Manually adjust electric seats (up/down direction)?

[JamesBall]

Although the rear electric adjustment of the drivers seat was working perfectly when I picked the car up, I managed to break it on the way home! The right-hand rear piston (as you sit in the seat) only retracts a couple of mm before sticking while the left-hand rear piston retracts all the way, although accompanied with much noise, grinding of gears etc.

There is clearly power to the rear right hand piston as it moves a little. Is there a common fault which causes these to stick? Putting weight on it while lowering the seat doesn't help, by the way?

And is there a way of manually lowering the seat? At the moment my head is jammed against the roof of the car!

(The front pistons have power to them but neither rise nor fall - perhaps the same issue as had befallen the rear right piston?)

 

[Riverside]

There are six bolts that hold in the seat, plus a couple of multiplug adaptors to undo to remove the seat. IIRC the motors are at the front of the seat & work the adjusters via cables & worm gears - I would guess the problem is with the cables & it may just be a matter of reconnecting something obvious & giving it all a drop of 3-in-1 oil.

With the seat removed you should be able to see how to manually lower it but you may then not be able to refit the six bolts to hold it in place so plan ahead.

 

[JamesBall]

I thought I would report back on my seat issue. I managed to remove the seat (6 allen key bolts to remove seat and runners as mentioned above). I manually lowered the seat base by pulling the cables from the motor to the lifting pistons off and using a screwdriver to turn the gear that raises and lowers the seat. With the seat in the lowest position I was still able to refix the seat back in to the car although the bolts at the front of the runners were a bit tight.