I've always wanted a nice display to run inside my car and that's one of the reason I started working on Android apps. Clarion recently came out with the AX (http://clarion.com.my/ax1/), an Android based head unit. That was the first I was seeing from a decent head unit company, instead of those Chinese no name one. The main issue with that unit tho is that it's running Android 2.3.7 which is already over 2 years old. I really want Ice Cream Sandwich at the very least. I would assume 2 years ago is when they started working on this thing but they need to update it as it's already way out-dated.
So while I'm waiting for that nice Android based head unit to come out, I thought I would come out with an alternative solution for a permanently mounted display. This is when I thought I could turn my boring Voltmeter into something much more powerful. I will be replacing it with a gauge that will be reading data from the ECM over the CAN bus. I'm mentionning CAN bus because I'm running a MegaSquirt ECM and it will be a much better option then serial as it will allow me to keep the gauge connected all the time while still have access to the USB port on the MegaSquirt to tune / datalog. Also, the gauge being a CAN device will allow me to tune it using the USB port of the ECM. That way I can change the gauge display value or whatever gauge parameter with an Android device or netbook in the same tuning software that I use to tune / datalog.
Making this project fully customizable and working on any ECM (even any MegaSquirt) would take years so this will be mostly be an hard coded version for my specific application. I might start "unharcoding" some stuff at some point but it will take a while. The good news for you guys is that it will be open source so I really hope I will have a few person jump in and create an ALDL fork or something :)
I've done similar project in the past but using an LCD touch screen instead and let me tell you that the OLED screen seems to be a much better option for automotive use. The display seems to look good from any angle which is definitely not the case of an LCD screen (or at least the one I had).
Any one interested in this project ? :) I will keep updating this thread if you guys think this is an interesting project!
The OLED I got now is this one: http://www.adafruit.com/products/938
The code will be hosted here: https://bitbucket.org/SebGiroux/diyecmgauge/overview
Here is where I'm at after 15 mins of work:
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