2 messages,
Last post on Oct 04, 2009 at 5:21 AM
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Hyundai Santa Fe, Safe Driving, SUV
#1 of 2 Rear Seatbacks Won't Lock
by dpomper
Jun 15, 2009 (11:25 am)
I have an '05 Santa Fe and the rear seats won't stay upright. They'll go back to the way back, but not totally reclined position. We'll pull them forward, but when someone sits in them they'll fall back. It sounds like the gears that lock them are stripped. Anyone else?
#2 of 2 Re: Rear Seatbacks Won't Lock [dpomper]
by agiorgio
Oct 04, 2009 (5:21 am)
This happened to my mother-in-law's 03 model. We ended up opening up the inner edge of the seat by unzipping, unscrewing, and peeling back the various trims and covers that block the gears. In her case there was a small bit of metal that was sitting in one of the gear teeth, and it prevented the latch from completely engaging. The recline lever pulls a cable that is routed to a latch that is on top of the gears in the inner edge of each seat (If you manage to open the seat enough, you'll see exactly what I mean). It's rather tight to take things apart, but it's doable if you're patient and careful. For what it's worth, I've never found a manual or diagram that explained this - we just figured it out by experimentation.
Once we cleaned out the metal bits, the seat back locked in place and was perfectly fine. The reason that the seat locks in the folded position is that the catch is on the upper half of the seat, and is rotating on the fixed gear (the gear is part of the seat base) enough to get past the metal bits stuck in the teeth.