I'm going to try describing this with words for now, because it's very tight in there, and it would be hard to photograph. But I'll post photos later if necessary.
I've had a 2001 LX470 for many years, and one of the 3rd row seats won't release from the floor to fold back up. There's a cable mechanism with little balls on the ends with a cable sheath (similar to a bike shifter cable), and it always felt like the lever just wasn't pulling on the cable quite hard enough on that side.
I avoid putting the seat down on that side... but every once in a while, I need to. I'm able to release the seat from the floor by jimmying the latch with a screwdriver, but it's a real pain, and requires many tries of the screwdriver slipping off the latch beak before it releases.
Today, in frustration, I tried taking the plastic panel off the seat leg cover (these are the legs that fold down automatically when the seat is lowered, called the "Seat Inner Leg" in the repair manual), and I was able to see where the cable connects. And wow! There's an adjustment nut there to control cable tension, just like on a bike shifter. So I adjusted it to max tension... but even then, pulling the lever didn't release the latch. Pulling the lever all the way barely moved the cable end, actually.
Comparing it to the side that does work, I found that the arm that pulls on the cable moves way more on the good seat than the bad seat.
Getting in there with a snake camera allowed me to see that the little metal linkage arm on the bad seat was *slipping* through its connection to the arm that pulls on the cable. Thus, pulling the lever wasn't moving the arm that pulls the cable much at all.
There's a little blue plastic bushing on the linkage arm that is kinda smashed, and it's allowing the linkage arm to slip through the hole where it links to the cable-pulling arm.
On the good seat, the blue plastic bushing is in good shape, which allows the linkage arm to seat in the cable-pulling arm snugly.
Interesting, the good side is on the left, and the bad side is on the right.... and the plastic for these bushings are slightly different shades of blue. The left side, they are very dark blue, and on the right side, they are lighter blue. I'm guessing they face different ways on the left/right side, so they are colored differently to avoid confusion during assembly.
Also, there are TWO of these little plastic bushings on each linkage arm, one on each end. The linkage arm is maybe 10- or 8-gage wire, and it's bent into an L shape on each end. These L-shaped tips go into these plastic bushings, allowing the tip of the linkage arm to "snap" into the holes on both the release handle and the cable-pulling arm.
I'm pretty sure the exploded view of all this is on page BO-149 of Volume 2 of my 2001 LX470 Repair Manual. "Rear No.2 Seat". But there's not enough detail to see these parts.
I've included some pictures of the bushing below. Maybe bushing is the wrong word for it. It actually clips onto the L-shaped end of the linkage arm.
Also, maybe the linkage arm is #10 in the parts diagram below?
Anyone know where I could get some of these bushings?
I've had a 2001 LX470 for many years, and one of the 3rd row seats won't release from the floor to fold back up. There's a cable mechanism with little balls on the ends with a cable sheath (similar to a bike shifter cable), and it always felt like the lever just wasn't pulling on the cable quite hard enough on that side.
I avoid putting the seat down on that side... but every once in a while, I need to. I'm able to release the seat from the floor by jimmying the latch with a screwdriver, but it's a real pain, and requires many tries of the screwdriver slipping off the latch beak before it releases.
Today, in frustration, I tried taking the plastic panel off the seat leg cover (these are the legs that fold down automatically when the seat is lowered, called the "Seat Inner Leg" in the repair manual), and I was able to see where the cable connects. And wow! There's an adjustment nut there to control cable tension, just like on a bike shifter. So I adjusted it to max tension... but even then, pulling the lever didn't release the latch. Pulling the lever all the way barely moved the cable end, actually.
Comparing it to the side that does work, I found that the arm that pulls on the cable moves way more on the good seat than the bad seat.
Getting in there with a snake camera allowed me to see that the little metal linkage arm on the bad seat was *slipping* through its connection to the arm that pulls on the cable. Thus, pulling the lever wasn't moving the arm that pulls the cable much at all.
There's a little blue plastic bushing on the linkage arm that is kinda smashed, and it's allowing the linkage arm to slip through the hole where it links to the cable-pulling arm.
On the good seat, the blue plastic bushing is in good shape, which allows the linkage arm to seat in the cable-pulling arm snugly.
Interesting, the good side is on the left, and the bad side is on the right.... and the plastic for these bushings are slightly different shades of blue. The left side, they are very dark blue, and on the right side, they are lighter blue. I'm guessing they face different ways on the left/right side, so they are colored differently to avoid confusion during assembly.
Also, there are TWO of these little plastic bushings on each linkage arm, one on each end. The linkage arm is maybe 10- or 8-gage wire, and it's bent into an L shape on each end. These L-shaped tips go into these plastic bushings, allowing the tip of the linkage arm to "snap" into the holes on both the release handle and the cable-pulling arm.
I'm pretty sure the exploded view of all this is on page BO-149 of Volume 2 of my 2001 LX470 Repair Manual. "Rear No.2 Seat". But there's not enough detail to see these parts.
I've included some pictures of the bushing below. Maybe bushing is the wrong word for it. It actually clips onto the L-shaped end of the linkage arm.
Also, maybe the linkage arm is #10 in the parts diagram below?
Anyone know where I could get some of these bushings?
Last edited:
