2 1/16 gauge ECM data display

[mikew]

Got some empty 2" x 1 5/8" deep gauge cases on their way!

I purchase Westach aircraft grade EGT gauges for one of my other hobbies, http://www.xm381.com They custom build each gauge for your specific installation, so when ordering another EGT gauge yesterday I asked if I could buy empty cases and they said yep.

This is what I'm thinking: this LED ring, http://www.adafruit.com/products/1463 and this OLED display (same as what 3400tZ is using I think), http://www.adafruit.com/products/938 powered by one of the small Arduino's like this, http://arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoBoardNano and a bluetooth transceiver like so, http://imall.iteadstudio.com/im120723009.html I think I can get it all to fit in the gauge case. I've got communication code for this already working here: http://www.xm381.com/xm381/aldl.html and pretty much done with the bluetooth portion too.

Functionally in stand alone mode the gauge will request ALDL data and then display it (a button or two for navigation between parameters) but when you pair with the bluetooth the gauge will then let TunerPro, ALDLDroid, etc. request the data then transmit the ALDL stream back.

BTW, hows it coming on ALDLDroid?

[3400tZ]

Cool that you found some empty gauge cases, let us know how it goes with them! I've been ordering a bunch more stuff for this project lately. :)

What do you mean hows it coming on ALDLdroid ?

[mikew]

I'm gearing my ALDL Gauge to work with your ALDLdroid, it can operate stand alone or as a bluetooth connection for ALDLdroid (function as a standard bluetooth to ALDL interface, got that working at 8192, might look into 160 also).

With 2" of gauge face to work with there's not much real-estate for displaying data, a parameter or two at a time. So I can see your ALDLdroid being used when I want to see a bunch of stuff at once.

And then's there's logging; although it would be reasonable to implement, once again using ALDLdroid solves a lot of problems (like ease of getting logs to a PC, etc).

So I'm kind of excited to see them work together!

[3400tZ]

I see what you mean, you want the gauge to act as a proxy, right ? So the gauge is connected to the ECM and ALDLdroid is connected to the gauge using Bluetooth. If ALDLdroid is getting the same exact data stream as the ECM from the gauge, I really don't see why it wouldn't work :) That's not a bad idea at all to have both working at the same time!

[mikew]

I got the basics working today.

In standalone mode the gauge requests data from the ECM, which means it has the mode request and data stream info in the Arduino sketch (I'm only doing mode 1 requests).

But when when the bluetooth is paired, I used TunerPro in testing today, the gauge lets the external software submit the requests. That way you can do other things like mode 10, etc.

At some point I might implement a microSD card so you can put an ADX file on it instead of hard coding the ALDL info into the sketch, but for now I'm just going to set it up for my specific installation.

[3400tZ]

Sounds good, sounds like you have done quite a bit already :)

I think it's better to do config at compile time for such project, instead of loading file from an SD card. From experience, it was so slow streaming a file from a SD card and then you still have to write a parser :D Of course, its not as sexy to do a compile time config but give better (faster loading and stuff) results IMO.

[mikew]

Well, here's a prototype of my ALDL Gauge:



It's not real data, just experimenting with visuals and packaging.

The colors are a little over saturated making them hard to distinguish, but the "sweep" changes from green to yellow to red depending on the RPM.

The Arduino NANO, HC-05 Bluetooth, display "sandwich" and another board for input and power conditioning will all easily fit in the gauge case. I will have an external rotary encoder that has a momentary push switch too for changing what is displayed on the gauge.

Now to modify my existing ALDL logging code so that it works with the new display.

Here's some pictures of the OLED text display / RGB LED Sweep sandwich. This ring on the last image is a 2" gauge bezel, for size comparison.

photo 1.JPG.jpegphoto 2.JPG.jpegphoto 3.JPG.jpeg