Spit-ballin' a heated steering wheel in a Tundra

Came looking to tag u about that RAv4 heated steering wheel post. But I see ya already liked my comment about it.

 

I can't wait!! Haha

 

This is definitely doable. They sell heated pads specifically for this, adding under a leather wrap on a non-heated wheel. I'd be a little worried about the clock spring though (that's the wire harness thing that allows the wheel to turn). A clock spring for a non-heated toyota has connections for the airbag, cruise control, paddles, phone buttons, etc etc. A clock spring for a heated wheel also has a separate connector on it for the heated wheel.
The airbag wires are thicker because it sends a might strong jolt of electricity into the bag to trigger the explosive charge. All the rest are just for sending signals for pushing buttons. The heated pads draw maybe 30-50 watts... at 12 volts that's 2-5 amps. Running that many amps on a skinny control wire in the clock spring it could heat up and melt... and what is that 12 volt wire that is now melted sitting right next to? Oh yeah, the wires for the air bag!

I did see another guy added heated steering to a corolla and used the shift paddle wires for it, but i wouldn't trust that so I would put in a proper clock spring meant for heated steering, not cheap.

So the best bet in my mind would be to head to a you-pick-it auto parts yard and find a land cruiser, rav4, highlander etc with heated steering and *carefully* take the steering wheel and the clock spring behind it for the wiring. Make sure to grab parts from one that *doesn't* have a blown air bag, because if the airbag triggers you want to junk the clock spring in case it was damaged by the high amp airbag trigger power.

Unfortunately basically none of the parts yards within 50 miles of me allow you-pick-it, wow do I miss that about living in the southwest!

So I went on car-part.com and searched for a rav4 steering column and just kept opening up the pictures looking for the heated steering button until I found one. I am hoping that the guys that pulled it out of the car didn't spin the wheel too much as they would have destroyed the clock spring if they did, I'll pick it up tomorrow and pull out a multimeter to test it out.

Here's the photo from the parts yard for the column I bought, you can barely see the heated steering wheel button that i circled, and you can see that the airbag isn't blown.
Unfortunately they had already sold the airbag so I needed to buy one, as the tundra bag is a totally different shape.

 

I've been through all this before, my old BMW wagon had the cheapest seats and steering wheel, so I bought a heated wheel and heated seats and swapped them out, adding a couple wires back to the fuse box with some add-a-fuses. I picked the RAV4 wheel because my buddy stopped by with his 2022 RAV4 Prime and let me drive it around a bit. Reeeeeally nice, gd that electric motor has a lot of torque! And the steering wheel felt really really nice. And it was heated.
I'll update the thread as I go.

On the airbag / safety: I checked internal part numbers (from photos on ebay) and from what I could tell they used the same wheel airbag on RAV4, Camry, Venza, Corolla and maybe a couple others, so hopefully it isn't much smaller than the tundra airbag, which would make it possibly slightly less safe in a crash. My truck will still have the seat, roof, and knee airbags so i'm not too worried. It actually got really good crash test results with the one exception being the grab handle in the A pillar, the test dummy's head would hit that, so I won't be adding a grab handle to the driver's side.

 

Our Lx570 has a heated steering wheel but it’s just on the leather at 3 and 9. But man when it’s cold it sure beats the wood.

 

Yeah all the toyota/lexus products at least through '22 they only heat at 3 and 9.

As a note on the above, I have a 2019 so my truck has lane departure warning and radar cruise, so i bought a wheel from a car of the same era that also has those buttons. If whomever was doing this was putting it in a pre-'18 truck they would want to source a heated wheel from a toyota car/suv/etc that doesn't have those features/buttons.

Oh yeah, and here's the control switch I ordered. Won't come in until march so i'll probably steal a switch from my boat temporarily, since i'm not using that right now anyways lol

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256803661245477.html

 

These first world problems are getting out of hand. I'll stick with the incredibly cheap frozen plastic steering wheel for 20 minutes until the cab warms up.

 

I used to feel this way until I drove a rental with a heated steering wheel. Lots of references here I shouldn’t put On the internet so use your imagine as to something warm without plastic.

 

I am going to disagree here. The plastic wheel Toyota puts in the Tundra is pretty ghetto. Even just a Tacoma wheel is a massive upgrade.

 

I agree, the steering wheel is horrible. Out of the many vehicles I have owned it's probably the worst.
Pure function, nothing else. One day I may address it and replace it. But as far as the cold, I can deal with it until it warms up.

 

Yeah this is where I'm at too. I've driven old used vehicles my whole life and maybe-not-ironically, the wheel in my $28k Tundra's only competition for worst steering wheel is the hard plastic wheel in my sister's '83 Toyota 2wd pickup. This is more than I've ever spent on a car or truck, I'm willing to put a few hundred more into having a nice wheel.

 

An idea-
Buy a Milwaukee heated garment (on sale or even used), cut out the entire heating system and install on a steering wheel cover. Decent heat and run time with L/M/H/off switch ready to go
A problem-
Where does battery go without turning it into a projectile if air bag goes off?

 

Ha! Battery management is key in this situation!

 

There was an effort on this before, apparently the issue is the clock spring, they couldn't get the steering angle sensor to work and was trying out with modifying existing clock spring, but couldn't get the airbag to work.

This was using Lexus GX components.

 

Damn, the journey to this has been intriguing...

 

It’s the part of the vehicle you will be touching everytime you’re using it and he whole time you’re using it. Toyota really went cheap especially considering how nice Tacoma wheels are. I got mine off FB market place for $120 or $140 lightly used and it’s fantastic such a huge upgrade.

 

There ARE other solutions:

 

That is hot! But it also has a bmw logo, which looks fine on my bmw but i wouldn't want it on my truck

 

Don’t worry, I’m sure that cover is compatible with vehicles equipped with a turn signal lever as well.

 

Hey now, the BMW definitely has a turn signal! At least, that's what the safety inspector said, not that I've used it

 

I like the Platinum leather wheel but would still upgrade to heated if the clockspring problem gets worked out. Or a way for the 22 wheel to intergrade or Landcruiser.

 

Same.

 

Booooo hissssss

 

Your hands, Sir, are like the terminator, do not feel pain, pity, or remorse. You are clearly cut from the same cloth as are Navy SEALs. Me? Not so much. I would love to add the heated wheel, IF it's not crazy expensive or adding a threat that my airbag will inadvertently deploy.

 

Well... Back from my Florida tow so I can take a better look at this. Must say I'm a little disappointed to find that the center bore of the RAV4 wheel is bigger than that of the tundra, so... There isn't a single part that can be transferred from one to the other. Back to the drawing board I guess.

I'm a bit surprised as I know people have put Tacoma wheels on a tundra, and there was a guy who put a Corolla/RAV4 wheel on a Tacoma. Maybe a year difference.

 

Looks like toyota changed from a 19mm nut to a 10mm hex key screw in the 2018-2019 redesign for rav4, so the older ones might fit. think i'm going to look at highlander first though, as i'm having an easier time finding a limited/heated column locally for a 2018 highlander, and it has all the buttons, 2018 rav4 doesn't have the lane departure button

 

I was just issued a 23 Rav4 for work. The steering wheel is heated, but only at 10 and 2.

I use the bottom of the wheel while driving, so yea, more first world problems.