2 1/16 gauge ECM data display

[mikew]

My ALDLGauge is pretty much done. Hooked it up to the '59 Jaguar. Got live data on the gauge and can transmit via BlueTooth to TunerPro!

Inside of the gauge case is a 16 pixel RGB LED ring, a 128 x 64 OLED display, two Arduino Pro Mini's (one handles the RGB ring and OLED display, one handles communications), a bluetooth transceiver and a 5v DC-DC power supply. There is a digital encoder that is remotely mounted to navigate through the display screens.

btg4.jpgbtg3.jpgbtg2.jpgbtg1.jpg

And exciting video of the gauge in action!

[3400tZ]

Looks awesome Mike! What are you using for a power supply circuit for 12V ?

[mikew]

I use these:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=321180078985

2A DC-DC converter.

DC-DC.jpg

[3400tZ]

Cool, ty. I will have to get one of those at some point!

[3400tZ]

So I moved everything over to an Arduino Mega.

Updated code is always here: https://bitbucket.org/SebGiroux/diyecmgauge. Still have a ton of work to do but all the component are working and basic stuff is hapening.

I can't wait to have finally received everything and start cleaning up this rat nest :)



And here is the schematic:

[Jim85IROC]

Your progress looks great! Just a couple comments:
Your issues with using all your Ram for the libraries is one that it seems a lot of people run into. Generally it seems that people trim the fat out of the libraries to help save space (as well as make things faster - something that's important when driving TFTs). You may want to fish through those libraries and dump the sections that you're not utilizing.

If you decide to add a button, you can look into the "joystick" style buttons. This gives you 5 buttons in one. I picked one up for my project, since I want to be able to scroll through various selections and be able to select one in order to change my display.

BTW Mike, that ALDL gauge is fantastic! Do you have any plans to share the source code? Quite a lot of what you implemented is similar to what I'm hoping to do, albeit mine will be interfacing OBDII and pushed to a TFT.

[mikew]

Thanks Jim85IROC,

I will post code and construction information shortly. Getting the parts to all fit in the case was the real challenge!

I'd think my stuff would be easily adaptable to ODBII.

I did the B/W OLED because they are quite readable in different lighting conditions. Color OLED would be nice too but the Arduino Pro Mini's definitely don't have the memory for that. I'd considered a Teensy 3.0 or MegaMini, plenty of memory, but neither will fit in the case but are small enough to be packaged in the gauges external wire harness.

I'm using a rotary encoder for input, it's also got a momentary pushbutton. Two Arduino pins let's you navigate up and down through the available ALDL parameters. One more Arduino pin let's you use the pushbutton to do something, not yet implemented on mine.

The next version, I'm never quite done with toys I build, will probably use the Teensy 3.0, maybe color OLED and for sure utilize the pushbutton for min/max average display of values.

Converting the last ALDL logger I built to CANBUS for OBDII might be a thought, Arduino Mega2560, color LCD, touchscreen, SD card, LiPo battery powered as is, adding bluetooth would be a snap. http://www.xm381.com/xm381/aldl.html#5

[3400tZ]

Jim, I agree that the libraries can usually be trimmed down. While that bring some good points like lower RAM usage and better performance like you mentioned, it can also introduce bugs and make updating the library a lot more painful (have to redo the changes every time). At this point, I really want to focus on the main sketch and not worry about those libraries. That's a reason why I try to buy most of the stuff from Adafruit, they have good tutorial with their products and usually a decent library as well that get you going pretty fast. Throwing hardware at the problem at first for the prototype is a good way to work around that issue at first. The only reason I started with an Uno is because I had one laying around :) And now I will probably be fine with the Mega but the reason I bought the Due anyway is really just to give it a try :P

Good idea about the button, I will have to keep that in mind for sure :)

[Jim85IROC]

FYI, this is the 5-way button I'm using:
http://www.adafruit.com/products/504...FeFlOgodlUMAcQ

Sparkfun also has a number of joysticks that use pots for X & Y movement. This is a neat idea because you use less input pins for X & Y movement, plus you get proportional control. These are pretty popular and have a lot of usage code available to draw from.
Here's one on Sparkfun that I want to try: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9032

Arduino's site has joystick tutorials, and Jeremy Blum also has one in the Arduino book I'm reading. There's also one right in the Sparkfun link above.
http://www.arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/JoyStick

[mikew]

Here's a link with info and code for the three projects below, ALDL_Communication (the basic Mode 1 request), ALDL Bluetooth Repeater (ECU to ALDLdroid / TunerPro via bluetooth) and the ALDL Gauge: http://www.xm381.com/xm381/aldl.html

ALDL_Communication.pngALDL _BlueTooth _Repeater.jpgALDL_Gauge.jpg

[Jim85IROC]

Awesome, thanks for posting that. Looking at your display code especially should prove very helpful when it comes time to start making mine do what i want it to. Just doing simple things like getting the display to update from double-digit numbers down to single-digit numbers (i.e. decreasing speed in a digital speedo) proved to be much more complicated than I'd imagined. I'm expecting similar issues associated with hysteresis and I'm anxious to look at your code tonight to see how you're handling that sort of stuff.

[3400tZ]

Time for an update on this project! I pretty much spent all day on it. I finally have a working and somewhat decent looking prototype. The prototype probably won't change anymore in term of hardware for this year but the firmware will change / improve A LOT!

Again, all the following is working in both hardware and firmware:
- MS communication with CAN bus
- Triple axis accelerometer + Compass
- Temp + humidity sensors reading
- GPS
- SD card for data logging
- Buzzer

Mike (mikew) sent me a empty gauge case and it turned out to be a much better option then the crap gauge I had. I've used 20% window tint on the gauge face to hide the screen PCB a bit. I've realized that I'm putting way too much crap on a single page now that the screen is in the gauge so I will increase the font size and reduce the number of items on one page so its easier to read. This is all easy stuff.

Also, I'm working on a computer side software that will allow to configure the gauge using the USB port. I'm writing it in Java so it works on any platform (Windows, Linux, Mac OSX) and could also be somewhat easily converted to Android at some point. It will allow to changes what the gauge is displaying as well as hopefully listing and downloading logs from the SD card and a bunch of other stuff. All this will be open source like the firmware.

[3400tZ]

Bigger text is definitely better :)

[mikew]

Looks very nice!

I ran into the same issue with too much tiny text on the screen.

I decided to go with two lines; the top line is for the parameter value with a text size of 5 (which gives you four characters to work with) and the bottom line for the parameter name with a text size of 2 (which gives you ten characters to work with). It's very readable even at a glance.

I also used some of the Neopixel rings LEDs for status: malfunction, open loop/rich/lean, idle/torque converter lockup, cooling fan on.

[mikew]

Built a second ALDLgauge for my '74 Jaguar.

I used an original Jaguar gauge case because I wanted it to match the others in the dash. I'll replace the cars voltage gauge with the ALDL gauge.

Stuffed inside the case are: 128x64 OLED display, 16 segment Adafruit "NEOpixel Ring", two Arduino Pro Mini's and a 12v to 5v DC-DC converter. External to the case are the bluetooth transceiver (I'll put some heat shrink around it before installation) and a rotary encoder. Only three wires to connect it to the car, ground, power and ALDL.

ALDL Gauge 2.jpgALDL Gauge 1.jpg