E30 door lock heater / heated door lock

[roundel318]

I live in Idaho and find myself wanting heated door locks, just the drivers like the factory had.
I procured a working E30 door lock heater, heating ring (left) and bracket (left) but upon removing my door panel and peeling back the inner sheet (love that rubbery black glue, nice touch) there is little room to work, see and dig at wiring.
Has anyone retro'd this that can give advice on optimal procedure, etc?
I cannot tell if I have a interior light control timer there, but I don't think so since the interior lights don't come on when I pull on the handle, they just stay on ~30 seconds after I turn the key off.
I wasnt sure if this was electrical, interior, or exterior, so we will start here :confused:

[JP 91iS]

Is this a stock part? I've never heard of it and can't find it on realoem.  Do you have a part number or a picture?

[roundel318]

It actually is on realoem, you just have to look correctly (It took me a while to figure out how they call the part, hehe)
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts.do?model=AJ93&mospid=47318&btnr=61_0602&hg=61&fg=25&hl=5

It has a control unit and a heating ring that goes around the lock barrell in the door.
The unit goes in place of the interior light control timer that some have that lights up the inside when you pull the driver handle, it sends a signal to the central locking control below the driver's speaker kick panel.
Also, here is some notes on posts I have found.
This was a factory option, mostly on 325iX's, M3's (I am talking US bound cars), on that note most all E30's found in Canada will have these options. This was part of the cold / winter option that you could opt with heated side mirros and heated windshield washer jets.
Heated seats could have been part of the actual factory option code, but probably were available seperate (at least regarding US sales) as lots of US cars have heated seats but not as many with the heated washer jets, side mirros and door lock

http://www.unofficialbmw.com/e30/interior/door_locks/e30_central_lock_faq.html

http://www.digest.net/bmw/archive/v7/msg14146.html

[roundel318]

annoying world we have, besides.
my heated door locks are far more important that some pr0n.

[JP 91iS]

So when you started digging around in your door, did you not find the wires to hook this up?  Maybe the cars with this option had an entire different door harness?

What does an interior light control timer have to do with this install?

[roundel318]

The wiring should be there (in theory at least in a 90+ E30) as they started installing a full factory wiring harness regardless of options elected at build.

From one of the links at unofficialbmw, the E30/E28 central locking FAQ
"When pulling up on drivers side door latch, a ground connection is made at the heater module. This signals the central locking to send 12V to a resistor mounted in the clip holding the lock cylinder to the car. To operate: lift and hold latch. "

The central locking system has a option that would activate the interior lights on a timer when you pulled up on the handle. The heater goes in place of this central locking interior light timer module.
I have a pretty good idea of where it goes, the wiring on the other hand not just yet, I need to pull wiring apart some more.

[roundel318]

Here is a link of a guy that has a E30 M3 with one that he repaired and took some pix of component location.
http://silverstone.fortunecity.com/chicane/541/m3.htm