Hello! This is my first post, I picked up a 99 suburban a few months ago. I was excited about the heated seats, but the drivers side doesn't work. Does anyone know how to go about fixing it? I got the specs from a mechanic that did the alignment, but he didn't have the time to check out the seat. Any suggestions???
Heated Seats in 99 Suburban
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hey, welcome to the Suburban Club.
It could be just about anything from a blown fuse to a loose wire. I would almost always start with the simple and work upwards. Check the fuses and see if there is one that's blown.
Anyone else have experience with this?
It could be just about anything from a blown fuse to a loose wire. I would almost always start with the simple and work upwards. Check the fuses and see if there is one that's blown.
Anyone else have experience with this?
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Bolt some milk crates down in the mean time :lol:
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im thinking that it could be a bad fuse also. never can go wrong with checking. good luck on it
ya the old milk crate trick.
no seriously tho my vavorite tool for testing electic sercuts is a plain old test light. check the wires under the seat for juice first if the fuses are good. then if the thing has juice going to it i wood say its screwed. if the wife minds the milk crate idea, and mine does. take the passenger seat out. and take the heat unit out of that one. two reasons for that, 1 the wife isnt sitting on milk crate, and two you get to see just how hard it is and how long it will take. or you could just swap the seats from one side to the other. if theyu are both heated and electric it shouldnt take 20 min. to do the swap. then you can work on the bad seat first. if the passenger seat isnt electric just swap the seat not the base that way she still has the adjustable seat and the heat.
dam dude where are you that you need the heeted seat already?
no seriously tho my vavorite tool for testing electic sercuts is a plain old test light. check the wires under the seat for juice first if the fuses are good. then if the thing has juice going to it i wood say its screwed. if the wife minds the milk crate idea, and mine does. take the passenger seat out. and take the heat unit out of that one. two reasons for that, 1 the wife isnt sitting on milk crate, and two you get to see just how hard it is and how long it will take. or you could just swap the seats from one side to the other. if theyu are both heated and electric it shouldnt take 20 min. to do the swap. then you can work on the bad seat first. if the passenger seat isnt electric just swap the seat not the base that way she still has the adjustable seat and the heat.
dam dude where are you that you need the heeted seat already?
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cool now im 3com. no biggy i forgot to login manually but once i did it took it all right steve
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99% of those that go bad are the unit itself. The leather bottom has to be unstitched and the unit replaced. Expensive. If you get lucky, and I do mean lucky, the switch will be bad.
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I was really hoping there was a complete answer for this thread. My drivers side heated seat doesn't work, but the passenger does. All of my fuses are good and I have replaced the switch in the seat and have verified that it is getting power to the switch. I haven't pulled the seat yet to check anything inside, but I guess that is next.
the heating element on the '99 'burb is part of the leather cover. It has been a while since i changed one but i know it involved removing the seat, removing the seat back from the base and then removing the cover from the base. i beleive you will need hog ring pliers to reassemble the cover onto the base. There are alot of other components inside the seat if you have power lumbar etc. The last cover i priced from GM was for an '01, and it was $375, but the heater in that seat is in the cushion, not the cover, so it was cheaper.
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Thanks for the information, Jack. Do you know if the driver seat has the feature like the passenger seat where the seat belt has to be connected before the element will turn on. It still doesn't work on my driver's side with the seat belt attached, but it may be somewhere to start checking.
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152 Posts
Just thought I'd add a post here since this seems to be the most replied to thread on this topic.
This last winter the driver's side seat heater stopped working on our 99 Suburban. Interesting that most of these that I've seen posted are the 99 suburban driver's side. Don't think it's worth sinking $400 plus a Saturday afternoon into this. As br2819 said, too much other stuff to fix first. Maybe in 10 years when I'm putting the finishing touches on the complete restore!
This last winter the driver's side seat heater stopped working on our 99 Suburban. Interesting that most of these that I've seen posted are the 99 suburban driver's side. Don't think it's worth sinking $400 plus a Saturday afternoon into this. As br2819 said, too much other stuff to fix first. Maybe in 10 years when I'm putting the finishing touches on the complete restore!
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57 Posts
Funny,my 99 Burb has the same problem.Probably will never fix it.Needs a front end rebuild and lots of other work.
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If you figure the driver's seat gets the most wear and tear, it's bound to be the first one to fail. If you buy a basic multi-meter (found at many electronics stores for $20-$100, depending on functions and quality), you can get a reading using the ohms function. A broken heater element will read open, where as a unit that doesn't have a broken/snapped section of the heating element will have some sort of ohms rating/resistance.
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I also just bought a 1999 Suburban. Leather heated seat doesn't work on the driver's side. The seat is also in pretty tough shape. I've been checking junk yards. Does anyone know if seats from a new suburban will fit in the 1999 (prior generation) without issues?
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