I'm a new member on this forum. I just bought a 97 LX450 with about 72,000 miles. So far, this forum has been very helpful. I am a victim of the notorius "little white cap" problem with the power seats. I bought the LX knowing that there was an issue with the driver's side seat, then after the purchase I discovered this site. I checked for the missing cap, and sure enough, the cap was missing. So, I looked on the passenger's side, no cap there either (and surprise surprise, the passenger side seat didn't work either). Fortunately, I have a neighbor down the street that has a 97 LX so I asked about their seats. Their passenger side seat does not work and the Lexus shop graciously disconnected the power to the seat for them (WTF?). However, their driver's side seat worked and had the cap. So they let me borrow the cap and of course it took care of the problem with my seats. Now for the parts dept. I e-mailed the parts department of my local Lexus dealer along with a complete explanation and pictures of everything. As others before me have already discovered, they apparently do not sell the part but rather you have to buy the entire housing (I am still working on confirming part numbers, etc. but I think this will end up being part # 72206-30040 (A044 Housing subassembly) as others have already reported here). Price tag is about $90.

When I had my neighbor's white cap, I measured the part. O.D. is 0.50" and the bore in the middle is 0.24" and the length is 0.38". I managed to find a nylon spacer at Lowe's that was advertised as O.D. 1/2" (measured 0.49"), bore 0.257" and length 1/2". Well, it was close but not close enough. When I pushed the bushing in the seat, it tried to work but would occasionally skip on the side where the cap installs. I assume the tolerances are just very exact. I also tried a bushing that had the same outside dimensions, but a bore of 0.194". It would not fit over the shaft so I drilled it out with a 15/64 bit (~0.234"). Now it fits over the hole but since I just had a hand held drill the bore was a tiny bit off center, and again it only works sporadically.

At this point, I think I have no option but to buy to whole housing at $90. I'll probably only buy one and use the cap to set the passenger's side all the way back and then leave the cap on the driver's side. I'm 6' and my wife is 5'2" so we definitely need to be able to adjust (of course, if I had no cap maybe she wouldn't drive it.... I better not go there).

Not that it would do any good, but I also sent a complaint to Lexus corporate about this. The spacers at Lowe's were 46 cents each. It kills me to pay $90 to get this part.

Next ..... all the other stuff

I don't recall reading about the white cap...but I know that people have had problems with the plastic gear on the seat mechanism.

have you checked the archives at www.ih8mud.com in the 80series land cruiser section?

I guess I'm lucky that neither my nor my wife's lx450 have had problems with this cap...

Have the same problem found one WHITE cap and keep it in the center console. It does get to be a pain to insert the cap and move the seat for people. You never see one of these vehicles in a recking yard to pull one. No Lexus dealer in our area and the Toyota dealer has an attitude so trying to get parts was an online effort to no avail. I did get very good at using my pinky finger to align the shaft until i found a cap in the drive way. God was on my side that day.

I GOT THIS OFF A IH8MUD POST BY LCphil:

The part number is 72206 a gearbox that contains the gear you need they are around $65 each

this might be the toyota number

Thanks ajh, but I think that that part number is for the gear that often also goes bad. I discussed this with the parts guy at the local Lexus dealer and he says the white cap fits into the motor itself. I have a diagram that he faxed me with the part numbers, but I don't have it handy right now. The motor costs $389.

I sent a complaint into Lexus thru their website, but so far no response.

If you don't get anywhere with lexus on it, you might try scrounging one from a salvage yard or somewhere like cruiserparts.net.

I am a victim of the notorius "little white cap" problem with the power seats. Anyone able to locate this little part? I am left with one, which I switch off to adjust. Annoying to say the least.

Hello,

Thanks for the helpful information. I'm new to the site and I have a 1997 LX450 whose passenger seats locked up recently. Did you have good luck with the kit and would you mind sharing where you got it?

here's a link on www.ih8mud.com to a thread with a guy who fabbed some of these gears and is selling them pretty darned cheap -- as of Sept. 2008, they were $20 for a pair.

click on this link

Does anyone know if the white cap maker is still offering his help? Clicked on the link but the last post was from this fall.

I talked to him about it a few months back. I'm sure he still sells them.

** today my drivers seat quit working(sc300) and I found a "white cap" under the seat, where does it go ? any photos ? (or very detailed description please), I have the seat out.

If I'm sitting in my LX, I can bend forward a little bit and look over to see the white cap for the passenger seat. It's located under the seat (obviously), towards what would be the upper left corner (for the passenter seat). It goes in horizontally, so when I look from the drivers seat, I see the philips screw end of it.

Hope that helps.

** I found the philips cap but that's not what I found under my seat when I removed it(seat). The plastic "Cap" that I found has a "hex" top and is threaded as well. I don't know if it came from the seat or not. Let me explain my problem. Today I moved the seat all of the way forward to put someting into the back seat area. When I tried to move it back, the rail by the drivers door moved but the rail next to the console didn't move, thus the seat actually tried to twist. Are there separate fuses for each motor ? how do you sync the rails? I removed the seat but I don't see anything wrong other than there is no rail movement on the console side of the seat frame.
Any ideas ? , where are the power seat fuses located ?

I found out where the Hex top plastic cap goes today, it goes into the white plastic box(outside edge) where the screw drive for the rail that didn't work is located. See photo.