99-01 power seats in a 97-98

[shonuff]

Despite my wife's frustration, I have purchased power/heated driver and passenger seats from a 99-01 xj for my 98. The set came with the heat switches and wiring harness.

Does anyone have experience with what I am up against in getting power to both of these? I understand my 98 should have power for the driver's seat, not sure if its a direct plug in.

I don't think there's anything for my passenger seat.

Any help for this frequent reader, seldom poster would be appreciated.

Josh

 

[RaccoonJoe]

I just pulled the power seat switches out of a 01 to put into my 89 XJ Limited. I had no problems at all with getting everything to hook up.

If I were you, I would wire 2 in-line fuses to the back of the fusebox. One for the power seats, one for the heated seats. Then, just run power from those in-line fuses, under the center console, and into your seat wiring. It's just that fun!!

 

[shonuff]

Good to know.

I was thinking an in-line fuse would be a good idea, and I'm guessing these are going to end up being hooked up just like they were aftermarket. It would be nice to keep the plug in connectors, but I'll most likely be splicing the wires together.

I'm not very savy when it comes to the electric aspects of my jeep. Most everything else I've done on my own.

Anyone else have more input? Just about anything could help.

Josh

 

[JEEPZZ]

Josh, I've done the same conversion your about to.
My heated leather seats came out of a 99 XJ Limited and I installed them in my 97 XJ.
Just a quick run down on the differences:
97 & 98 only came with the option for a power (motorized) drivers seat on the 97 Country and the 98 Limited. All 97 & 98 passenger seats were manual.
99 was the first year of available heated leather seating in the Limited model only. All 99-01 that have the heated leather option also have the passenger power seat. Those 99-01 that have leather but no heat will only have the drivers power seat.

Now for the install; does your 98 have power windows & door locks? If so, the wiring for the 98 drivers side power seat is already there under the carpet just in front of the rear seat, drivers side. Look for the open wiring pigtail in the left rear corner under the carpet.
Now for the heated seats; the 99-01 heated seats are both wired together into one harness so that the one pigtail does both seats. Unfortunately the harness terminates over by the passenger front door sill and the connector is different than the 97-98. The good news is that all you need to do is extend your existing 97-98 wiring from just in front of the rear seat on the drivers side over to the passenger front door sill and splice on a matching connector so you can plug and unplug at will.
All of the relays, circuit breakers and other required stuff is already bolted onto the seat bases right next to the motors; that means everything is plug and play.

The only thing I can't remember is where the power wire for the heaters terminate. (let me know on your harness) I do remember that I ran power for them over to my cig lighter which is switch ignition power.
The heaters only get power when the key is on but the seat motors have power all the time. (that's the same way the factory set them up)


...almost forgot, you'll need to cut a small hole for the heater switch wiring under where your ashtray currently is. All the 99-01 center console are pre-cut for the wires but the 97-98 are not.

Let me know if you have any other questions. :sunshine:

 

[shonuff]

Jeepzz, its great to hear how easy this has the potential to be. I do have a couple questions, and probably just because I don't have a chance to look at everything until it arrives through freight.

Yes my xj does have power windows and locks, so that makes the driver's seat easy.

When you talk about extending the wiring from the driver's side over to the passenger front door sill, are you talking about extending the existing pigtail that is used for the driver's seat? How do I plug it into the driver's seat and entend it over to the heated seats harness?

Also, how did you get power to the passenger seat? Is that in the heated seats harness?

Where did you find a matching connector to splice on?

And lastly, how do you like them? Was it worth it.

Thank you very much for your first response though. My anxiety over making this clean and fully functioning is lowering. When I get things delivered I'll try to answer your question about the harness.

Josh

 

[shonuff]

Holy crap you've put some time into your XJ. Looks really nice and you get some serious work out of it too. How did you lose that wheel?

 

[JEEPZZ]

When you talk about extending the wiring from the driver's side over to the passenger front door sill, are you talking about extending the existing pigtail that is used for the driver's seat? How do I plug it into the driver's seat and entend it over to the heated seats harness?

Also, how did you get power to the passenger seat? Is that in the heated seats harness?

When you get everything delivered a lot more things will makes sense as to what goes where once you lay the wires out inside the Jeep. Here's a pic of when I re-did my interior (of course I did a lot more than just the seats at the time ).

Let me know when it all shows up.
Hopefully you do get EVERYTHING shipped to you. If they leave out the required wiring harness, you're screwed; there's about 20-30 wires running every which-way.

How did you lose that wheel?

That's the $56,000 question.

 

[shonuff]

I'll shoot you a PM after I get things here and take a look at it. Thanks again for your input.

Josh