tldr: This thread describes how to install Tillett bucket seats in the US spec Aventador w/o getting any airbag warnings.
I've scoured the internet for Aventador seat mods before I took on this project. The car is exclusively for show and shine, not driven on the road and so I wanted to get a seat that matches the interior looks of the SVJ w/o the requirement of being comfortable. My choice fell on the Tillett B7 for several reasons:
Removing the old seats
Removing the factory seats is a relatively simple task. The 4 bolts are easily accessible, the seats are not that heavy.
Mounting brackets
The factory mounting points are in a single plane. Even better: Tillett's sliding rails can directly be fastened to those points. The tricky part is that the factory seat is not centered around the mounting points. I ended up using a combination of inside and outside mounted rails/brackets.
With this combination the brackets cannot be moved close enough to each other to directly mount the seat in between, so a spacer is needed. I made one out of Aluminum on my lathe.
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![Image]()
Seat belt
The factory buckle is too long and does not line up with the opening in the seat, so a shorter one is needed. I ended up using the buckles from a 2014 Mercedes ML. An adapter is needed to allow mounting the buckle to the rail brackets. I built it out of mild steel and powder coated it in black. A welded nut allows for easy installation of the bucket and an adapter allows the use of a “reasonable” bolt size.
![Image]()
![Image]()
Electronics
This is arguably the hardest part and one that many people shy away from. The way I approached it is to first build a wiring harness that plugs into the factory seat harness and that is long enough to plug it into the factory seat outside of the car. Together with a wiring diagram this allowed me to measure certain voltages/resistances. I then used an OBD tool to check the interpreted signals on the vehicle side. For the US spec passenger seat, we need the following:
![Image]()
![Image]()
If you have any specific questions I’m happy to answer them. This was the first mod that I did to the car and I'm planning to share the others as well.
![Image]()
![Image]()
![Image]()
I've scoured the internet for Aventador seat mods before I took on this project. The car is exclusively for show and shine, not driven on the road and so I wanted to get a seat that matches the interior looks of the SVJ w/o the requirement of being comfortable. My choice fell on the Tillett B7 for several reasons:
- Carbon fiber looks
- Lightweight
- Narrow enough to fit
- Extremely low seating position
Removing the old seats
Removing the factory seats is a relatively simple task. The 4 bolts are easily accessible, the seats are not that heavy.
Mounting brackets
The factory mounting points are in a single plane. Even better: Tillett's sliding rails can directly be fastened to those points. The tricky part is that the factory seat is not centered around the mounting points. I ended up using a combination of inside and outside mounted rails/brackets.
With this combination the brackets cannot be moved close enough to each other to directly mount the seat in between, so a spacer is needed. I made one out of Aluminum on my lathe.
Seat belt
The factory buckle is too long and does not line up with the opening in the seat, so a shorter one is needed. I ended up using the buckles from a 2014 Mercedes ML. An adapter is needed to allow mounting the buckle to the rail brackets. I built it out of mild steel and powder coated it in black. A welded nut allows for easy installation of the bucket and an adapter allows the use of a “reasonable” bolt size.
Electronics
This is arguably the hardest part and one that many people shy away from. The way I approached it is to first build a wiring harness that plugs into the factory seat harness and that is long enough to plug it into the factory seat outside of the car. Together with a wiring diagram this allowed me to measure certain voltages/resistances. I then used an OBD tool to check the interpreted signals on the vehicle side. For the US spec passenger seat, we need the following:
- Seat occupancy mat: This uses a 0-5V pressure sensor. Different thresholds are used to indicate child seat vs passenger. I used a potentiometer to emulate this.
- Seat buckle strain gauge: This is another signal that’s used for the child seat – I think it is not used as a control input during airbag deployment. The output is another 0-5V signal.
- Seat belt buckle switch: Two resistors used to identify open circuit + whether the seat belt is buckled. A resistor does the job.
- Seat position sensor: On/off switch that indicates the seat position. This is the one I was most surprised about. It really only triggers when the seat is all the way to the front. Moving it ⅛” deactivates it. Not sure why they did it that way. The easiest way to mimic the sensor is to use the original one and bring it close to a piece of steel. The sensor will pick that up and tell the ECU that the seat is not all the way towards the front.
- Seat airbag: That’s the easiest one. A fuse and a resistor will do the job
If you have any specific questions I’m happy to answer them. This was the first mod that I did to the car and I'm planning to share the others as well.
