Hello Brain Trust,
Since I first got it, both front seats blow fuses. If i move the seat when I'm not sitting in them, they are fine; if I'm in the seat but "help" it move in the direction I'm adjusting, they're fine; if I resist at all, the fuse blows.

My assumption is gunked up grease in the tracks or gears, worn motors, or the like. Before I start taking things apart I wanted to see if anyone has any experience with this problem.

 

In general, from an electrical perspective, more load on a motor draws more current. Maybe step up the fuse size by one step and try it out. The fuses mainly function to protect against shorts, not so much overloads, since the motors only run for short periods of time, they won't heat up very much.

To answer your question, that has not happened to my electric seats. Mine have two 30A fuses each feeding two motors, those fuses are fed from 60A fuses. Occupant weight will also be a factor .

 

Maybe it’s safe enough to upsize a fuse for a short test. The fuse is sized to protect the wire, not the appliance. Personally I wouldn’t try upsizing the fuse. It’s blowing because there’s a problem.

 

I had issues with both seats. Drivers would short and blow fuse when I was sitting in it. It would work normal without me in it. I could only move it up or back a touch and it would freeze. Recline up/down would blow a fuse as it struggled. I found that the wire runs from the motor up into the seat back was chaffed. I had bare wire touching metal and popping the fuse. Patched it up, cleaned the tracks and good as new. Passenger seat needed the tracks cleaned and had the same type of bare wire spot. It acting different in that it just blew the fuse whether I was sitting in it or not.

 

I finally solved this one.

I had the seats out to service the SRS pretentioners and so I overhauled the seat mechanisms while I was in there. Gunk and crud were the problem. I cleaned the tracks and gears and stuff and now they move like a dream.

 

This is on my winter todo list. They feel kinda crunchy at the moment and I think cleaning them up will help a lot.

 

Thanks for letting us know the solution

 

I should have done the cleaning while I had the front seats out when I did the dash. My drivers lumbar pump is blowing the fuse and I’m trying to decide what to do. A disadvantage of being a goon is that I actually kinda need the lumbar support for otherwise very comfy seats.

In the requisite research in the Rave, I’ve come up with there being a thermal shut off switch, but I don’t think that will blow the fuse, so I think I’m to the pump has tanked or the like. Most likely I won’t get to it until I get the seat recovered unless someone has other ideas?

I was thinking of doing the redneck fix short term and a larger fuse just to see if I could get it to engage. The fuse is only 3A, so it seems a very light load.

 

There is a lot of the mechanicals of the seat that can't be accessed unless the upholstery has been removed, so there's that then. Be careful with the fuse, if you burn up a wire, it'll be up in the foam and stuff of the seat back.

 

So I just went out and put a 30A one in, and it didn’t work at first. Wiggled around and then got it to go- only did it for a few seconds as you are correct, I didn’t want to burn the wire up.

I then put a 5A fuse in and ran it for a good bit and it held. You think going from the 3A to 5A is acceptable? I didn’t have any 3A fuses, so just used the smallest I had.