 1998 V70.

Time to get out the hog ring pliers.

By the way -- thanks Kahl for your generous offer, but I'm going to pass on the wiring modification. I know even less about electricity than I do about upholstery so I don't really want to hack into the wiring harness to add power to the passenger seat. The goal here was never to come up with a way to fit a power passenger seat, but rather to get a better seat bottom on the existing passenger seat. I know how to do that since I've done it before.

Thanks for all the replies.

obayha · Post by **obayha** » 11 Jun 2015, 06:19

If and when I rip into my '98 and remove anything, I will look at the wire harness and see where it travels to. Maybe take some pictures and if it has a common port to plug into, maybe it would be the same on yours, less the wire to the seat. So hold onto the bottom and it still might happen.
As said before, my '99 has the wires, just not working upon hook up. Still need to look into that.
Shane

Post by **MrAl** » 11 Jun 2015, 07:26

E Showell wrote:After some investigation, I report my findings:

Shane's right, the backs will bolt up, like for like. The bottoms, however, are a different story (and, it is, of course, the bottoms I need). Due to differences between power and manual seats, the seat frames do not interchange. Thus, hog rings must be clipped and skins removed and replaced.

Additionally, there is absolutely no wiring present for power seats in at least one base model manual trans., non-turbo 1998 V70.

Time to get out the hog ring pliers.

By the way -- thanks Kahl for your generous offer, but I'm going to pass on the wiring modification. I know even less about electricity than I do about upholstery so I don't really want to hack into the wiring harness to add power to the passenger seat. The goal here was never to come up with a way to fit a power passenger seat, but rather to get a better seat bottom on the existing passenger seat. I know how to do that since I've done it before.

Thanks for all the replies.

Hi,

When it comes to cars i dont know much except theory, but when it comes to electrical/electronic work i've done that for over 40 years now, both in the industry and as a hobby.
Unfortunately that doesnt mean that i can tell anyone how to wire their car up as the factory would do it, but i can recommend ways to modify stuff, with the right wire sizes and fuses and that sort of thing. So if you wanted to install the seat as an electric seat it could be done, but would require wiring from the seat all the way to the battery or a lead off of the battery, along with a new fuse and fuse holder. This assumes that the seat has a two wire connection and does not connect to the computer, which i dont think it does.
Wiring two wire devices usually just means connecting one wire to ground and one to the positive of the battery, but with the right size wire and right size fuse. If we could find the wiring diagram for the seats this would be all too easy. If we cant, i'd have to try to trace the wiring in my car and see what they are using for the fuse and maybe wire size. The physical motor size would also hint at the current draw and thus the wire size. So it might not be that hard to do. You might want to rethink this before you start tearing it apart. This also assumes that the seat WORKS to begin with.

Where you able to test the seat to see if the motors work and all that? Do you see any visible connectors under the seat (i think you should be able to see some) ?

If you opt out that's up to you, i just thought i would mention that given the above assumptions it probably would not be that hard to hook up. The best way would be not to modify any existing wiring, but to install a whole new circuit just like in a house.