Hi,
I'm a long term member but small time poster on this forum. I'm on my second mk3 Leon and thanks to Lozzy's guide I did a heated seat retrofit on the first Leon I owned. What I really wanted for that car was a heated steering wheel - I suffer from raynauds and work outside a lot, so having warm hands is a big deal for me.
When I ended up in another Leon I started researching and found that a HSW retrofit did seem to be possible on the mk3, albeit there wasn't a huge amount of info online. It involved using the steering wheel from a mk4 Leon.
I cobbled some information together and set out on the retrofit, which I'll detail as best as I can here with what is required. It's actually a really easy retrofit once you get the right parts and if you look around it needn't be mega expensive. I have to thank Kieran at East Yorkshire Retrofit who was helpful with providing part numbers and some moral support along the way
The total cost for me to do this retrofit is in the region of £450. So it's not the cheapest by any stretch however if you keep an eye out on eBay and other selling sites the parts do come up for sale at reasonable prices as more and more mk4's get crashed, broken etc.
*I'm not writing this as an idiots guide and won't include how-to's for things like removing the glovebox, airbag, steering wheel or other things. There are guides for that online if you need them, but please only attempt this if you're competent to do so*
(Click on the thumbnails for bigger images)
Parts required:
- Mk4 Leon heated steering wheel - there are plenty of variations of part numbers depending on whether you need DSG or manual, FR trim, Xperience trim, SE trim, Cupra trim etc but a good starting part number for eBay searches is 5FA 419 091. Then look for wheels with the tell tale heated steering wheel button on the bottom right of the right hand multifunction button unit. None heated wheels will have a phone symbol in that place:
If you find a bare wheel with no button units then you're looking for the extra two wires on the wheel itself that provide power to the heating elements:
- Mk4 Leon airbag - this is shared across all cars as car as I can tell albeit with different covers depending on if its a Cupra or Seat. A good starting point for eBay searches is 5FA 801 201
- Steering wheel wiring loom - I don't know the P/N for this because it came with the airbag that I bought however it's crucial so if you find either a wheel or an airbag for sale with it included then snap it up. It looks like this:
- Steering wheel control module (also known as clock spring or slip ring) - 5Q0 953 549 B or 5Q0 953 549 D. The 'D' suffix is the newest part number, supercedes the 'B' suffix and is available new on eBay for around £150. These control modules have a different type of plug (14-pin as opposed to 16-pin) which has larger power and earth pins for the HSW, pictured here:
- MQB platform NONE CRUISE CONTROL wiper/indicator stalk unit. There are hundreds of minor variations of P/N but you're looking for stalks that match those of the Mk3 Leon that don't have cruise control on the indicator stalk. That's because the mk4 steering wheel has the cruise buttons integrated into the wheel.
- Kufatec MQB heated steering wheel retrofit loom - the Kufatec part number for RHD cars is 43696-1.
OR*
- 14-pin multiplug so you can re-pin the existing 16-pin plug - 5Q0 972 726
* if you choose to repin the existing plug (as I did) then you'll need to sort out some wiring and pins to suit the power feed and ground wire needed to power the HSW.
The Kufatec loom makes it pretty much plug and play.
Tools needed:
Standard workshop tools including Torx bits
12mm triple square (splined) bit for the steering wheel centre bolt
VCDS (or equivalent) for coding - Hex-Net or Hex-V2 as a minimum for MQB coding.
Procedure:
- Grab a quick VCDS snapshot of the long coding on your current steering wheel module in case you ever return the car to standard.
- Disconnect the battery
- Remove the airbag, steering wheel, cluster trim and column shroud trim:
- Remove the steering wheel control module and column stalk unit.
- Remove the glovebox, head unit and both centre console side trims.
- Unclip and pull out the fusebox
- Run the Kufatec loom from column to the fusebox using an appropriate routing where it won't chafe on anything
- Fit the power feed and earth of the Kufatec loom to the fusebox and surrounding area according to their instructions
(if building your own loom, you can use fuse position SC24 or any along the same row - they are a terminal 30 feed)
- Refit the fusebox
- Fit the new column stalk unit and steering wheel control module
- Plug the Kufatec loom into the steering wheel control module
(if building your own loom, now is the time to re-pin the original column plug into the new 14-pin plug - this is well documented on other forums however the pin-out is as follows:
Pin 1 (16-pin) red/white to Pin 2 (14-pin)
Pin 2 (16-pin) brown to Pin 4 (14-pin)
Pin 3 (16-pin) orange/brown to Pin 5 (14-pin)
Pin 4 (16-pin) orange/green to Pin 6 (14-pin)
Pin 5 (16-pin) black/white to Pin 7 (14-pin)
Pin 6 (16-pin) black/red (if present) to Pin 13 (14-pin)
Pin 7 (16-pin) purple/red to Pin 12 (14-pin)
Pin 8 (16-pin) purple/blue to Pin 14 (14-pin)
Pin 11 (16-pin) blue/grey to Pin 9 (14-pin)
PIn 14 (16-pin) black/grey to Pin 10 (14-pin)
Pin 16 (16-pin) black to Pin 11 (14-pin)
Pin 1 of the 14-pin plug goes to a 15A fuse protected terminal 30 feed
Pin 8 of the 14-pin plug goes to earth.
- Refit the centre console side trims, cluster trim and steering column shroud.
- Refit the glovebox and headunit.
- Fit the heated steering wheel
- Fit the small wiring loom to the new steering wheel. **Depending on how it's wired you may need to move the blue horn feed wire from the small multiplug in the wheel to the yellow airbag multiplug to allow the horn to work. It's dead obvious when you compare the loom with the loom from the original steering wheel - use that as reference because the wire colours are different.**
- Fit the new airbag
Double check you're happy with everything, then reconnect the battery. Should look something like this:
Fire up VCDS again, do the relevant coding.
Module 08 (HVAC) - Coding - Long Coding Helper (and say "yes" to the "trying experimental features" to see more descriptions of bits)
- Byte 11: Add a tick to bit2 and bit3
- Byte 13: Choose whether you want the wheel to come on automatically with either outside temperature or wheel temperature or not at all.
Done!
Enjoy a little HSW logo come up on your HVAC control screen:
Enjoy the extra screen where you can alter the temperature:
Check on VCDS to see what's going on in the measuring blocks within Module 16 -Steering Wheel:
Look forward to having warm hands come the winter.
NB - Mine is a 2016 manual FR so I didn't have to worry about any coding of the DSG paddles etc. All of the steering wheel buttons worked on my car without any issue. Yours may not be the same, but any issues would be easily solvable with the relevant coding alterations I'm sure.
Thanks
Tom
I'm a long term member but small time poster on this forum. I'm on my second mk3 Leon and thanks to Lozzy's guide I did a heated seat retrofit on the first Leon I owned. What I really wanted for that car was a heated steering wheel - I suffer from raynauds and work outside a lot, so having warm hands is a big deal for me.
When I ended up in another Leon I started researching and found that a HSW retrofit did seem to be possible on the mk3, albeit there wasn't a huge amount of info online. It involved using the steering wheel from a mk4 Leon.
I cobbled some information together and set out on the retrofit, which I'll detail as best as I can here with what is required. It's actually a really easy retrofit once you get the right parts and if you look around it needn't be mega expensive. I have to thank Kieran at East Yorkshire Retrofit who was helpful with providing part numbers and some moral support along the way
The total cost for me to do this retrofit is in the region of £450. So it's not the cheapest by any stretch however if you keep an eye out on eBay and other selling sites the parts do come up for sale at reasonable prices as more and more mk4's get crashed, broken etc.
*I'm not writing this as an idiots guide and won't include how-to's for things like removing the glovebox, airbag, steering wheel or other things. There are guides for that online if you need them, but please only attempt this if you're competent to do so*
(Click on the thumbnails for bigger images)
Parts required:
- Mk4 Leon heated steering wheel - there are plenty of variations of part numbers depending on whether you need DSG or manual, FR trim, Xperience trim, SE trim, Cupra trim etc but a good starting part number for eBay searches is 5FA 419 091. Then look for wheels with the tell tale heated steering wheel button on the bottom right of the right hand multifunction button unit. None heated wheels will have a phone symbol in that place:
If you find a bare wheel with no button units then you're looking for the extra two wires on the wheel itself that provide power to the heating elements:
- Mk4 Leon airbag - this is shared across all cars as car as I can tell albeit with different covers depending on if its a Cupra or Seat. A good starting point for eBay searches is 5FA 801 201
- Steering wheel wiring loom - I don't know the P/N for this because it came with the airbag that I bought however it's crucial so if you find either a wheel or an airbag for sale with it included then snap it up. It looks like this:
- Steering wheel control module (also known as clock spring or slip ring) - 5Q0 953 549 B or 5Q0 953 549 D. The 'D' suffix is the newest part number, supercedes the 'B' suffix and is available new on eBay for around £150. These control modules have a different type of plug (14-pin as opposed to 16-pin) which has larger power and earth pins for the HSW, pictured here:
- MQB platform NONE CRUISE CONTROL wiper/indicator stalk unit. There are hundreds of minor variations of P/N but you're looking for stalks that match those of the Mk3 Leon that don't have cruise control on the indicator stalk. That's because the mk4 steering wheel has the cruise buttons integrated into the wheel.
- Kufatec MQB heated steering wheel retrofit loom - the Kufatec part number for RHD cars is 43696-1.
OR*
- 14-pin multiplug so you can re-pin the existing 16-pin plug - 5Q0 972 726
* if you choose to repin the existing plug (as I did) then you'll need to sort out some wiring and pins to suit the power feed and ground wire needed to power the HSW.
The Kufatec loom makes it pretty much plug and play.
Tools needed:
Standard workshop tools including Torx bits
12mm triple square (splined) bit for the steering wheel centre bolt
VCDS (or equivalent) for coding - Hex-Net or Hex-V2 as a minimum for MQB coding.
Procedure:
- Grab a quick VCDS snapshot of the long coding on your current steering wheel module in case you ever return the car to standard.
- Disconnect the battery
- Remove the airbag, steering wheel, cluster trim and column shroud trim:
- Remove the steering wheel control module and column stalk unit.
- Remove the glovebox, head unit and both centre console side trims.
- Unclip and pull out the fusebox
- Run the Kufatec loom from column to the fusebox using an appropriate routing where it won't chafe on anything
- Fit the power feed and earth of the Kufatec loom to the fusebox and surrounding area according to their instructions
(if building your own loom, you can use fuse position SC24 or any along the same row - they are a terminal 30 feed)
- Refit the fusebox
- Fit the new column stalk unit and steering wheel control module
- Plug the Kufatec loom into the steering wheel control module
(if building your own loom, now is the time to re-pin the original column plug into the new 14-pin plug - this is well documented on other forums however the pin-out is as follows:
Pin 1 (16-pin) red/white to Pin 2 (14-pin)
Pin 2 (16-pin) brown to Pin 4 (14-pin)
Pin 3 (16-pin) orange/brown to Pin 5 (14-pin)
Pin 4 (16-pin) orange/green to Pin 6 (14-pin)
Pin 5 (16-pin) black/white to Pin 7 (14-pin)
Pin 6 (16-pin) black/red (if present) to Pin 13 (14-pin)
Pin 7 (16-pin) purple/red to Pin 12 (14-pin)
Pin 8 (16-pin) purple/blue to Pin 14 (14-pin)
Pin 11 (16-pin) blue/grey to Pin 9 (14-pin)
PIn 14 (16-pin) black/grey to Pin 10 (14-pin)
Pin 16 (16-pin) black to Pin 11 (14-pin)
Pin 1 of the 14-pin plug goes to a 15A fuse protected terminal 30 feed
Pin 8 of the 14-pin plug goes to earth.
- Refit the centre console side trims, cluster trim and steering column shroud.
- Refit the glovebox and headunit.
- Fit the heated steering wheel
- Fit the small wiring loom to the new steering wheel. **Depending on how it's wired you may need to move the blue horn feed wire from the small multiplug in the wheel to the yellow airbag multiplug to allow the horn to work. It's dead obvious when you compare the loom with the loom from the original steering wheel - use that as reference because the wire colours are different.**
- Fit the new airbag
Double check you're happy with everything, then reconnect the battery. Should look something like this:
Fire up VCDS again, do the relevant coding.
Module 08 (HVAC) - Coding - Long Coding Helper (and say "yes" to the "trying experimental features" to see more descriptions of bits)
- Byte 11: Add a tick to bit2 and bit3
- Byte 13: Choose whether you want the wheel to come on automatically with either outside temperature or wheel temperature or not at all.
Done!
Enjoy a little HSW logo come up on your HVAC control screen:
Enjoy the extra screen where you can alter the temperature:
Check on VCDS to see what's going on in the measuring blocks within Module 16 -Steering Wheel:
Look forward to having warm hands come the winter.
NB - Mine is a 2016 manual FR so I didn't have to worry about any coding of the DSG paddles etc. All of the steering wheel buttons worked on my car without any issue. Yours may not be the same, but any issues would be easily solvable with the relevant coding alterations I'm sure.
Thanks
Tom
Glad to hear it went successfully 
