I finally got my mechanic to look at my power seat troubles ('88 300TE). He agrees that the problem is only with the motor that raises the aft end of the seat. _Sometimes_, one of the gear mechanisms (the one on the right, towards the center of the car) doesn't move as fast (or just gets stuck), getting the seat all crooked and the motor unhappy.
He suspects that the cable (which he says is like the cable for the odomoter, w/ a square-section rotating inside) could be failing. He complained that these things can be expensive to fix, because the whole seat needs to be taken apart, etc. (wanting to save me money is a good quality in a tech, in my book).
I suggested that maybe I could do it myself, and he said sure, that he could help w/ the part ordering.
My question for this crowd is this -- given that the problem occurs only sometimes, is it likely that with the seat out I would have a hard time reproducing the problem and pinning down the source of the failure? Has anyone experience with these sort of cable failures (if indeed that is the problem?)? Also, what are these cables called?.
Thanks in advance.
-- David
'88 300TE (2 weeks new to me)