Cooled seats not cooling

[DropTop]

DropTop, please share your findings as I'm interested in seeing if Tim's F150 fix will fit inside our more compact seats. I wasted a ton of time trying to find a skinny enough hose to work before I gave in and went with the odd but effective 3 hose option.

My goal was to find as simple and inexpensive a solution as possible. What makes it work without an exhaust solution is that the intake hoses go to the cold air. I tried to explain this in a prior post but did so quite badly so I won't try again.

When Droid_Junky did his fix and said that the intake was the key, I doubted it as well. But it turns out he was on to something. As long as you feed the unit cold air it can overcome the exhaust issue.

However, that doesn't mean that adding some sort of exhaust solution won't help it. I've been working on a simpler version of my exhaust option, but due to some minor back issues (mine not the cars) haven't had a chance to test it installed inside the seats. My original exhaust required cutting a hole in the back of the seat, but I decided I'd try to simplify it. Unfortunately the only way to do that is to route the exhaust under the seat which I was trying to avoid. Doing so might somewhat impact the performance of the cushion cooler, but shouldn't hurt the back cooling.

My expectations are that the exhaust will only provide modest improvements over the intake alone and may not be worth it. It might allow the seat to get cooler a little faster and since the hot exhaust air won't be blowing right onto the hose that's going into the seat that air might be a bit colder. I will share once I have a chance to give it a go.

Sent you a PM..... ensuring that good fitment can happen in our vehicles is why Tim wanted to get some Beta test vehicles to ensure that enough space exists.....the mating to the TED appears to be the same as in F-150!! DropTop

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[ctlaw]

[MENTION=14078]DropTop[/MENTION]

F-150 has underseat AC ducts that presumably help cool the intake air to the TED. How is an F-150 solution to work in a mustang that has no underseat AC ducts?

 

[Darko66]

Sent you a PM..... ensuring that good fitment can happen in our vehicles is why Tim wanted to get some Beta test vehicles to ensure that enough space exists.....the mating to the TED appears to be the same as in F-150!! DropTop

Just to be clear, I wasn't trying to be snippy. Tim's solution takes the fix to the extreme and could possibly provide the absolute best cooling possible from the seats. I'm truly curious as to whether his system will fit within the Mustang's seats and hope he can get some takers to give it a try.

 

[DropTop]

[MENTION=14078]DropTop[/MENTION]

F-150 has underseat AC ducts that presumably help cool the intake air to the TED. How is an F-150 solution to work in a mustang that has no underseat AC ducts?

Nope.... assume you mean from HVAC!? no such air ducts under f-150 seats!!.....just like other Ford seats, the TSB just added a "sock" to draw fresher cooler AMBIENT air from below seat area to deliver to the TED intake....then proceeded to dump the extracted exhaust air back into the seat cavity..... whole reason the TSB was needed was to disrupt the cycle of hot/hotter air within the seat cavity.... but did nothing with the exhaust. Pre-2015s had both intake and exhaust ducts to allow the TED to operate at highest efficiency....2015 redesign regressed the earlier design.

Again it is NOT an HVAC device, the TED just lowers the air temp to "cool" (or raises it if polarity is reversed to "heat")... DropTop

 

[DropTop]

Just to be clear, I wasn't trying to be snippy. Tim's solution takes the fix to the extreme and could possibly provide the absolute best cooling possible from the seats. I'm truly curious as to whether his system will fit within the Mustang's seats and hope he can get some takers to give it a try.

No offense taken.....you also attempted to get a fix out there that Ford was slow to provide so hats off to you!!. Yes, Tim's solution optimizes cooling by addressing BOTH intake and exhaust.... ironically those that already installed your kit could still get improvement by installing Tim's EXHAUST kit and just either use your intake or add it to TSB versions.... DropTop

 

[ctlaw]

Nope.... assume you mean from HVAC!? no such air ducts under f-150 seats!!.....just like other Ford seats, the TSB just added a "sock" to draw fresher cooler air from below seat area to deliver to the TED intake....then proceeded to dump the extracted exhaust air back into the seat cavity..... whole reason the TSB was needed was to disrupt the cycle of hot/hotter air within the seat cavity.... but did nothing with the exhaust. Pre-2015s had both intake and exhaust ducts to allow the TED to operate at highest efficiency....2015 redesign regressed the earlier design.

Again it is NOT an HVAC device, the TED just lowers the air temp to "cool" (or raises it if polarity is reversed to "heat")... DropTop

I am talking about the conventional underseat ducts to provide AC (or heat) for rear passengers. Unless I am mistaken, they discharge right below the intake for the TED.

I am right now driving a loaner Fusion and, with the driver's seat all the way back, the underseat ducts discharge air only a couple of inches aft of the front end of the driver's seat.

if the fusion and F-150 underseat AC ducts are discharging 50F air under the front seat, that 50F intake air for the front seat TED is a heck of a lot cooler than the intake air mustang seats have to deal with.

 

[DropTop]

Underseat Ducts

OK... those ducts were investigated early on by us guys and here is what we found....

1. They deliver either cooled or heated air, per setting of the climate control.
2. They BARELY deliver any airflow at all.... nowhere near the force of the rear seat passenger ducts on the console... even on highest fan speed.
3. Early attempts to tap into them for COOLING were offset by adverse effects on the TED during heating mode.....drove temps TOO HIGH...abandoned those efforts
4. Little to no effect (as tested with ducts open or closed off) was felt on the cooling seat (TSB intake or Tim's kit) performance.... negligible effect!
5. I/we assume that lack of those ducts on Mustangs should have little to no appreciable performance impact vs. the F-150....

To prove the above, Tim wants to get a Beta test vehicle for his kit(s) to actually measure before/after with FLIR etc. readings vs. just subjective impressions. Remember....some owners still feel their cooling seats work just FINE.....for them....and that is what matters....smile.

DropTop

 

[HoosierDaddy]

3. Early attempts to tap into them for COOLING were offset by adverse effects on the TED during heating mode.....drove temps TOO HIGH...abandoned those efforts

You seem to be implying that owners will simultaneously want hot air AND cooled seats at the same time or vice versa?.?

 

[DropTop]

Believe it or not..... owners on the F-150 forum also DID expressed a wish to run cooling seats while HEAT was coming from climate control...especially on longer trips! Go figure...smile.

Aside from that....as I posted... effect from those ducts was minimal at best AND even if you had a good flow of hot or cool air coming from the ducts, it was found that during heating seat operation, introducing the hotter intake air would ramp the TED up to such hot operating temps over time that it would become a safety concern..... as was the original 2015 Ford design that produced a very hot spot once continual flow of hot exhaust was re-introduced repeatedly to the TED intake....hope that helps....

 

[ctlaw]

...Aside from that....as I posted... effect from those ducts was minimal at best AND even if you had a good flow of hot or cool air coming from the ducts, it was found that during heating seat operation, introducing the hotter intake air would ramp the TED up to such hot operating temps over time that it would become a safety concern..... as was the original 2015 Ford design that produced a very hot spot once continual flow of hot exhaust was re-introduced repeatedly to the TED intake....hope that helps....

I approached the problem from the baseline of the Fusion. Its seats are less functional than other cooled seats (such as my 2007 Lexus IS350 which the Mustang replaced), but people do not seem to be complaining. The Fusion uses the same seat climate control unit.

The issue you raise confuses the heck out of me.

Fusion's intake is much closer to the outlet of the underseat duct than is the F-150's (based on my personal observation of Fusion and the F-150 thread's photos of F-150). Heating mode overheating should thus have been a massive problem in the Fusion.

 

[DropTop]

I approached the problem from the baseline of the Fusion. Its seats are less functional than other cooled seats (such as my 2007 Lexus IS350 which the Mustang replaced), but people do not seem to be complaining. The Fusion uses the same seat climate control unit.

The issue you raise confuses the heck out of me.

Fusion's intake is much closer to the outlet of the underseat duct than is the F-150's (based on my personal observation of Fusion and the F-150 thread's photos of F-150). Heating mode overheating should thus have been a massive problem in the Fusion.

Do you agree with our F-150 observations that the FLOW from the duct(s) is negligible at best... no gusts of air there cool or otherwise. The consensus in our experience is that the ducts have little to no effect on heating or cooling....either way. Proximity to something that literally produces no observed flow is not GOING to influence one way or the other.

The prime factors in the seat cooling question is input air (Ambient) and the ability of the TED to transform per its polarity... and the removal of exhaust/waste air away from the proximity of the TED so as to not hinder its operation.... Those ducts are not a force to be dealt with in the issue.... that is also why Ford Engineering simply ducted ambient air from below the seats in the TSB/Sock to introduce cabin level temp. air and then transform it to heat/cold with the TED....

You may still differ with the observations above, but a lot of high level thinking went into the F-150/Tim's solution and we discussed ALL these points and options with the Ford team... they chose to only do intake, but we will see once a kit is put into a Mustang if it fits and if the performance is relatively similar in heat transformation to what we demonstrated in the F-150.... DropTop

 

[RubyRedVert]

The seat back in mine have zero cooling. I have an appointment at the dealer for next Tuesday. Piss poor design, that Ford has know about but continues to install and sell them.

 

[fionic]

any ever try directing the tubing directly to the footwell vent?

 

[ctlaw]

Do you agree with our F-150 observations that the FLOW from the duct(s) is negligible at best... no gusts of air there cool or otherwise. The consensus in our experience is that the ducts have little to no effect on heating or cooling....either way. Proximity to something that literally produces no observed flow is not GOING to influence one way or the other.

The prime factors in the seat cooling question is input air (Ambient) and the ability of the TED to transform per its polarity... and the removal of exhaust/waste air away from the proximity of the TED so as to not hinder its operation.... Those ducts are not a force to be dealt with in the issue.... that is also why Ford Engineering simply ducted ambient air from below the seats in the TSB/Sock to introduce cabin level temp. air and then transform it to heat/cold with the TED....

You may still differ with the observations above, but a lot of high level thinking went into the F-150/Tim's solution and we discussed ALL these points and options with the Ford team... they chose to only do intake, but we will see once a kit is put into a Mustang if it fits and if the performance is relatively similar in heat transformation to what we demonstrated in the F-150.... DropTop

I agree that the ducts may have a low impact in the F-150. That does not make them irrelevant to the diagnosis of the design defect.

Again, I turn to the Fusion (and perhaps Taurus).

What other than the underseat duct and the space between the front seat back and rear seat bottom would explain the greater apparent functionality in the Fusion?

Or, perhaps, the Fusion seats are not functional and Fusion drivers are sufficiently less astute than the real men driving F-150s and Mustangs that they don't notice.

My specific theory is this:

1) Fusion seats are marginally functional. They are not as functional as other cars such as Lexus due to poor design. Their limited functionality over F-150 and Mustang is due to the underseat AC ducts. The duct outlet is relatively forward and the seat is relatively low so that air discharged by the ducts is very likely to be ingested by the TEDs.

2) F-150 is less functional than Fusion because the seat bottom is higher off the floor than Fusion's and the AC duct outlet is relatively rearward. Air discharged by the duct is likely to bypass the TEDs.

3) Mustang is the least functional due to no underseat ducts and the fact that, for tall drivers, the seat back abuts the rear seat bottom to further isolate air under the seat.

 

[DropTop]

Expectations perhaps

Or, perhaps, the Fusion seats are not functional and Fusion drivers are sufficiently less astute than the real men driving F-150s and Mustangs that they don't notice.


Quite possibly the lower price point of the Fusion etc. vs. F-150 and Mustang accounts for SOME of the awareness and expectations. Also, remember that early-on many F-150 owners were perfectly happy with the performance of their seats.... it was mainly after running them for 30 or more minutes that the closed loop heat syndrome caused the real hot spot to appear in the seat back. Yet other owners complained to dealers about the seatbacks not cooling....only to be told that they were not DESIGNED to cool....only the seat bottoms. Not sure if that was ignorance or what, but I think a lot of owners just shrugged their shoulders and said OH!? Even today, many F-150 buyers feel that the seats are "OK" as is.....each of us has our own set of expectations.

I am preparing some FLIR pictures to post here giving data on just how hot the F-150 seats would get pre-TSB..... and also comparison Post-TSB and post install of the exhaust ducting. If Tim can get a Beta vehicle, he will take before/after FLIRs to document performance.... that will take the subjectivity out of it.

The TED is a very limited device in terms of really generating cooling as compared to a climate system, although it can give a bit more comfort via the ventilation/circulation to keep the butt and back from sweating..... if it is working properly.

Those that have literally NO air coming from the seatback MIGHT have a defective TED or collapsed intake or....??? But, if all equipment is go, cooling of sorts should occur.... DropTop

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