# 2012 Routan Third Row Seats Will Not Extend



## BigD62 (Dec 11, 2017)

My 2012 Routan SE third row folding seats sill not extend. They are folded flat and are stuck down and will not raise up.

Looking for any suggestions to get them to extend?


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## Zambee500 (Jun 23, 2011)

Both sides? That's a little bit odd. Will the seats move at all, and go back into the stow position? If they aren't moving, you may've blown a fuse.

The back "sticking" facedown into the seat bottom is a safety feature so nobody can sit in the seat. It usually occurs because some foreign object got stuck around or underneath the hooks that the front feet of the seat are supposed to latch to. Are the front feet of the seats latched into that hook? Try stowing the seats again and then vacuuming out around the hooks. Lots of stuff gets stuck down there, from pebbles to dried out french fries to legos and other micro-sized toys.

That's a good sign that it's not just one side of the 60-40 seats. Sometimes that happens when the seat motor goes bad, and the seat motor is expensive.

I think one time I disconnected it for awhile and when I plugged it back in it worked again. You could try disconnecting it from the seat, i think the plug is underneath the flap if you're looking at it from the tailgate. Or pull the fuse. Or disconnect the battery and let it sit quite awhile (e.g., overnight) so the "memory" drains. Then plug the battery back in and see if the 3rd row seats work again.

Fuse diagram is here if it helps: 
http://forum.chryslerminivan.net/showthread.php/122513-5th.-Gen.-Fuses-complete.?highlight=TIPM

You might also try searching the Chryslerminivan boards (5th Gen) and see other possible solutions. I'm sure this issue has popped up there a time or ten.


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## BigD62 (Dec 11, 2017)

Thanks for the suggestions. However my 2012 Routan has manual operated folding seats.

After further investigation, I found that the last time the seat was stowed, the seat back did not latch to the seat bottom. When I tried to pull up to extend the seat, the seat back was binding against the wall of the stowage well. Strange that it happened to both seats at the same time. 

In the future I will ensure the seat back is latched to the seat bottom before folding the whole seat into the storage well.


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