Front Seat Heater/cooler problems of the 2006 BMW X5

When pulling into my driveway I noticed a burning sensation on the left side of my butt burning my coat. I stopped the BMW and jumped out . With the courtesy light on I could see that the leather seat had a burn hole where I could see the electricity like Mini lightening. When I turned off the seat heater and the burning stopped. Had I been on the highway, serious injury could had occurred. BMW referred me to have the problem evaluated and determined that they were not responsible and repair would cost about $1400. BMW is aware of their seat heater problem as see by numerous blogs online but refuses to recall the affected vehicles. I have not yet contact my insurance company.

The heaters in both the driver's and front passenger seats overheated to the point that it was too hot to touch and melted the leather seats. We are not sure if the heaters were even engaged at the time. We brought the car to the local BMW service department and were denied any assistance or warranty coverage. We then called the national BMW customer service number and were also turned down. The costs to fix this very dangerous issue would be close to the value of the vehicle. We are still pursuing this with local management but at this time, despite recalls in previous years for this same safety problem, we have been denied any assistance or relief.

Started X5 up and turned on driver 's seat warmer. Let car warm up for 5 minutes and commenced to drive away. One minute down the road I smell smoke like an electrical fire. I feel my left hip getting hot at the same time. I stop car and look down and see a dull red glow from the seat. Immediately turn off heater and get out of car. The driver seat warmer had shorted and burned a hole through the leather seat along the left side of the seat. How hot was it! my pants had been burnt and had a small red mark on my skin. Think goodness I was not severely burned due to the area of my pants that was burnt was also the left back pocket area so the interior pocket fabric help protect me. Wow! will BMW fix this?????.

2006 BMW X5. Seat heater turned on. Smell of burning rubber in cabin. Smoke. Burn to driver back leg.

The contact owns a 2006 BMW X5. The contact stated that the electric seat heater on the driver's side caught fire. While at a stop light, he noticed that the seat was smoking and his leg was burned. The seat heater was activated prior to noticing the failure. He took the vehicle to the dealer, where it currently remains. The manufacturer stated that they were aware of the issue; however, the failure was a result of the risk of having seat heaters. They also stated that they would repair the vehicle for free. The current and failure mileages were approximately 27,000.