BMW X5 seat install- seat wiring questions

[Richfj60]

Hi all,
I'm in the middle of an install of 2007 E70 Basic seats (no heat) in my 62. I wouldn't advise going this route, although the seats are really comfy. You have to do some fab to get them to fit and probably better options out there. More pictures to follow.

I need some electrical direction.

First, I have found the wires for the motors and the switches and hot wired to the factory plug on the seat side on the bench. Bench tested the seats, worked fine. The time-out feature is annoying, but I can live with it. However, when I put seats back in the truck and connect the chassis side plug that is wired the same as was on the bench test, seats don't work. We have confirmed that there is power on both sides of the plug. Same on both front seats. Any reason for this? How could the plug impact the power supply? I am tempted to cut the plugs off and just wire the four wires.

Some other general questions-

• is there a way to bypass the time out?
• Why is there a time out on the passenger side?
• I read that the switches should be wired to ignition and the motors stay powered, is this correct? Seems to me that thew switches should stay powered for the memory??

Appreciate any input you may have.

 

[86aggie]

I used the body side plug and did not have an issue with either seat not having power. The time out is a function of not having the BMW on-board computer - I'm drawing a blank as to what it is called. If you have read the other posts about BMW seats, most of us have wired an inline switch mounted to the seat base, which we power on when we want to adjust and power off the rest of the time. There should not be a time out on passenger side, mine did not have that issue. Without the BMW computer(and its not just a matter of pulling one and powering it up, the name 'can-bus' may be what it is called) you won't have memory. My seats are powered via a fused link that goes straight to battery.

This site gave me full on wiring diagrams, as well as button/control function instructions. However, as you will see, BMW shut them down. The page has a link to BMWs paywall site.

newTIS

I also went by my local BMW dealer and talked to the service manager. He handed me to a tech who pulled the wiring diagrams on his workstation and printed them for me as well.

Both the dealer and the TIS site used the VIN of the donor vehicle, as BMW is known to change wiring in the middle of model years.

 

[Richfj60]

I used the body side plug and did not have an issue with either seat not having power. The time out is a function of not having the BMW on-board computer - I'm drawing a blank as to what it is called. If you have read the other posts about BMW seats, most of us have wired an inline switch mounted to the seat base, which we power on when we want to adjust and power off the rest of the time. There should not be a time out on passenger side, mine did not have that issue. Without the BMW computer(and its not just a matter of pulling one and powering it up, the name 'can-bus' may be what it is called) you won't have memory. My seats are powered via a fused link that goes straight to battery.

This site gave me full on wiring diagrams, as well as button/control function instructions. However, as you will see, BMW shut them down. The page has a link to BMWs paywall site.

newTIS

I also went by my local BMW dealer and talked to the service manager. He handed me to a tech who pulled the wiring diagrams on his workstation and printed them for me as well.

Both the dealer and the TIS site used the VIN of the donor vehicle, as BMW is known to change wiring in the middle of model years.

Thanks! Didn’t realize that the timeout was due to not having the computer, thought it was a “function”. Looks like I’ll be installing the switch. Really happy with the install, but the electrical has been the challenge