'07 front pass. power seat with very specific motor problem.

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Wile E Coyote

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Howdy all,
My wife's 07 Limited Expi has it's newest issue: The passenger power seat works in all directions except forward/back. Lumbar, up/down, tilt up/down, seat cooling/heating, side airbag are all ok otherwise. Pulled the seat out, removed the rail assy, removed the horizontal motor for testing. The left track was jammed, but only slightly and it went full travel by chucking the drive cable into a cordless drill (quite like testing an old-school speedo).
The switch passed continuity testing, so it all went back together. Turns out, the motor does work going back, just not forward. Back-probed the connector at the motor, and get 12v pushing switch in both directions.

Pulled the dc motor apart and checked the brushes...moderate graphite dusting cleaned off the commutator and contact surfaces of the brushes and reassembled it. Plugged it into the under seat connector...no change.

-12vdc measured in both directions while backprobing the connector should rule out the wiring, the switch, the 'controller' (I did open that controller up and the PCB looked pristine, for what it's worth) and point to the motor right? However, here's the rub: I can apply 12v directly to the motor with jumpers and it works in both directions.

-One leg of the internal motor power leads has what I assume is a capacitor to suppress elec noise, but I wonder if another component that looks like a circular capacitor that connects both leads comes into play when reversing directions, or is it something in the underseat "controller" that I'm missing. I snapped some internal pics if it helps.
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-I have a DMM that can briefly measure up to 10 amps, would load testing shed any light or what? I'm trying to avoid buying a new motor, because it seems that horizontal motor only comes as a whole assembly with the seat rails, and directly testing the controller hasn't pointed to any obvious problem...both too $$ to just blindly replace.

-Would the driver's seat controller (with memory...the pass seat doesn't have memory) be swappable for testing?
 
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