Hi all,

New member here so please forgive me if this topic has been beaten to death elsewhere. I am happy to read up in previous threads. I searched online and this forum but am not sure how to best proceed. I wanted to post here before bringing to a dealership.

This morning my driver’s side seat will recline but not move forward and back and now my wife cannot use the car.

I do not want to start throwing parts at a problem without any diagnosis. Has anyone else had this issue? I saw a few things online but everyone had slightly different symptoms.

Any and all help is appreciated. Thanks in advance.

 

I wonder if the plastic gear went bad. It’s happened

 

Bad switch maybe? Can you hear the motor making noise when u press the button?

 

That sounds like a bad switch for sure to me. Super common but so is the plastic gear. I think that problem causes crab walking for a while before giving out completely though like the switch will. Keep fiddling with it and you might get it to work intermittently. Search for seat switch and you should find lots of threads about this topic. Some show you how to take it apart to try and clean the contacts A little expensive to replace.

 

You can disconnect the harness on that motor under the seat, then use a digital multimeter to check for voltage, it's a 4 wire harness for seats with the memory function on the motor, white wire, and blue wire are the ones for the power to the motor, the other two are for an encoder. When you press the switch forward and backward the voltage should change from +12vdc to -12vdc. On seats without the memory function it's just a two wire harness.

If you are getting power to the motor then the motor itself is cooked. If you are NOT getting power (double check the other wires in each combination to make sure it's not different on your vehicle) then the problem lies elsewhere.

 

Thanks for all the replies. I believe that the issue is a broken plastic gear. Going to replace that first.

I appreciate all of the help. Will report back if that doesn't work.

 

Keep in mind those gears typically break if something is bound up on one side of the slider track. Once you replace it watch it VERY carefully and just bump the switch to verify that both sides are moving. You probably need to shoot a bunch of aerosol white lithium grease on the track to lubricate it. Factory grease doesn't last forever and these cars are pushing 15-20 years old.