It was bound to happen
 

I have had my X3 almost 1 year to the day. With over 22K miles on her not a single thing has gone wrong, until last weekend! My wife comes back from the bakery early Saturday morning and says "your seat just burnt the shit out of me"! She shows me a nice little burn on her ass and then explains that she had the seat heater on high. After about 5 minutes she started to smell smoke and said that is when she was burnt. Has anyone else had this problem before?

so what your trying to say is: your wife's ass is "on fire"? hahah just jk, but no i haven't. It has become hot toa point where i had to shut it off but to almost catch fire... never!

I would think that the seat covering would go on fire first?

I can't really imagine that the seat heater could get that hot for safety and liability reasons

Maybe she is just very sensitive or hot.

:loco: :throw:

Seat heaters going bad is a not so uncommon problem with BMW's. It was very prevalent on the E46 models and has been known to occur on the E53 (and I'd assume the X3 as well). Usually you will see burn lines on the leather first, but if you happen to have black leather, there would be a chance that the burn is the first thing you'd feel. Head to a dealer and have it checked out as the overheating could result in a fire within the interior of the seat.

That same thing happened on our Chrysler, hurt like hell!

If you both say so I guess you are right.

I thought that the output of the heater would be low enough such that it could not cause a fire even if it ran continuously?

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/recal...w_heaters.html
http://www.automotive.com/2004/49/bm...lls/52375.html
http://www.internetautoguide.com/aut...45i/index.html
http://www.lemonauto.com/complaints/bmw/7_series.htm

You are right thanks for the facts.

Thanks for the help. Not to big a deal with the vehicle at least it is still under warranty. Maybe this was a blessing in disguise, at least I got to look at my wifes ass without asking :)

Please send pictures;)