A friend is having the standard problem with the power seat switches on his 89 Rangie classic going south.

So... Are there any US rangies with manual seats that would bolt in?

If not, does anyone have a good source of cheap new or used switches and/or control boxes? He tried cleaning all the contacts, but the seats are still intermittant and now one of the boxes is missing some internals due to "helpful" offspring.

Thanks,
John

try some WD-40 . . . no kidding. fixed all of my issues with my passenger seat. after that, there is a mercedes switch that's interchangeable with the rover unit, but i'd have to download the RRO archive to dig up the p/n's (hint hint). JPurnell has a little writeup (http://www.jpurnell.com/RR/repairs/seat_switches.htm) on cleaning them, which would also likely rectify the problems.

Yeah, I'm going to take a look at the truck today, double check the relays and fuses, and see about cleaning the contacts. Unfortunately, the missing parts won't reappear with liberal application of WD40. :flipoff2:

I saw the writeups on the mercedes switches. That may be a good way to get new ones.

-john

campy headset bearings fit perfectly, and the springs are pretty easy to source. A GIANT pain in the ass though to take apart and put together.

lost some of those bearings yourself, huh? :flipoff2: Originally posted by redrangie
campy headset bearings fit perfectly, and the springs are pretty easy to source. A GIANT pain in the ass though to take apart and put together.

I'll finally get to look at it this evening. Maybe a solution will present itself.

Did any of these things come from the factory to the US with manual seats?

thanks for the help,
-John

hunter's may have come with manual seats. not sure about great divide, but i would doubt it.

purnell talked about where he got the bearings. i would think there are a half dozen places around town to match them up.

>>Unfortunately, the missing parts won't reappear with liberal application of WD40.


Got me on that one :D

This one is a Great Divide edition, so I'm pretty sure they come with power seats. Dunno about the Hunter editions. I haven't seen one in a few years. Anyone out there have one?

-John

Hunter's Do come with Manual Seats. I remember a while back I was considering swapping my power seats for the manual's thinking I might gain headroom. Talked with a guy who owned a Hunter and he took some measurements off of his manual seats. Turns out I wouldn't have, thus I didn't.

Originally posted by lwg
Hunter's Do come with Manual Seats.

Cool! Do you know if they have the wiring already in them so we might trade the power seats to someone who wants to swap power for manual? When you were considering this swap, did you come up with anyone who had a pair of seats?

Thanks,
John

If you have a pull your own junk yard around that would be the place to try for controls it is supposed to be late 70's mercedes? Doing it that away you would be able to check yourself before you paid for it as well as getting them for 5- 15 $ lot of money saved as well as being easier than swapping seats..



Good Luck

yup.. I'm going to look into the Mercedes junkyard too. I'm thinking the cheaper the better, but it would be nice to go manual seats. That's the permanent fix.

-John

Originally posted by Rover Addiction
but it would be nice to go manual seats. That's the permanent fix.

-John

I agree with this statement. The more power junk I can get out of my Rangie the better. Unfortunately I never really did much more investigation about the swap. I would imagine that the power is there as it would be smarter to make all production vehicles nearly the same, but then again this is LR we're talking about.:confused:

The seats in the Range Rover Classic and the Disco are very similar looking. my power cloth seats in my RRC are identical as far as i can tell to the leatehr power seats in my Disco that was 8 years newer.

having said that,

There are plenty of manual Disco seats around, even in leather in some cases. perhaps you can try locating those and do some slight modifications to fit the.


-rob

The more power junk I can get out of my Rangie the better.

i have to disagree on this point - I see so many people try and convert rangies into something that they're not, and they aren't happy with the result. sound familiar? :flipoff2: why not just buy an old bronc, scout, or series LR and be done with it???

if it weren't for the amenities in the rangie i would have just kept my old diesel traveler. the rangie was a middle ground between something the wife would ride in, and that was still decent as a trail worthy rig. same day transitions from the jag to the scout were too much of a shock to the system.

martini anyone? just putting another log on the fire - snow day here in seattle. ;)

cheers,

isaac

We're not trying to make the rangie what it's not. The seats rarely get moved anyway, so power is not mandatory.

roversnorth has a passenger side in the les' loft category.
I have a Hunter, and the plinth that the seat itself attaches to is different than my '89 non-hunter.
That being said, shouldn't be too terribly hard to attach some sort of seat track for another seat that is easier to find. http://catalog.roversnorth.com/catalog/large.taf?id=lesloftrangerover#

We're not trying to make the rangie what it's not. The seats rarely get moved anyway, so power is not mandatory.

. . . that's fair :flipoff2: what was that drivel i was spewing anyway . .. the rangie is your canvas - paint away :D

If I remember right, you need the opposite seat switch in the mercedes that you are trying to replace. If you need a pass. seat switch order a drivers switch for a mercedes. The mercedes switches are mounted on the doors, that's why they're backwards.

When you see it, Can you get pics of the switches / relays / layout you do have? I've just scrapped a '91 rangie which had power seats. Some bits missing (the memory positions stuff), and it was outside with a broken windscreeen for a while but you may be lucky....

Merv.

I have a 91 Hunter and the manual cloth seats are one of it's best features. There are even some small spacers that are about 5/8" tall that mount between the lower seat rail and the floorboard that could be removed to drop the seat by that much - of course that's uneccesary in a Hunter because most of them don't have sunroofs either (it was a $1500 option).

Some guys from LR of North America told me years ago that the 91 Hunters are the best Range Rover to have for off roading - no power seats, cloth interior, no sunroof, no front spoiler, no swaybars, no ABS but all of the advantages of the later electrical system and vented front brake rotors - they only built 405 so they are hard to find but they are great Rovers!

So I take it you don't want to trade seats. :flipoff2:

Originally posted by JackW
I have a 91 Hunter and the manual cloth seats are one of it's best features. There are even some small spacers that are about 5/8" tall that mount between the lower seat rail and the floorboard that could be removed to drop the seat by that much - of course that's uneccesary in a Hunter because most of them don't have sunroofs either (it was a $1500 option).

Some guys from LR of North America told me years ago that the 91 Hunters are the best Range Rover to have for off roading - no power seats, cloth interior, no sunroof, no front spoiler, no swaybars, no ABS but all of the advantages of the later electrical system and vented front brake rotors - they only built 405 so they are hard to find but they are great Rovers!

Originally posted by JackW
of course that's uneccesary in a Hunter because most of them don't have sunroofs either (it was a $1500 option).



Damn, I need a Hunter Roof for my truck to get rid of the Sunny.

It took a lot of looking to find my Hunter - I've owned it for eight years and over 110,000 miles (and it had 80,000 on it when I bought it). Now with just under 200K on it I see no reason to sell it before I reach the 500,000 mile mark. It's been remarkably reliable with only a couple of water pumps and a new radiator being the major exceptions to regular maintenance items.

My previous Range Rover was a grey market 85 Vouge that had the nasty habit of clogging up it's sunroof drain tubes and then dumping cold water on either the driver or passenger when the tray filled up. I decided I wanted no more Range Rovers with sunroofs.

I have a couple of seat switches from a mercedes 300td I'll sell you if you
are interested. The drivers seat switch works the passenger seat in the
rover, it also has a 1 and a 2 button that you might have to take out, and
an extra little switch knob that could be cut off. The passenger side
mercedes switch is a direct repalcement for the driver side( rrover).

Working on getting rover replacements at the moment (Friend's wife's truck, so it's gotta be pretty), but I'll let you know if I need them. We may end up getting the Mercedes ones and swapping guts. Also, it turns out the friggin flex shaft from one of the recline motors on the pass. side broke, so we're debating right now.

Personally, I'm voting for locking it in a good position and leaving it. Not an option on the driver's side though. :(

Thanks!
-John

Originally posted by ottoyota
I have a couple of seat switches from a mercedes 300td I'll sell you if you
are interested.