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Retrofit heated seats guide

38K views 153 replies 17 participants last post by  Robbie 
#1 ·
Hi all, bit of a lurker on forums, so thought I would upload a guide for once as there doesn’t seem to be any info out there. I bought a leather interior with heated seats for cheap so set about retrofitting the electrics. I also got the seller to send me the switches with the plugs attached with about 10 cm of wire.
1) Cut off original connectors which are for heated seats and add any new male connector. I used these waterproof ones off ebay and soldered them on. Remember what order the wires are in. You need to connect to the positive, negative, sender for high heat and sender for low heat.
2) Disconnect battery as you will be messing with the SRS connection which will leave an error light if not.
3) Take out old seats and centre console cover. Screw on switches for seats.
4) Get the corresponding female connector and solder on 4 wires with the power and ground able to carry 20A. Tape it next to the SRS connector and then route it under the carpet and back up into the centre console.
5) Use piggyback fuse blocks to take a feed from 28 or 29 for the one that says number 5 on the diagram. Number 5 is for heated seats in the fuse box, so as these were not installed from the factory it isn’t present. 28 and 29 are for the cig lighters. Piggyback off 36 too (which is present). Route the power wires to the centre console.
6) Wire up as per wiring diagram, noting that the high and low heat are back to front on the diagram. There is only 7 wires to connect, if you don’t bother to connect the wiring for the switches to be illuminated when the lights are turned on. They will still have the power LED when they are the seats are turned on. Ground the earths to any suitable point.
7) Bolt down seat and plug in. Do same on other side. Reinstall centre console.
Hopefully someone will find this useful :) Car looks good with a leather interior now.
 
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#6 ·
I bought leather seats for my car but couldn't find the wiring for it anywhere. Today I got very lucky and got my hands on the wiring with plugs for the switches and the seats. I got it all for £5 from a scrapyard. I will be doing the retrofit soon by following your tutorial, thanks and i will get back to you after I have done my car. Also could you possibly send me the picture of the wiring diagram with better quality, thanks.
 
#14 ·
I already bought the full leather interior with door cards, and switches. I followed this same guide but instead of cutting the wires in the seat I just got the plugs from a donor car so that they could be plugged straight in, which is easier because the wires are also colour coded but make sure you get the plugs for the switches as well as the seats. So all together you should have two plugs for the seats and two for the switches. For power I tapped into the fuse box. The only issue I had was the lights on the switches weren't working. To fix this I spliced the wires on the stereo wiring and connected the two wires to the illumination wires. Unfortunately I no longer have this car so I can't show you the wiring. If you want to look at the wiring diagram for the stereo then search for "enabling AUX - true, Honda way, factory way" by xfiniti64. Hope this helps and good luck.
 
#10 ·
I've just got a leather interior to install but the wiring is way more difficult to get hold of. I don't have the multi plugs to fit the switches at the moment, so if anyone knows of the connector type needed it would be useful. Difficult to read the pin numbers on the diagram so if anyone has a higher res picture would also be useful.

Let us know how you get on willhall and post some pictures/diagrams if you can. I want to get the switches to illuminate and looks like it just needs a supply which comes live once the lights are switched on.
 
#11 · (Edited)
So a bit of further studying.....

At the drivers switch, it looks like:
Pin 1 - ignition controlled live
Pin 2 - light controlled live
Pin 3 - switched output for seat on low heat. Cable goes to low heat relay in seat
Pin 4 - ground for illumination of switch (although ground symbol isn't used)
Pin 5 - ground
Pin 6 - switched output for seat on high heat. Cable goes to high heat relay in seat

The above can all be done in relatively small cable.

The seat relays then need large cable to provide the main power for the heating. Can be done in permanent live but would be better through an ignition switched live source.

There is also a ground connection to the heater elements, but not sure if this connection is in the seat base (where the yellow and orange cables connect in the wiring diagram above on the far left). If so, the seat needs a single ground connection.

Any comments on this?
 
#12 ·
Ok, a bit of further studying :)

Looks like the seat has 4 cables to it. So these will be main power and ground from the fuse box along with high heat and low heat cables from the switch to turn on/off the appropriate relay in the seat base.

So I need to confirm the pin out of the switches and the seat base. Will get the multi meter out to check but that's not going to happen this weekend.
 
#13 ·
I've finally had the chance to look further at the wiring. I have obtained the wiring from a hybrid so the colours may be slightly different compared with the Civic, but the hybrid wiring colours are as follows

Wiring from switches (can all be small cable)
Dark blue to passenger side high relay in seat
Light green to passenger side low relay in seat
Dark green to drivers side low relay in seat
Yellow to drivers side high relay in seat
Black to earth
Light green to fuse 36
Grey to fuse 14
Light blue to light controller to illuminate the switches

Then of course you need to wire the seats (live and earth) through a 20A fuse for the main power supply to the heating pads. These cables carry the full load of the seat heaters so need to be rated for at least 20A. Could wire direct back to the battery (through a fuse) as the relay will switch the seat off when the ignition is turned off. Relays are all in the seat base.

The wiring diagram above is for a left hand drive car so the driver and passenger labels are the wrong way round for UK.

I just need to fit it all now!
 
#15 ·
I assume the switch illumination worked ok ARazaQ95? I have allowed for a cable to go to the dimmer switch as shown in the schematic in this thread, but its the multiplug which feeds all the rev counter and warning light electrics. Not clear which of these cables it needs to connect with (schematic states blue wire but there are a few in the multiplug). Connecting to the stereo may be easier but I have left the cable coiled behind the rev counter for the time being.

I just need to connect the main live cables at the fuse box howard the switch illumination cable. It's taken me a while but I have had to completely make a wiring loom and I've only had an hour or 2 here and there. It's also been summer so not in any rush. I also wanted to make sure it was done properly with fully wrapped and protected cables (I got some of that corrugated tubing for wiring under the carpet to the seat base and all joints are soldered, heat shrinked and it's all wrapped in proper loom tape).

Just hope my seat pads work when I switch them on for the first time!
 
#16 ·
Yes the illumination worked perfectly. The buttons would illuminate when the buttons on the stereo illuminated, When I connected all the wires; power, ground and switch control, I had two wires left. I spliced those wires in D1 and D10. Check the attached photo which I used from xfiniti64's post.
 

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#19 ·
I was wondering if I can get some help. I have a 2006 Acura CSX (Canadian only Civic cousin) with cloth seats and no heated seats. As steo 1 I bought the seats, door cards and the OEM heated seat switch which has a harness .

Tonight I took the passenger side seat out (which had 4 connectors) and put the new seat from a 2011 Honda Civic (with heated seats) in. 3 of the 4 connectors were direct plug ins. But the 4th connector is different. Do I need to buy the wiring harness from the donor wehicle? Also where do I find the wiing diagrams?

Thank you
 
#20 ·
Wiring diagram for the seats is in post #3 in this thread (albeit not in great quality).


If the connectors don't match up (mine didn't for the power and the high/low signal cables) then just cut the connector off the seat and install a new connector from ebay. Ensure you know what the wires actually do though. I would suspect you have successfully connected the airbag and occupancy sensor connectors with the power to the heated seat being the different one. Can you post any pictures ( I think you need 5 posts to add images).
 
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