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Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row)
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MrPolak
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PostPosted: Mon May 10, 2021 2:42 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

djkeev wrote:
Yesterday morning I was loading up the Van with furniture and boxes to run them out to Pennsylvania.

I'm taking out some buckets of gravel for my driveway too.

I filled a five gallon pail and lifted it to set it inside the sliding door.....
i could feel the pop as pain shot up my back!

Crap!
Of all days......

Gotta do it, no backing out so I endured the pain and finished loading, climbed in and took off for Reading.

These Stow and Go seats supported my sore back perfectly!
I could not have designed a seat better if I wanted to.

The drive was pain free...... getting in and out? Unloading? Well............

Dave


Fit is highly personal. Glad they are magical for you.
My 2 cents: These are no Recaros, but they will do for the money. You can do a good number of hours in them.
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shagginwagon83
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PostPosted: Mon May 10, 2021 6:40 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

MrPolak wrote:

Fit is highly personal. Glad they are magical for you.
My 2 cents: These are no Recaros, but they will do for the money. You can do a good number of hours in them.


Yes, I second this - and I have rode in a Westy with new Recaros for 6 hours.
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djkeev
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PostPosted: Mon May 10, 2021 8:42 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

MrPolak wrote:
djkeev wrote:
Yesterday morning I was loading up the Van with furniture and boxes to run them out to Pennsylvania.

I'm taking out some buckets of gravel for my driveway too.

I filled a five gallon pail and lifted it to set it inside the sliding door.....
i could feel the pop as pain shot up my back!

Crap!
Of all days......

Gotta do it, no backing out so I endured the pain and finished loading, climbed in and took off for Reading.

These Stow and Go seats supported my sore back perfectly!
I could not have designed a seat better if I wanted to.

The drive was pain free...... getting in and out? Unloading? Well............

Dave


Fit is highly personal. Glad they are magical for you.
My 2 cents: These are no Recaros, but they will do for the money. You can do a good number of hours in them.


Absolutely correct!
Every body is a bit different.
Our needs are a bit different.
I've sat in Recaro seats.
They are indeed comfy but for me a bit too bolstered for easy access/egress in this application.
At my age you sort of slither wiggle slide in/out and onto/off of the seat. Climbing out of a depression simply ain't happening! Laughing

Dave
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djkeev
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PostPosted: Wed May 12, 2021 9:17 am    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

And another plus about the Stow and Go Seat!

Carrying something long?

The seat back folds flat, completely out of the way......

Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


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PostPosted: Wed May 12, 2021 11:18 am    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

Nice! Im going for this set up! Lots of those vans down here!
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vwwestyman
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 7:56 am    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

I think I got the heaters to heat!

We're going on a road trip (leaving Thursday after work) and I decided it would be nice to have heat on my back from time to time.

There are four wires going to each seat set. Did a little poking around with my multimeter, and figured out that two seem to be for 12v + - and the other two are for the sensor that would talk to the original controller.

The two brown wires with stripes seem to be to the sensor, and the other two are for the heater. I couldn't decide which side would be for positive and which for negative, but I don't think it probably matters all that much anyway.

So I connected the two positive wires from my generic kit's switch (those heaters were installed in the old seats) to the colored wire (one seat had yellow, the other green) and the negative wires from the kit to the black wire from the seats.

Fired up the Bus and sat in the driver seat while I caught up on all my Topic Reply Notifications and gave the seat time to warm up.

And it definitely did warm up! What I don't know yet is if they'll eventually get too hot, but I do think that the generic heat kit I'm using the controls from did not have any kind of sensor in the pads so the high and low regulation must be controlled externally. So I'm optimistic.

All that to say, it seems that you can get these to heat using controls from a generic kit, using the Chrysler-installed heating pads.

I'll let you all know if it seems that it doesn't work as it seems to be working. Feel free to ping me after next week (which will provide plenty of driving time for testing) to ask for a check-in.
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ekrysztof
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 12:27 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

Forgive me if this has been covered, I tried to look to see if it has, but might've missed it.
Does anyone know if this seat swap will work with newer years Town & Country second rows? I am going to attempt this as my first large project and feel comfortable with the directions posted in the original post so I probably don't want to have to stray or adapt too much but I have found that the good condition and matching 2009-2015 seats are getting difficult to come by. If I could extend the model years, it would help a ton.
Thanks,
Erica
1984 Westfalia
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djkeev
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 1:22 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

ekrysztof wrote:
Forgive me if this has been covered, I tried to look to see if it has, but might've missed it.
Does anyone know if this seat swap will work with newer years Town & Country second rows? I am going to attempt this as my first large project and feel comfortable with the directions posted in the original post so I probably don't want to have to stray or adapt too much but I have found that the good condition and matching 2009-2015 seats are getting difficult to come by. If I could extend the model years, it would help a ton.
Thanks,
Erica
1984 Westfalia


You are thinking Chrysler Pacifica?

At the top of this topic there is a search box.
Type in
Pacifica
A lot of threads will be listed, some might help you.

Dave
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Last edited by djkeev on Tue Sep 21, 2021 1:20 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Robw_z
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 7:40 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

vwwestyman wrote:
I think I got the heaters to heat!

And it definitely did warm up! What I don't know yet is if they'll eventually get too hot, but I do think that the generic heat kit I'm using the controls from did not have any kind of sensor in the pads so the high and low regulation must be controlled externally. So I'm optimistic.

All that to say, it seems that you can get these to heat using controls from a generic kit, using the Chrysler-installed heating pads.

I'll let you all know if it seems that it doesn't work as it seems to be working. Feel free to ping me after next week (which will provide plenty of driving time for testing) to ask for a check-in.


I believe the seats use PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) for heating. Meaning a 12V signal is pulsed at an intermittent frequency on high, 4V on low, etc. A constant 12V signal would make the seats too hot.

Chrysler uses a control module for the heated seats to achieve this. However, the module takes its commands from a LIN-Bus system, meaning digital, which is complicated. The heated seat switches send a command to a central module, which then commands the heated seat module, which applies voltage to the seats.

This is all knowledge gained from the internet and NOT testing, but I believe in theory you cannot just grab the control module from a Chrysler and expect to be able to manipulate it to follow commands from simple switches.

I think ultimately the answer will be using custom PWM modules which I know little about.

-Rob
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vwwestyman
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 21, 2021 7:53 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

The "controller" I used was from some kind of generic seat heater kit from Amazon a few years ago. Has a high and low setting. They appear to run through relays, but perhaps those "relays" are way more complicated.

Had the seats on for a long time with it on high while driving. They never got too hot or felt like they were heating out of control or whatever.

But at some point I decided to switch to low and the fuse blew pretty quickly. And with a new fuse in, I observed dash lights dimming again before turning it off and seeing the lights go back. (Did that to verify that the fuse blew because of the seat being put on low.)

Perhaps the "relays" are modulating voltage somehow? I did measure 11.5ish volts on the downstream side of the switch while testing. I didn't have the engine running when I checked and I didn't check voltage with engine running. But also it didn't have any issues whatsoever with starting.

Anyway, do with all that what you will. Using my switches to turn the heaters to high worked fine for me.

But now the engine blew up, so I won't have to worry about it for a long time. I don't believe the two are related.
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DuncanS
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 21, 2021 9:00 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

For me, as many have said about how personal the comfort is, I prefer the OG non Westy seats. However, I did modify them to get an extra inch of thigh support. And I also added an aftermarket hi/lo seat and back heating kit. For my wife with the bad back, we can pull the plug on the seat part so in the summer just her back is warmed. Perfect on low. The other advantage of the after market heating is you have to pull the upholstery which meant it got to go in the washing machine and come out far, far better. Warning--first wash with soap in the bathtub 7 or 8 times until most of the sand and dirt come out.


Dave with the flat folding PS is absolutely right in how handy having this extra room for long things is. I solved my PS seat in a slightly different way.

Made a piece of ply with keepers on the bottom to locate it and slapped on some extra matching carpet.
Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


Or
Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.
The beauty of the first solution is the platform is below the dash and so a 14' piece of lumber can go in and under the dash with the rear hatch closed.

Duncan
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DuncanS
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 21, 2021 9:00 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

For me, as many have said about how personal the comfort is, I prefer the OG non Westy seats. However, I did modify them to get an extra inch of thigh support. And I also added an aftermarket hi/lo seat and back heating kit. For my wife with the bad back, we can pull the plug on the seat part so in the summer just her back is warmed. Perfect on low. The other advantage of the after market heating is you have to pull the upholstery which meant it got to go in the washing machine and come out far, far better. Warning--first wash with soap in the bathtub 7 or 8 times until most of the sand and dirt come out.


Dave with the flat folding PS is absolutely right in how handy having this extra room for long things is. I solved my PS seat in a slightly different way.

Made a piece of ply with keepers on the bottom to locate it and slapped on some extra matching carpet.
Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


Or
Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.
The beauty of the first solution is the platform is below the dash and so a 14' piece of lumber can go in and under the dash with the rear hatch closed.

Duncan
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TopBud
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 10, 2022 6:01 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

I just got some seats from someone on craigslist. These are not heated, but I want to add heat to them. I ordered this kit from amazon, took it to my upholstery guy and he said they will not fit because the seat pads can not be folded or cut. Have any of you added a heat pad for the top and bottom. If you did can you please provide me with a link. I appreciate it and am looking forward to the new seats and the heated seat part.
https://www.amazon.com/Dorman-628-040-Universal-Seat-Heater/dp/B002U6IL9O
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 10, 2022 8:13 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

Topbud, those kits look like you can’t cut the pads due to the way the heating element circuit is one long element in series. If you cut it you break the circuit. I’ve used kits from Amazon in a few cars now, I’ve always used the “carbon fibre” ones. They can be cut down and make holes in the middle of the pads to hog ring the upholstery back onto the foam. And to Westyman, I think you’re talking about the relays that come with the kits I’ve used. They come with a hi/ low switch and two relays. The way they work is either power the two pads in series or parallel to give hi and lo heat settings. Basic ohms law stuff. Probably wouldn’t work quite right with the original Chrysler heater elements. The easiest solution would be new kits from Amazon and replace the Chrysler ones. I’ve never had an issue with the inexpensive kits from Amazon or eBay. One more thing to mention is the aftermarket kits have a temperature “sensor” on each pad right where the wires attach. It’s really just a snap disc type switch that goes open when the preset temperature is reached and then closes the circuit when it cools down again. You can feel it cycle. I upgraded to the stow and go seats in black leather a few years ago and have a seat heat kit ready to install when I have time.
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 10, 2022 8:20 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B08PBWW3Z2/ref=sspa_mw_detail_0?ie=UTF8&psc=1

This is the same kit I’ve used but is a different name brand. I’ve had good success and haven’t had one fail. The first ones I installed in a Honda CRV was about 6 years ago and still going strong.
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 10, 2022 9:22 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

On topic somewhat...For utilitarian use with long lumber, take the passenger seat out of its' spot and into the garage, the roof, another part of the van.....

A seat modification I used when young with my 1st non-bug ('84 Audi Coupe GT) was to roll back the recline dial with me in the seat, fasten the seat belt under no stress from my upper body and forcibly lock/tug the seat belt from extending with its' built in feature. I would then manually crank up the reclined seat with me in it to create a secured person squished between the seat back and the safety activated non-moving seat belt. Then I could take on the twisted back roads with nearly no worries. I learned a lot about car dynamics/behavior/ handling when I wasn't concerned one bit about me shifting in the seat.

Oh to be young again...

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PostPosted: Mon Jan 10, 2022 9:32 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

djkeev wrote:
MrPolak wrote:
djkeev wrote:
Yesterday morning I was loading up the Van with furniture and boxes to run them out to Pennsylvania.

I'm taking out some buckets of gravel for my driveway too.

I filled a five gallon pail and lifted it to set it inside the sliding door.....
i could feel the pop as pain shot up my back!

Crap!
Of all days......

Gotta do it, no backing out so I endured the pain and finished loading, climbed in and took off for Reading.

These Stow and Go seats supported my sore back perfectly!
I could not have designed a seat better if I wanted to.

The drive was pain free...... getting in and out? Unloading? Well............

Dave


Fit is highly personal. Glad they are magical for you.
My 2 cents: These are no Recaros, but they will do for the money. You can do a good number of hours in them.


Absolutely correct!
Every body is a bit different.
Our needs are a bit different.
I've sat in Recaro seats.
They are indeed comfy but for me a bit too bolstered for easy access/egress in this application.
At my age you sort of slither wiggle slide in/out and onto/off of the seat. Climbing out of a depression simply ain't happening! Laughing

Dave


At the price Recaro is asking for their delicious seats, having a baby/mini parking brake devise included that dumped the thigh and side support flat or even negative (sloped downward) on the entry/exit side would be nice.


BK
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Some BMWs.


Last edited by 1988M5 on Mon Jan 10, 2022 9:45 pm; edited 2 times in total
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Robw_z
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 10, 2022 9:33 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

TopBud wrote:
I just got some seats from someone on craigslist. These are not heated, but I want to add heat to them. I ordered this kit from amazon, took it to my upholstery guy and he said they will not fit because the seat pads can not be folded or cut.


Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


This is what he means by the seats cannot be cut. The upholstery is bonded with adhesive to the foam core. I tore apart a hashed junkyard stow n go because I was curious if heat elements could be put in.

I ended up getting Stow N Go’s that were heated from the factory, and powered them with some $10 PWM modules from Amazon. They work great.

-Rob
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TopBud
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 10, 2022 9:57 pm    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

Robw_z- the upholstery guy said he could put heated elements into the seat, he stated that the kit I bought could not be cut or folded. I hope I didn't confuse you. The guy said he has done heat in the stow and go's.I am not sure how from your picture.

Jordauto- thank you. I will look at
carbon fibre elements. Thanks for the link. Have you cut and trimmed these (or similar) in the link? Thanks
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 11, 2022 5:43 am    Post subject: Re: Front Seat Swap (Town & Country 2nd Row) Reply with quote

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08PBWW3Z2/ref=redir_mob...ity1-21-20

This kit will work fine. I don't know why you need an upholsterer. The covers are already off the seat so slap the cut down heater element in, toss the covers on and go for it. My guess is he didn't want to bother with it since you were going to buy the heating elements and he couldn't mark them up.

Duncan
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