My Daughter took her Mustang 120 miles away. Part Two.
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| It still ain't any closer! |
The saga of the errant power seat.
Premiere level Triple A delivered on the 200 mile tow. They did give my Daughter a bit of grief about not getting it fixed locally, and told her that they would not cover the move from our house to the shop. That irritated me but I figured that we could deal with that later. Either way, it made it down to my driveway soon enough.
I booked an appointment with the transmission shop for the next week. They are a busy shop which is a good sign!
While the car was here I decided to look into the power seat problem. The seat wouldn't move back and forth, it would cock to one side and get stuck. I did a deep dive into the Internet to learn all that I could on the subject. What I learned only reinforced what I had learned a year or so back. The seat motor assemblies are very prone to breakage, and they are very expensive, 900.00 sourced from Ford. Used items usually run from 130-300 dollars. And of course Ford does not make any service parts available. After watching several videos I learned that the seat tracks are not a separate bolt on part to the seat, they are now an integral part of the lower seat frame!
This was an unwelcome surprise, it meant that a manual seat track could not just be easily installed in place of the original, the replacement unit had to be detached from the seat back and existing frame. That called for removing the seat back and side trim as well as disassembling the upholstery cover and foam bun. (It turned out that this was not exactly true, as I would later discover.)
When I bought my '96 Mustang the electric seat was stuck almost all the way forward, causing my knees to almost touch the dash. The seat motor would not move the seat back, but I was able to squeeze in and test drive the car. I figured that it would be an easy fix, so I bought the car anyway.
I soon discovered that the motor assembly was a 400 dollar part and went and pulled the manual track out of a car at the wrecking yard for 15.00. I was no longer able to tilt, or raise the seat height, but I found that I could find a comfortable setting anyway. So no problems there. The track bolted to the bottom of the seat which was easy to accomplish.
Since my old Mustang has cruise control and a tilt wheel, I find that it is easy to shift positions on a long drive. I don't usually change the seat position on trips, except in my truck, which doesn't have cruise control. On long trips I'll move the seat back and forth to different positions to vary the angle of my legs and ankle.
On one video the guy found that seat movement was blocked by a c cell battery that had fallen between the seat and console and obstructed the movement. Of course I was not so lucky. I found that the seat did move when I unbolted it from the floor initially. I removed the seat and cleaned and lubed the tracks. Upon re- installation it seemed to work, then it cocked sideways and stopped. I unbolted the seat and tilted it to the side so that I could watch it work.
The outside spiral drive of the track would not move, but the inside drive did, that's what would cock the seat. If I manipulated the spiral drive it would work intermittently. The angle drive gears in the 90 degree drive were damaged. At least the plastic gear was broken and probably missing some teeth. There is a "traveler" that moves back and forth on the spiral drive, this is attached to the movable part of the seat track which then moves the seat back and forth.
The use of a nylon gear eliminated any noise, or the need for lubrication of the 90 degree power turn. But it also eliminated a trouble free life for the unit! There were many respondents on the forums that had the unit fail while the car was relatively new and still under warranty. There were also guys that had to fork over the money for a new or used assembly. Of course there is no guarantee how long any of them will last.
I guess Ford engineered the part to last just long enough through the warranty period, and they figured the demographic of their customers was young and slender and not too heavy!
It isn't so much that the unit will eventually fail, what frosts me is that it is not serviceable, just fork over the dough and buy a new unit! And it is quite expensive and complicated to replace. Now I know why I've seen some late model Mustangs with racing type seats, you can buy a new pair of seats and mounts for what replacing just that motor assembly would cost.
My preference would be to replace it with the manual unit. There was some doubt on the forum that a manual unit was ever used, they are quite rare. I'd never seen one.
I went off to the local wrecking yard, Pick and Pull. There used to be two locations in San Jose, now there is just one. I was going to see if I could find any car with a usable seat track, manual or powered. When I made my way to the Ford section I found a single S197 Mustang, an '06 V6 five speed coupe. It still had the seats in it, so I hoped for the best. What I found was a unicorn! A manual driver's seat car. This also had a manual height adjuster. I checked the function and it worked fine.
I decided to just take the entire seat. It wasn't that bad, not too dirty, just a bit worn with a gouged area near the drivers side seat hinge. I'd checked the price of just the power seat track and it was 35.00. I figured that the seat would be a lot more, maybe over a hundred bucks, sometimes they'll charge you for every little single part! " Oh, that still has the head rest, 10 bucks, the seat belt latch, 15.00, the side trim 10.00, the seat adjuster lever 5.00, etc, etc. but I had a new plan in mind.
I was pleasantly surprised when they asked if the seat was power or manual. When I answered manual the girl said, okay 49.99! What??? She didn't even ask if I wanted the warranty (?) or charge me a core charge!
I quickly paid up and scooted out of there, ( start the truck!!) maybe the manager would show up and tell her to tack on those additions. A couple of years back I bought a radiator and some coils and other stuff for my XJ6 at the location in Newark. I had left the wiring connectors on the coils like they were tomatoes on the vine. The cashier asked if I wanted the connectors, I told here I'd take them if they were only a couple of bucks. She said that they were 5.00 apiece, and extra 30.00 please. Obviously I quickly disconnected them!
My plans for this seat are two fold. First, I'd like to just bolt the complete unit in my daughter's car. Yes it's kind of ugly and doesn't match the rest of the interior. But I'd rather not tear this and the original seat apart, ...yet. I'd rather swap them out and keep the original seat at home with me, while I search for another power unit. Then I can repair the seat. It only takes four bolts to remove and switch them. That's something that I can easily do in her parking lot. I can easily carry the seat in my truck or the Flex.
Second, I can keep the seat, at least the manual mechanism, as a spare for my next Mustang. I have been seriously considering getting a '13 or '14 Mustang GT. I was really bummed out by the power seat problems and the thought that I wouldn't be able to replace it with a manual unit, but now I can. For some reason that thought really killed my enthusiasm for a newer car, since I was intending to make my newer Mustang another long time ownership vehicle. This thought hadn't bothered me much about my XJ6 or the Flex. I'm not planning on keeping the Flex for a real long time, and I never really thought too much about the Jag, as there never was a manual seat available on this model.
I don't think that my daughter will be too crazy about the junkyard seat, but I'd rather have the original seat with me where I can work on it, If not, who knows when I'll have the car in my driveway again?
Today is the day that I'm to take the car to the transmission shop. I called Triple A to arrange for the tow. I didn't volunteer any additional information and they didn't bring up the previous long distance tow. That tow would have cost me at least 500.00, possibly even more. I probably would have rented a car carrier trailer and used the truck to bring it home on my own.
More to come on this story. I've been working on my '96 Mustang during this period also. Kind of like walking and chewing gum. The more cars that you've got the work there is to do.
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