RX350 Ventilated Seats
 

How quickly do the ventilated seats warm-up? Do they have their own resistance heater which heats the circulating air or do they depend on engine heat? On another thread, someone said the ventilating blower is quite loud except on the lowest setting? Is this a common complaint? Thanks.

Thanks. So, you do not need the blower in heat mode. Does that mean the electric resistance heat comes right through the seat leather like regular unventilated heated seats?

This is important because, believe it or not, heated seats (and how well they work) is pretty much the most important option to my wife!

artbuc, the heated seats warm up nicely within two minutes. It's certainly quicker than the heater. I don't hear anything with them on. Mine is set on 3. I heard some noise from the cooling fan when I test drove the 450h last summer . But I found it to be minimal.

To answer your questions, no, you don't have to put the blower on. The seats have their own control in the middle console. The heat feels like it comes through the leather like on the unventilated seats.

I thought you were looking at the Acura instead of the RX?

We looked at the MDX yesterday. It is a beautiful car. Didn't drive it because roads are still bad with snow & ice. My wife thinks the MDX will be too big as it is huge compared to her RX300. The MDX comes with many nice standard features which are options on the RX350. MDX will cost about $600 more per year for gas (at current prices).

Hopefully the roads will be good enough to test drive the MDX and RX later this week. My wife did drive the Toyota Highlander Limited and liked it.

If heated seats are so important to your wife, check out an audi Q5 or Q7. We traded in a Q7 that had five different heated seat settings and the top one would fry your butt if you left it on too long. They were the best heated seats we have had in any car. ( we have had heated seats in the MDX, Chrysler 300C, Q7 and Mazda 929).

Isn't the new Highlander much bigger than the MDX?

Highlander MDX

Overall Length 188.4 191.6

Wheelbase 109.8 108.3

Width 75.2 78.5

Height 69.3 68.2

The Highlander height is to the top of the roof rails. I don't know about the MDX so the height measurements may be on a different basis.

OTOH, the Highlander has more passenger volume (145.7 vs 141.8) and more cargo volume behind the first row (95.4 vs 83.5). Again, I don't know if these figues are calculated on the same basis, but it appears to me that the Highlander is much bigger inside but smaller outside.

to asnwer your original question.

the heated function on the ventilated/hated seats do not use the blower to warm your back. Only the ventilated option uses the blower, which may create fan noise.

We have a 2010 RX 350. The heated seats are a big disappointment to us. We have had both Lexus and Mercedes-Benz vehicles with heated seats that worked great but these do not. The heat output is so low we cannot feel that it is on. Lexus says it is working as designed so apparently they did a poor job on this area. What little warmth there is is more on your legs rather than on the seat and lower back. Any ideas on how to resolve our issue?

2nd option:
Cheap and more effective: LINK

Buy a Mercedes :)

We traded a 2001 RX on the 2011. The heated seats on the 2001 were very weak. The driver's side was worse than the passenger's side. We have not had the opportunity to use them in the new RX. I just hope that they are better.
What I do know for sure is that, in my opinion, the design, operation, and control of the seats in the new RX is terrible. First you have to slide the arm rest back just to access the controls. So...you can't see the controls at all without looking down. Why not just place a push button on the dash on either side of the shift lever. There certainly is ample room. Second, once the car is turned off and you leave, the seats controls remain wherever you had set them previously. That means when you restart the car the seats come back on to either heat or cool and if the armrest is now forward you will not know it until you feel the effects. Why not just have them turn off when the power is turned off. I guess that is not possible with the rotary controls. Lastly, on our Cadillac, you can have the seat heat just on your back, the seat, or both. This is a wonderful function particularly for the back. Oh well, I guess one can't expect everything. This is just one of several features that I personally find either poorly designed/thought out or difficult to use.
There are many thing I just love about the new RX. It is very comfortable, quiet and smooth. However, I would have to say that based on driving both the RX and the CTS, that Lexus could learn a few things about the design, ergonomics, and operational controls of the interior of a luxury car from GM. On the other hand, GM could learn a few things about overall quality from Lexus.