Options for power seats with memory?

casm · Aug 16, 2014

The Jetta is about to go from being a one-driver car to a two-driver car - my fiancée is going on the insurance shortly.

There's an eight-inch height difference between the two of us, and I'd like to swap out for power seats with memory. Is there anything in the VW family that will fit a 2012 TDi Sedan with the Premium package? Keeping the seat heaters is a must as we drive in cold areas during the Winter.

Leather (or at least Cornsilk) is preferred, if it helps. I'm done with cleaning cloth seats.

CameraJack · Aug 19, 2014

Just pull the handle and push it back and forth each time? It probably takes less time than waiting for the memory seat to adjust, and saves you a lot of cash! It's what my parents have done for as long as I can remember, and what my girlfriend and I will do once she gets put on my insurance.

casm · Aug 19, 2014

CameraJack said:
Just pull the handle and push it back and forth each time? It probably takes less time than waiting for the memory seat to adjust, and saves you a lot of cash! It's what my parents have done for as long as I can remember, and what my girlfriend and I will do once she gets put on my insurance.

Sounds like an awesome idea once you, your girlfriend, and your parents are driving our car. Until then, looking for alternatives.

CameraJack · Aug 20, 2014

casm said:
Sounds like an awesome idea once you, your girlfriend, and your parents are driving our car. Until then, looking for alternatives.

All I'm saying is that it's a lot of money to spend for a rather minor inconvenience. If you have the money to burn then go for it!

casm · Aug 20, 2014

CameraJack said:
All I'm saying is that it's a lot of money to spend for a rather minor inconvenience. If you have the money to burn then go for it!

While I do not wish to get into an argument over this, there are a couple of things I would like to bring up:

Your original reply did nothing to answer the question that I had asked. You are certainly entitled to your opinion as to what I am looking to do, but it frankly it has nothing to offer - as written - with regard to the question I was posing.
Something that I did not mention in my initial post is that I suffer from rather substantial nerve pain in my neck, back, and shoulders. As a result, being able to get the seat into the correct position to avoid aggravating this is critical; reaching down, over to the side, or elsewhere to adjust it can literally send shooting pains throughout my body. This is something that, frankly, I'd like to avoid as much as possible - and which, equally frankly, I did not include in my original post because my medical history is no-one else's business.

Your intent is not lost on me. But how I am considering spending my time, money, and effort is something that I am capable of deciding on my own. And while I have elicited outside opinion, it should have been clear to you on the face of it that if the system currently in place was working for me I wouldn't have asked for ideas regarding how to change it.

Now that that is out of the way, if anyone has any ideas for how to do what I am looking to accomplish, I would definitely be interested in hearing them.

midntdi · Aug 21, 2014

The only option I can think of would be to "retrofit" seats from the MKV into the MKVI. I am not familiar with either platform so I am not entirely sure what would be involved but it would probably involve swapping frame rails and a good bit of wiring. I haven't heard of anybody doing this but there are some people on the site (graeme86 is one name that comes to mind) who might be able to help you out.

CameraJack · Aug 22, 2014

casm said:
While I do not wish to get into an argument over this, there are a couple of things I would like to bring up:

Your original reply did nothing to answer the question that I had asked. You are certainly entitled to your opinion as to what I am looking to do, but it frankly it has nothing to offer - as written - with regard to the question I was posing.

Something that I did not mention in my initial post is that I suffer from rather substantial nerve pain in my neck, back, and shoulders. As a result, being able to get the seat into the correct position to avoid aggravating this is critical; reaching down, over to the side, or elsewhere to adjust it can literally send shooting pains throughout my body. This is something that, frankly, I'd like to avoid as much as possible - and which, equally frankly, I did not include in my original post because my medical history is no-one else's business.

Your intent is not lost on me. But how I am considering spending my time, money, and effort is something that I am capable of deciding on my own. And while I have elicited outside opinion, it should have been clear to you on the face of it that if the system currently in place was working for me I wouldn't have asked for ideas regarding how to change it.

Now that that is out of the way, if anyone has any ideas for how to do what I am looking to accomplish, I would definitely be interested in hearing them.

Bloody hell! I was giving you another possible option, rather than paying a lot of money for something which apparently doesn't yet exist, which would mean again paying somebody to modify older parts to fit your car to get what you want. If this is what you want, that's totally fine!

I'm not in the financial position to drop lots of money on stuff so I have to make do with scrapyards and the like.

casm · Aug 23, 2014

midntdi said:
The only option I can think of would be to "retrofit" seats from the MKV into the MKVI. I am not familiar with either platform so I am not entirely sure what would be involved but it would probably involve swapping frame rails and a good bit of wiring. I haven't heard of anybody doing this but there are some people on the site (graeme86 is one name that comes to mind) who might be able to help you out.

Thanks, much appreciated; that gives me a starting point to go from. FWIW, I've done seat swaps between other vehicles before, and wouldn't be the least bit surprised to find that the frame and wiring need to be adapted.

CameraJack said:
Bloody hell! I was giving you another possible option rather than paying a lot of money for something which apparently doesn't yet exist, which would mean again paying somebody to modify older parts to fit your car to get what you want. If this is what you want, that's totally fine!

What you seem to be missing here is that the 'option' you offered me was to keep doing the same thing as I am now, which happens to be not entirely ideal.

If I was fine with the status quo, I wouldn't be asking the question in the first place. Furthermore, as a grown adult, I do not require being saved from myself; I am quite capable of determining whether or not I should undertake a project by myself.

I'm not in the financial position to drop lots of money on stuff so I have to make do with scrapyards and the like.

You have absolutely no idea of my financial position, and, frankly, it's none of your business. Additionally, you also have no idea of my ability to handle this on my own using parts pulled from other vehicles. So unless you actually have something useful to contribute towards what I am looking to accomplish, kindly find another thread to participate in.

CameraJack · Aug 24, 2014

casm said:
What you seem to be missing here is that the 'option' you offered me was to keep doing the same thing as I am now, which happens to be not entirely ideal.

If I was fine with the status quo, I wouldn't be asking the question in the first place. Furthermore, as a grown adult, I do not require being saved from myself; I am quite capable of determining whether or not I should undertake a project by myself.

You have absolutely no idea of my financial position, and, frankly, it's none of your business. Additionally, you also have no idea of my ability to handle this on my own using parts pulled from other vehicles. So unless you actually have something useful to contribute towards what I am looking to accomplish, kindly find another thread to participate in.

At no point did I make any comment about your financial position or your ability to pull parts from a scrap yard. I simply pointed out my financial position and what I have to do as a result, as a reason for my suggestion.

A quick Google search lead me to these results:

http://www.edition38.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=509020

http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthread.php?5247581-MKVI-seats-in-MKV

Apparently the seats fit, but you'll need to get creative with the wiring to get the power and memory option functioning correctly. May involve VagCom work if it's tied in with the ECU but I have no idea if that's true or not.

murray8144 · Aug 25, 2014

casm said:
You have absolutely no idea of my financial position, and, frankly, it's none of your business. Additionally, you also have no idea of my ability to handle this on my own using parts pulled from other vehicles. So unless you actually have something useful to contribute towards what I am looking to accomplish, kindly find another thread to participate in.

Wow dude you should cool it. I read this thread and he did nothing wrong u seem to have a burr up ur arse

casm · Aug 26, 2014

CameraJack said:
A quick Google search lead me to these results:

http://www.edition38.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=509020

http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthread.php?5247581-MKVI-seats-in-MKV

Apparently the seats fit, but you'll need to get creative with the wiring to get the power and memory option functioning correctly. May involve VagCom work if it's tied in with the ECU but I have no idea if that's true or not.

Understood, and I had run across these in searching. They're helpful, but weren't exactly covering what I'm looking to accomplish. There is some good information in them, though.

That said some digging around suggests that Audi A3 seats may be what I'm looking for, but they're not exactly a straight drop-in - from people who have gone from non-memory to memory seats in A3s, large portions of the wiring harness had to be added and / or replaced in order for them to work. The seats themselves are a bolt-in, but everything necessary to make them functional is less than pleasant to deal with.

Top that off with the Mk. VI Jetta having a wiring harness unique to itself in North America and that the A3 was apparently not offered with memory seats here in recent years, it's looking like a swap to straight power seats without memory may be much more feasible than trying to hack in something else. I'll look into it a bit further, but this may be more than it's worth getting into to make it work.

CameraJack · Aug 26, 2014

casm said:
Understood, and I had run across these in searching. They're helpful, but weren't exactly covering what I'm looking to accomplish. There is some good information in them, though.

That said some digging around suggests that Audi A3 seats may be what I'm looking for, but they're not exactly a straight drop-in - from people who have gone from non-memory to memory seats in A3s, large portions of the wiring harness had to be added and / or replaced in order for them to work. The seats themselves are a bolt-in, but everything necessary to make them functional is less than pleasant to deal with.

Top that off with the Mk. VI Jetta having a wiring harness unique to itself in North America and that the A3 was apparently not offered with memory seats here in recent years, it's looking like a swap to straight power seats without memory may be much more feasible than trying to hack in something else. I'll look into it a bit further, but this may be more than it's worth getting into to make it work.

Straight power seats would be pretty easy, as I imagine all it would need is 12V power and then the switches control the motors within the seat. With the memory function, however, I doubt each seat contains the necessary electricals to retain 'memory positions' and as such that task is most likely delegated to the ECU. Thus, you'd need to sort out a BUS patch lead (is that the right terminology I wonder?) to get the seats to talk to the car, and then fiddle with the ECU to get that to talk to the seats in return.

Might be worth keeping an eye on scrapyards for cars with the seats and functions you want, and then pull the whole loom with the seats to lay into your car.

Options for power seats with memory?

casm

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casm

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casm

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midntdi

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casm

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murray8144

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casm

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