Passenger Seat Occupancy sensor

[Vog97]

I've posted this in the readers cars section as well.

My 12c has an airbag light due to the passenger seat sensor failing. The original cars had weird load sensing bolts which are no longer available so the fix is to detriment the seat and fit a regular weight sensing mat just like every other car on the planet.

However they no longer can get the parts and so McLaren have ordered a whole new seat as vast expense (£14K under warranty luckily). This has been on back order for 4 months....

Does anyone know of where to get the mats, or if there is another way of bypassing the system? (I'm not planning to put children or car seats in it) I imagine there might be a fix involving a couple of resistors or something.

The guys at V-engineering didn't suggest any alternative (super helpful guys by the way, it's definitely gong there once out of warranty.)

The car is just amazing though, so fast and planted and with the inconel sports exhaust it even sounds good too, I had not expected that. Track tyres are going on soon and then to Silverstone, can't wait!

(It's also just gone back t the dealer as I parked it nose down in a rain storm one night and the oil sender has flooded. The replacement is raised a bit to prevent this happening again. Good thing for the warranty!)

[Streetbeat]

I would advise either,

Getting a 2nd hand seat to match, or a damaged 2nd hand seat and remove the sensor pad.

Or

Buy a set of more modern 720s/570s etc seats as by all accounts they are more comfortable, Thorney did a video on the swap

I remember reading something about this on Mclarenlife which covered the issue with the older seats.

You won't be able to use a resistor, apparently Mclarens have variable rate for occupancy sensors.

[Vog97]

Thanks.

It’s being done under warranty but I’ll certainly keep the old seat to swap back later if the leather does not match perfectly and transfer the pad sensor.