Even though I woke somewhat later than planned yesterday, I managed to make it to the BMW dealership before closing to pickup the parts I ordered. Finally my new seat heater elements had come in. About a year ago the seat element went out in my car; I can’t remember the element in the backrest ever working. In typical MacGyver fashion, I thought I’d be able to solder the heater wire back together and fix it for free. My fix worked, but only for a single evening drive with the windows open.

The e36 325i doesn’t seem to be designed around serviceability of seat heater elements. Non-working heated seats are all too common on this car, and I couldn’t bear the defect any longer.

Notice the burnt area.

This time I decided I was ready to fix them for real. It time to remove the seat again, pull off the seat cushion (snapping 4 breakaway pins), separate the leather from the foam by removing a number of demonic little metal rings–to get to the heater element. For the first time I figured out how to get the back of the seat open for this process too. The leather is essentially tucked in around the edge with a plastic spline. The spline is removed by simply pulling from around the edge. It turns out the shell of the seat back is made out of some sort of fiberglass that made it quite light and rigid. Hrm, fiberglass. I always forget to document these projects with more photos.

A helpful how-to detailed some of the steps required, but is focused on retrofit installation of elements rather than replacement.

I arrived home with the parts around 3:30 pm and by 8:00 pm I had reinstalled the repaired seat. Driving home last evening with the windows open I experienced that fleeting summer feeling of a cool breeze and a warm seat. Today was much less eventful; I just changed the oil, flushed the brake fluid, and installed new rear rotors and brake pads. After completing the remainder of service at the dealership I should be back to premium condition. The hours of intricate finger work for that seat repair was most certainly worth it, the new elements seem to keep the seat warmer than ever.