Front Power Seat Removal & Disassembly
****Use this guide at your own risk and double-check everything - procedure and specifications. The factory service manual can be a great help.****
This information may be useful if you want to:
- Remove front seats
- Disassemble front power seat
- Swap seat covers (e.g., swap your worn driver’s seat bottom with your passenger one)
- Possibly fix your lumbar motor (mine broke but I don’t know what I did to fix it)
- Install heated seats
- Add extra cushioning to your seat back and cushion
I had bought a 2001 4Runner Limited passenger seat and wanted to mix and match parts to have a driver’s seat with the best covers, cushions, heating elements, and also keep the lumbar support. With all this in mind, I needed to 1) remove the seat bottom from the 1999 and replace it with the 2001, 2) put the 2001 upper cushion, heating element, and cover on the 1999 upper frame so I could also keep the lumbar option.
Tools & Supplies - you may not need all of these, but this is what I used:
-
Factory Service Manual -
Components picture -
Disassembly instructions
- Ratchet
- 3” ratchet extension
- 12, 14mm sockets
- Phillips screwdriver #2
- Flathead screwdrivers
- Sharpie
- 2 needle-nose pliers (I got by with one and a flat-nosed pliers)
Seat Removal
1) Pull off by hand or use a flathead screwdriver to pry up the 4 mounting bolt covers
2) Use a ratchet and 14mm socket to remove the 4 mounting bolts. Slide the seat all the way forward/backward to get easier access to the front/rear bolts.
3) Slide the seat so that it is close to the middle of the track.
4) Remove the headrest, put the upper part of the seat all the way in the upright position (not reclined).
5) Tilt the seat backwards and disconnect the electrical connection underneath (if you have power seats)
6) Remove seat
Seat Disassembly – separating the seat back from the seat bottom
7) Remove the power seat control knobs prying them with a flathead screwdriver.
8) Remove the phillips screws (3 total) holding the side plastic seat covers. Two screws on the inside cover, one on the back of the outer cover. Now remove both covers. The outside one can be difficult so see the picture below to understand how it is clipped in. Using a longer flathead screwdriver can help release the built-in plastic clips from the seat track. The clip on the left side can be a pain.
9) Pull the bottom backside of the seat back downward to release it. Now lift that piece up and disconnect the electrical connection.
10) Remove two 14mm bolts on both sides of the seat at the base of the seat back. You can now separate the seat back from the seat bottom.
Separating the seat bottom from the seat track
11) Disconnect every electrical connection you can find – you may want to take pictures first so you have a reference for how everything goes back together. You will also need to pop some of the plastic mounting clips from the frame. This picture does not show all the connections.
12) Remove 4 12mm bolts – 2 on each side of the seat. Separate the seat bottom from the seat track.
Seat back disassembly
13) Remove the headrest supports. This step can be a real pain and the following text may be hard to follow. With one hand keep the leather on the backside pulled away from the frame. In your dominant hand have your flathead screwdriver ready. Use the screwdriver hand and reach down to one of the supports. Use your index finger to feel where the one side of the clip is pushed up against some metal. Slip your screwdriver between the metal and the clip. Take your other hand and reach around the outside of the seat to grab and pull on the headrest support. Now pinch half the clip with your finger, pry the screwdriver against the metal to push the other half of the clip in (now both sides of the clip should be squeezed together). Pull the headrest support out once you are able to pinch the clip.
14) Now you can start pulling the leather cover off. It will help to push the padding around as you remove the cover. The heating pad has those plastic deals that you see holding tags to clothing. First I marked with a sharpie where they went through the fabric then pushed them through rather than cut them so they could be re-used. Another option would be to cut them and then use some small zip ties. You can pull about half of the leather up but then you will get to a point where it is held in by two hog rings. I used a flat-nosed and a needle-nose pliers to bend them open and remove the rings. Two needle-nose pliers would be best. Now you can pull the whole cover off.
Inside of leather cover with heating pad attached.
Backside of seat pad.
Lumbar Motor disassembly
My lumbar motor was not working and I disassembled this a year ago so I am just providing pictures for taking it apart to help you put it back together. I have no idea what I did to get it working again…messing with the motor, disconnecting wiring, whatever…all I know is that it works again. So here are the pictures I took.
Seat bottom disassembly
I did not need to do this so you are on your own for this part. Hog rings hold the leather cover to the frame.
Seat Heater Wiring
So following this part of the write-up is super shady for you to do. My educational background in electrical wiring = NOTHING. I just look at the pretty pictures in the wiring diagram and try to understand them. I put my on/off switch in the factory location so the following is based off that.
The first thing I did was remove the electrical tape and plastic tubing from the 2001 seat track wire set so I could easily follow the individual wires. Next you want to cut the white-black wire coming from the seat back heater (if I remember correctly) and the blue wire coming from the seat cushion heater. Leave yourself enough wire to easily splice new wiring to those wires. You should now be able to remove a chunk of the factory seat track wiring with a total of 4 connectors...2 for the seat heaters, one each for the occupant sensor and seatbelt. Plug the connectors into the seat heaters. The other two connectors will remain unused.
Ground wire
Now you will need to add a length of wire to the white-black wire and you want to ground this somewhere.
Power wire
Disconnect your battery
The power wire needs to start after the ignition switch so that you can't accidentally leave the heater on after you turn the car off. That could be very bad. So....
With a ratchet, 3" ratchet extension and 10mm socket remove these 4 bolts. You can now pull the cover off (but not completely). Behind the ignition switch you will need to find this connector.
Find the black-yellow wire and splice a new wire into that. Then feed the new wire past the steering column (you can just have the new wire follow the clump of wires coming from this connector) and out through the hole for the on/off switch.
Add a in-line fuse holder to the end of the wire. I put in a 10amp fuse since normally it would have a 20 amp but I only have one seat heater....I just make this stuff up as I go so again, do this mod at your own risk. You could burn you car down, house, whatever. Messing with electrical stuff can be very dangerous.
Now send another wire from the on/off switch opening back to the seat and connect it to the blue wire.
You also need one more wire going from the switch to be a ground wire.
Power lumbar switch relocation
Linear Mode
