[[email protected]]

So I ordered a Corbin seat for my 2008 Goldwing with comfort package, and after almost 6 weeks it finally came in. I love the seat but the heat is non existent. It doesn’t even try to get warm. I have the Electrical Connection heated seat amplifier which is essentially a 4.7k resister for the front and a 10k resistor for the rear. Still no heat at all, front or rear. My heated grips still work fine even with the seats turned all the way up level 5. So I’m not sure what’s going on.

I’m trying to check the resistance in the thermistors at the seat connector but I’m getting nothing. Checking the heater element I get continuity and a small amount of ohms which is normal. But when I check the thermistors I get nothing, all 4. I must be checking them wrong because I have an Ultimate seat I’m taking off and my factory seat and they check the same. Hopefully someone can explain to me exactly how to check the ohms on the thermistors.

My Ultimate seat heat works so it has to be something with the Corbin seat. I’m also curious how the thermistors in the Ultimate read because it would get hot on level 1. Level 2 would get crazy hot and sometimes shut the whole system down until restating.

 

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[bndiii]

Under warranty?

 

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This is what I’m using to check them.

 

[[email protected]]

Under warranty?

Yes but would that would take forever. And they would likely say it checks out fine. They told me they check them before they go out. I’ve read where some people seem to have problems with them. I probably should have just went with the heat that uses their switch on the side.

They did offer to have me ship it back and they would look at it. They made a note that I’m having a problem and said I have a year warranty. So that’s an option if I can’t figure it out.

 

[[email protected]]

Never mind, we figured it out. It helps when I use my volt meter correctly. The front and rear thermistors in my factory seat measured 90k ohms at about 50 degrees or so. I’ll check my ultimate seat and the new Corbin tonight when I get home.

 

[gumbyredd]

delete.

 

[[email protected]]

Ok so I got home and checked all 3 seats. They were all 55 degrees sitting for hours in my garage. Here are the numbers:

Factory seat
Front thermistors: both 74K
Rear thermistors: both 78K

Ultimate seat
Front thermistors: both 95K
Rear thermistors: both 96K

Corbin seat
Front thermistors: both 17K
Rear thermistors: both 17K

So the Corbin seat is WAYYY out of spec. The specs from the manual show:
10°C—90 - 101 k
15°C—72 - 80 k
My bike must think the seat is over 100 degrees and sending no heat to the elements.
My thinking is that I need to add 70K resistors to the common ground to get the resistance in line with specs. I have a EC heated seat amplifier that I could cut and play around with resistors. Maybe start low and work my way up so I don’t hurt anything.
And yes my seat is under warranty but if I could fix it easily like this I would prefer not to ship it back and have them remove the leather and all that. What do you guys think?
I’ll probably make another thread about it just for info for others with Corbin’s that don’t heat properly.

 

[crossi92]

Just went through this with my Diamond Custom seat, days of testing, going back and forth with them, and it went nowhere. Their seat was testing around the same as what you're seeing, way out of spec and didn't want to waste time and money shipping it back. I now know the heating system like the back of my hand though... I gave up on it and bought a Warm & Safe dual grip/seat heat-troller and wired it directly to the heating elements for the front and rear. Bonus, it gets way hotter than the stock setup ever did and doesn't care what the ambient temp is.

 

[rooster shooter]

Just went through this with my Diamond Custom seat, days of testing, going back and forth with them, and it went nowhere. Their seat was testing around the same as what you're seeing, way out of spec and didn't want to waste time and money shipping it back. I now know the heating system like the back of my hand though... I gave up on it and bought a Warm & Safe dual grip/seat heat-troller and wired it directly to the heating elements for the front and rear. Bonus, it gets way hotter than the stock setup ever did and doesn't care what the ambient temp is.

So, what about your heated grips? Do they still work?

 

[crossi92]

So, what about your heated grips? Do they still work?

Yes, I added the heated seat dummy load from Electrical Connection so I could retain the stock control of the grip heaters.

 

[rooster shooter]

Yes, I added the heated seat dummy load from Electrical Connection so I could retain the stock control of the grip heaters.

Never thought of that. My seat works but often it’ll quit working and I have to cycle the ignition switch to reset. That seems to work for a while but your solution is a good idea.

 

[[email protected]]

Just went through this with my Diamond Custom seat, days of testing, going back and forth with them, and it went nowhere. Their seat was testing around the same as what you're seeing, way out of spec and didn't want to waste time and money shipping it back. I now know the heating system like the back of my hand though... I gave up on it and bought a Warm & Safe dual grip/seat heat-troller and wired it directly to the heating elements for the front and rear. Bonus, it gets way hotter than the stock setup ever did and doesn't care what the ambient temp is.

That’s definitely the way I will go if I can’t get this to work reliably. Especially if the seats don’t heat enough without shutting the system down. My factory seats never got very hot at all even with the “amplifier” plugged in. The Ultimate seat get very warm even on 1, 2 or above will shut the whole system down.

 

[crossi92]

That’s definitely the way I will go if I can’t get this to work reliably. Especially if the seats don’t heat enough without shutting the system down. My factory seats never got very hot at all even with the “amplifier” plugged in. The Ultimate seat get very warm even on 1, 2 or above will shut the whole system down.

The first thing I did with my Diamond seat was to verify that the heating elements actually work. Connect the heating element leads directly to 12v for a couple minutes to make sure that the seat will heat up. When doing this, I found that the heating elements on mine were backwards, the front seat leads were heating up the passenger section and vice versa. Didn't trust the thermistor wiring after that and went the heat-troller route. There should be no need for the amplifier if you go that route, anything above halfway gets too hot for me, but it never shuts down. Just make sure you get the heated seat dummy load so your factory grip heaters and control will still work.

I spent weeks tearing apart the bike and going through every single test in the service manual just to make sure I wasn't missing anything else. I really didn't want to have extra knobs on the bike, and have the factory heat controls not do anything, but I wish I had gone this route a lot sooner.

 

[[email protected]]

The first thing I did with my Diamond seat was to verify that the heating elements actually work. Connect the heating element leads directly to 12v for a couple minutes to make sure that the seat will heat up. When doing this, I found that the heating elements on mine were backwards, the front seat leads were heating up the passenger section and vice versa. Didn't trust the thermistor wiring after that and went the heat-troller route. There should be no need for the amplifier if you go that route, anything above halfway gets too hot for me, but it never shuts down. Just make sure you get the heated seat dummy load so your factory grip heaters and control will still work.

I spent weeks tearing apart the bike and going through every single test in the service manual just to make sure I wasn't missing anything else. I really didn't want to have extra knobs on the bike, and have the factory heat controls not do anything, but I wish I had gone this route a lot sooner.

I don’t know why it’s so hard for these companies to get these seats right after all these years of making them. One thing I noticed on the Corbin is that the thermistors don’t have much range to them. From 55 to 45 degrees they only moved from 17k ohms to 20k ohms. Where the Ultimate went from 95k ohms to 113k ohms. So if I add resistors to make them right at one temperature they won’t be in spec at another temp.
I added 82k ohm resistors to the Corbin that took it from 20 ohms to 102ohms and it did heat up (not hot like the Ultimate but I could feel them) but they would shut down the whole system after about 10 minutes. So tonight I may try some different resistors. Maybe a 100k to make it 120k. My thinking is if the resistance it too low the computer probably thinks the seat is really hot and shuts it down. Idk. Trial and error. I’m afraid it will never work like I want and I will just go the warm n safe route.

 

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Here’s some more ohm reading just for info’s sake. At 55 degrees, 46degrees, and 39 degrees.

 

[rooster shooter]

What do these numbers mean actually?

 

[[email protected]]

What do these numbers mean actually?

It’s how many ohms I get when I check the thermistors built into the seats. They change based on temperature.

 

[rooster shooter]

So the less resistance means more heat?

 

[pwhoever]

So the less resistance means more heat?

I think it's actually the opposite. The colder the ambient temperature gets, the higher the resistance with the thermistors so more heat ends up being produced.