Interior swap - 2015-2017 into 2009?

[Gregg Eshelman]

How about swapping the upholstery and padding, if needed, onto the old seats? That way you keep the early headrests. Color mismatch? Take a look inside a 97 Taurus LX with tan leather interior. Ford had no qualms about pairing that with a nearly black dash and center console.

For using the newer seats with their fancy pants multi-motion, I suspect someone sufficiently skilled with a bus pirate and arduino coding could put together an interface, or build an independent system, with more position memory than factory.

The bus pirate is used to capture data streams between electronic components for reverse engineering the signals, usually with the intent to design something different to connect, or go between the original components.

An Arduino is a microcontroller on a board with various peripheral chips and interfaces, plus a uniquely designed software environment for the program it runs. For some reason Arduinao programs are called "sketches". This platform typically has several General Purpose I/O pins that can be programmed to do pretty much whatever you want. Input, Output, or both, digital, analog etc. Since Arduino is open source there are tons of clones that cost less than the official models, and many of the clones have feature sets not available on anything the Arduino company makes.

There are a lot of vehicle hacks and mods on the web where people have used these to add stuff that was never available originally.

 

[Adieu]

How about swapping the upholstery and padding, if needed, onto the old seats? That way you keep the early headrests. Color mismatch? Take a look inside a 97 Taurus LX with tan leather interior. Ford had no qualms about pairing that with a nearly black dash and center console.

For using the newer seats with their fancy pants multi-motion, I suspect someone sufficiently skilled with a bus pirate and arduino coding could put together an interface, or build an independent system, with more position memory than factory.

The bus pirate is used to capture data streams between electronic components for reverse engineering the signals, usually with the intent to design something different to connect, or go between the original components.

An Arduino is a microcontroller on a board with various peripheral chips and interfaces, plus a uniquely designed software environment for the program it runs. For some reason Arduinao programs are called "sketches". This platform typically has several General Purpose I/O pins that can be programmed to do pretty much whatever you want. Input, Output, or both, digital, analog etc. Since Arduino is open source there are tons of clones that cost less than the official models, and many of the clones have feature sets not available on anything the Arduino company makes.

There are a lot of vehicle hacks and mods on the web where people have used these to add stuff that was never available originally.

2009 has the uncomfortable whiplash headrests already

And they're interchangeable anyway

Forget about memory, and you can wire motors straight to controls

 

[star-art]

When swapping upholstery, care must be taken to preserve the functions of the OCS system in the passenger seat as this is safety-critical (it controls the passenger airbag). The original system should be left intact and not modified in any way.

As to adding memory/heated/cooled seats in a truck that doesn't already have them, in theory it *could* be done, but it's not very practical because it requires a lot more effort than most might be willing to invest. Thus, no one has done it yet (as far as I know). For example, the climate seat buttons are integrated into the HVAC controls and there is no physical connection between these buttons and the seat module. Control of the seats is therefore via CANBus messages sent over the network. If your truck doesn't have dual-zone climate control, I don't think it's practical to swap that. The HVAC module is highly integrated into the vehicle systems and I have never seen anyone successfully swap dual-zone HVAC into an Expy that did not have it.

IF you can manage to decipher the messages sent by the HVAC module to control the seats, you'd need to build some sort of custom module to send/receive those messages and receive input from a set of custom buttons. You'd also need to control the indicator readouts on those custom buttons.

Even if you manage to do all that, the two seat modules still need other parameters to function. You'd need some sort of custom "gateway" module that could tap into the vehicle network. You'd only want to read messages -- not put data onto the bus. This would help prevent interference that could have a potential safety impact.

You'd need to know what message values to "capture." Then, you could set up a dedicated "sub net" consisting only of the Driver Seat Module and the Climate Controlled Seat Module, both isolated from the rest of the truck via the Gateway. You'd need to retrieve the needed values from the vehicle bus and then pass them onto the sub-net through the Gateway interface. In theory, doing all this *might* allow the seats to function. But, if you're missing even one parameter, they might refuse to turn on or they might even malfunction.

I've spent years trying to figure this out and I finally gave up. I bought a truck that had the seat package already installed so I could concentrate on other more practical upgrades. . .

 

[ManUpOrShutUp]

Re the heated/cooled seats, they're more headache then they're worth imho anyway. You can buy a cheap seat heater kit and with a little effort can install some factory-looking buttons to activate them. They'll last forever and work better than the overly complicated and unreliable TED-based system in the factory heated/cooled seats. Just my 2 cents on that item.

 

[Gregg Eshelman]

My 07 EL has *none* of that fancy stuff to break down. No moon/sun roof either.

 

[Nate Carlson]

Re the heated/cooled seats, they're more headache then they're worth imho anyway. You can buy a cheap seat heater kit and with a little effort can install some factory-looking buttons to activate them. They'll last forever and work better than the overly complicated and unreliable TED-based system in the factory heated/cooled seats. Just my 2 cents on that item.

I've had no issues with it in either my previous 2014 EL XLT or my current 2017 EL XLT; like the cooling feature too.

 

[Parkspremier]

I have katzkin leather in my 15 and am very impressed with how nice it is. Could possibly be cheaper than a complete interior swap etc

 

[Nate Carlson]

So the 2009 EL is now here, properly licensed and insured, and got its first inspection at the mechanic yesterday. Looks pretty good mechanically -- it needs one ball joint badly (no surprise here, probably original), needs the fluids done (again, not a surprise), and tires and brakes aren't too far off in the future. There is a slow seep coming from somewhere, likely a seal on the front differential; today I'm taking it in for the ball joint and to have them clean up the area around the leak to make it easier to identify where it's coming from. The truck's got a fair amount of surface rust, but nothing that'd scare anybody from a state that uses salt in the winters! Nothing structural.

I also already replaced the front resistor for the HVAC, as only speeds 3/4 were working, and replaced the transmission for the rear wiper which was seized up and causing the battery to drain. I was hoping to free up the one that was on there, but I managed to break a chunk off the threaded part while removing it (yaaay corrosion!), and figured I'd rather spend the $45 on a new one than deal with one that can't be properly greased anymore. Haven't found anything else electronic that isn't working.

The interior is absolutely nasty - needs a deep cleaning desperately! Will get on that before too long. Not surprisingly for an auction car, there is tons of trash in it, plus personal papers, and the seats are well stained. Ah well, I'm OK with that for the time being!

It also has the typical older Expedition paint peeling on the front of the hood and on the liftgate.. I read elsewhere that it's at least aluminum, so not a risk for rust.. but I'll probably look into what I can do to at least make it look better at some point. For now, I'm not going to worry about the dents in the bumper covers; at some point I'll yank the covers off, pound the dents out as best as I can, and put 'em back on.

I picked up a cheap-o Joying 7" Android head unit and installed that; need to take out the mounting kit again and do some dremel work around the border, as it's recessed a bit too far right now. Need to clean up my wiring too -- just a big jumble underneath the head unit right now. But it's nice to have bluetooth audio! I also need to dig into where to install the mic and rearview camera - I'm hoping that the wires are present on the harness that goes along the roof to the rear, so I can tap into the on the connector by the dash. I already validated the wires don't go all the way up behind the radio. If not, I'll be tucking wire along the headliner or the floor.

I ordered the 2009-2010 Ford service manual DVD off eBay; works great, I love being able to see the wiring details! It is annoying that it doesn't go into different variations of the wiring harnesses, though -- it looks like the basic part number (for example, "14A005" for the body harness) has a couple different full part numbers depending on features/etc. Very annoying, as I can't easily tell what my car will have without tearing it apart! Ah well.

As far as swapping the seats goes -- I validated that my body harness only has two of the three connectors that are needed for the memory and heated/cooled functions. To swap in heated/cooled seats, it'll require replacing a whole bunch of harnesses and electronics.

If I can find a good wreck cheap (I'm hoping for a Limited or King Ranch where the engine compartment, frame, and exterior are pretty trashed, to limit the number of people interested in it), I might just be willing to do the work to swap over all the body, dash, and headliner harnesses to upgrade the parts of the truck I want to. From what I'm seeing, it should be possible to pick and choose, if I'm willing to swap a few connectors (IE - I'd like to keep the manual liftgate; to do so, I'd probably need to swap a connector on either the new harness or the liftgate to get it to connect properly. Or, maybe, just not plug a single plug in - hard to tell without being able to see the actual harnesses.) Just have to see what sells, and how cheap!

In any case - not sure when or if I'll be tackling any of the fun stuff.. for now, just getting it into good condition for a daily driver!

Appreciate all the advice from everyone, and when I start to have fun with it, I'll be sure to post!

Here's a crummy picture of my two expy's:

 

[Nate Carlson]

I have katzkin leather in my 15 and am very impressed with how nice it is. Could possibly be cheaper than a complete interior swap etc

Are you willing to share how much you paid? Apparently you have to contact an installer for a quote; don't want to sign myself up for all the spam until I'm actually to the point where I might be interested in doing it.

 

[Parkspremier]

Are you willing to share how much you paid? Apparently you have to contact an installer for a quote; don't want to sign myself up for all the spam until I'm actually to the point where I might be interested in doing it.

Fortunately for myself I bought the rig with it already installed, but from what I gather through google or even their website it said the average rig is 2-3k. But I don’t know if an expedition would fall into that or not?! If it did I’m sure it would be the high end of that

 

[Adieu]

Are you willing to share how much you paid? Apparently you have to contact an installer for a quote; don't want to sign myself up for all the spam until I'm actually to the point where I might be interested in doing it.

You can get returned/unclaimed kits on ebay or craigslist for $200-350 for the whole set

Apparently installers dump em there if the wrong color gets ordered or something

Regardless of what it says on the ad, heated and cooled seats aside, afaik there's just TWO year variations and TWO model variations:

1) headrests : 2007-2008 for humane ergonomic short headrests, 2009-2017 for federally mandated forward tilt elongated neck torture headrests... otherwise interchangeable

2) 3rd row fold: power or latch-lever... otherwise interchangeable if you staple patches to the latch holes on the carpet back or something (there's HDF fibreboard underneath) for power, or carefully cut for manual

Otherwise... it might say 2009 swb or 2015 EL, but it's all the same

 

[Nate Carlson]

You can get returned/unclaimed kits on ebay or craigslist for $200-350 for the whole set

Apparently installers dump em there if the wrong color gets ordered or something
<..>
Otherwise... it might say 2009 swb or 2015 EL, but it's all the same

Good to know -- thanks!!

 

[ManUpOrShutUp]

I've had no issues with it in either my previous 2014 EL XLT or my current 2017 EL XLT; like the cooling feature too.

That's surprising. The climate-controlled seats seem to be fairly trouble-prone based on what I've read/heard. They don't quite have the legendary status of the s*itty power running boards though.

On a side note, I actually don't like them anyway. The cooling function feels odd to me and the heating function doesn't work nearly as well as a traditional system.

 

[NIGHTLIFEphantom]

Any updates on this as to if the instrument cluster/speedometer alone is swappable from a 2015 to an 2007?

 

[star-art]

Almost certain this swap is next to impossible for anyone but a Ford engineer. 2015-17's are EcoBoost and that's a totally different setup from the 2007. Also, the Instrument Cluster (IC) is one of the most important modules in the network. It's a "gateway" module that passes info between the different CANBus networks inside the vehicle. It's my understanding that if the IC is missing, the vehicle won't start. So, if you try to tamper with it (by swapping in another one) your truck might end up crippled and unable to function.

 

[JExpedition07]

Almost certain this swap is next to impossible for anyone but a Ford engineer. 2015-17's are EcoBoost and that's a totally different setup from the 2007. Also, the Instrument Cluster (IC) is one of the most important modules in the network. It's a "gateway" module that passes info between the different CANBus networks inside the vehicle. It's my understanding that if the IC is missing, the vehicle won't start. So, if you try to tamper with it (by swapping in another one) your truck might end up crippled and unable to function.

There is a European user with a unicorn on here that has a 2015 Expedition with the 5.4L V8 and it has the 15-17 dash and bodywork. It is setup for the 5.4L redline on the tach so looked to be legit Ford for some cancelled order. We couldn’t figure out if it was legit, a wrecked/ stolen 2014, or a 2015 with the EcoBoost replaced with the 5.4 Triton. Either way it all worked and the pics baffled me, it was a 2015 dash with a 5,200 RPM redline.

 

[762mm]

This sounds like an interesting nightmare, lol... With all the headaches, work and expenses to get it done and working properly, one would probably be better off buying a wrecked 2017 for cheap and getting it fixed with new gen compatible parts...

Reverse engineering modern cars is a rabbit hole very few people would venture into.