Driver's Power Seat Won't Move Forward and Backward

[TBirdIV]

Howdy all,

I've got a 2003 Eddie Bauer Expedition. It's got a powered driver's seat. That seat will move up and down but not forward and backward. It makes a tap or thunk noise when you operate the switch to make it go forward or backward. Anyone know a fix?

What I've tried:
1. Cleaning out under the seat. There was a lot of junk that might've stopped it from working at the beginning
2. Checked the runners and I couldn't seem to find anything stuck in them.
3. Vacuumed out under the seat.

I searched the forums and couldn't find any posts that addressed this specifically. Searched online and found that the fact it makes a tap or thunk noise means the electronics are fine but it is just stuck or thinks it is.

Anyone know a fix? If I've cleared out something that might've stopped it moving before, do I need to reset anything to get it to function again?

Thanks very much!

 

[whtbronco]

Mine did this as well. The motor is in the front of the seat and it has flex cables that go to each track. They will bend/flex and pull out pretty easy, it's slightly tougher to put them back in. Anyway, I pulled the cables and verified the motor worked. I found the gear where the flex cable seated in each track were stuck. I tried lots of ways to free them up and finally used the long flex cable and my cordless drill to keep turning the cables back and forth and after a handful of attempts in both directions they would free up. I held my hand around the cable to kind of guide it so it didn't get messed up. I greased everything with white lithium grease. I'm not sure I'd recommend this method, but it was effective and I had gotten to that point where it was I'm either gonna fix it or break it .

The drill was really just used to bump the gears back and forth with the cable. I just couldn't get any grip on it with my hand and even vise-grips just didn't allow me to turn it the way I wanted to.

 

[kellyr1]

I had the same problem as TBirdIV. I stuffed a rag under the seat and it is a cramped area. I could not move the electric seat forward or rearward. I unbolted the seat and leaned it backward to expose the motor works toward the drivers wheel. I could see the right flex shaft where it belonged, but the left shaft was laying on the floor. The seat motor flex shaft wound the rag and was pulled out of its sockets. I reiinstalled the flex shaft and watched the seat operation in all directions to undersand how it works. I removed some rag fibers and saw the flex shaft's thin plastic sheath was disintegrating and that is how the towel fiber got snagged. I cut a spare vacuum line to make a new sheath to protect the flex cable and added some lithium grease. I tested the whole set of motors and all looked well. I reattached the seat bolts and my seat works as it should.