Retro fit heated seats

[Mark House]

I would like heated seats but don't want to go through the hassle of putting heaters in mine. If I get seats with the heat units present what, other than switches, would be need to complete the install? How complex are they to wire? Also are 996 and 986 seats interchangeable? Thanks,

Mark

[Tool Pants]

With enought money you can do anything to a car. This guy started the project by buying the individual parts but gave up because of the cost. Dave's site

Jonathan Turner did do the retrofit on his Boxster. I have asked him in the past to put together some instructions..... Jeff

[Mark House]

Yes, There is considerable expense and difficulty if the seats are not "set up" for heat. What I was wondering is what's the process if I purchase "take off" seats that are all set to go?

Mark

[jonathan]

Mark,

If you buy seats that include the heaters then installation will be much easier. The under-seat wiring harnesses can be bought from Porsche for about $30/side. Depending on what exactly the seat comes to you with you may also need to purchase a pair of relays, also one per side, and in the same price range. Installing the harnesses and relays is a matter of snapping the plugs together if you have the preinstalled seat-heaters.

Installing the switches to replace the switch blanks is trivial.

The challenging part will be the wiring running between seat harnesses and switches. It is simple wiring, power, ground, and two relay settings, but difficult to run cleanly. Wiring flows from the seats out to the door sills, runs under the door sills up to the under-dash bundle, across to behind the AC control unit, and then down to the switches. The under seat/door sill part is relatively easy, the under-dash wiring is a chore. Tie wraps and creativity work just fine though. After running a non-factory path for a year and a half I eventually pulled the entire dash off and rewired it along the factory bundle (I needed to remove the dash for another reason anyway) just to satisfy my need for elegant implementation :)

On the driver's side, you will need to tie power for both seats into the fuse block. There are power wires available to tap into. I wanted to go into the stock location on the block so I trimmed a non-stock metal connector to fit the fuse block in the correct location. I have not yet found a part number for the stock connector.

So the summary is, still a pain, but I feel it was worth it.

Another alternative might be to order a new dash harness that includes seat heating (and whatever else you desire, e.g. auto-dimming mirror, cell-phone hook-up, etc).

Or trade for a model that has the heated seats already :)

[Mark House]

Jonathon,

Thanks so much! Your message has the information I am seeking. Great forum!!!

Mark