Gauges Vs. OBDII Reader + App
 

Hey guys, feel free to move my thread if I'm posting in the wrong area.

I've been looking at getting an Oil Pressure and Temp gauge for some time. Was gonna go with Tanabe brand ones, but now I'm realizing it might be cheaper to go with an Android tablet, the Torque (or other) app, and a bluetooth OBDII adapter.

Any reason I should go with one over the other?
The only thing I can think of is the refresh rate/how quickly it sends, in which case I wanted to ask for recommendations for apps and bluetooth adapters, lol.

Try oft, have both

I know OFT offers a lot more like tuning, but a smaller screen a slightly higher price, I've kinda taken it out of the equation. Though I plan on picking one up if I ever choose to get UELs.

Have you considered a scangauge II?

Never knew of it until now. It looks pretty good, however, I get some discounts on Android tablets lol, and I find more use for the tablet outside the car for a similar/lower price point. That's a pretty nifty suggestion though!

Depends on what you want to get out of the gauges.

For simple monitoring, you're perfectly fine with a OBD-II reader. It's cheaper and there's nothing to screw up.

Standalone gauges are better from a functionality and are easier to read, especially at the track. Tablets, while nice, sometimes have too much glare or are otherwise difficult to read when you are scanning for something for a split second.

I have used both (Aim Solo DL, Pivot OBD-II gauge, as well as standalone Blitz Racing Meter SD gauges) and I prefer standalone gauges for track use. For street use, it's whatever you prefer.

-alex

You won't get oil pressure from OBDII unfortunately.

As I'm researching I'm starting to come across this info. Damn :/ on the huge Torque app thread I don't see anyone that got it to work. I feel like Oil Press is an important one.

Street use, yes. But as stated above I guess Torque/OBD won't read Oil Pressure so that kinda answers my question.

For oil pressure you can either use the oil galley plug near the throttle body and in front of the intake manifold, or if you get an oil cooler you can get on that supports a pressure sensor in the sandwich plate.

Might end up just getting an Oil pressure gauge and then go with the OBD Tablet combo later on.
Guess this thread/question has been resolved. Thanks all!

They didn't get it to work because the car does not have an oil pressure transducer and does not have the actual oil pressure data in the computer. There's an oil pressure switch that just lights up an idiot light on the dash when your pressure drops to something ridiculously low like 3 psi, but it doesn't provide the actual pressure.

But, as has been noted, there is a spare port in the oil gallery right on top of the motor where you can install a pressure sender, and they also left a pass through hole in the firewall for aftermarket gauge lines. I bought a digital aircraft oil pressure gauge that will eventually go where that stupid digital clock is in the center stack, when I get around to installing it.

This is exactly right the oil pressure light is like the older miatas or older cars for some reason it's just a switch with an ON and OFF value that happens to engage at a low psi. It'd be cool if it actually was a pressure unit, it would be really useful with a limp home table that engages at a certain pressure for safety, really could help the turbo aftermarket :lol:

There's also oil filter sandwich adapters if you want to run more than one sensor from the engine.

-alex

If one was to use the sandwich plate to mount a pressure sender, is there any combo gauge that runs Pressure AND Temp in one location? And would that be simple/possible to wire up together using the plate?

I want to mount a gauge in front of the analog speedo, since it has no actual use in this car, and I was considering trying to simply mount my OFT there, but I worry that's going to be very annoying to start up every time I get in the car, plus it's hard to read at-a-glance.

It'd really be awesome if we could somehow convert the needle on the speedo to measure oil pressure, so it'd be an actually useful gauge!

There are such gauges available, and what you're describing shouldn't be too difficult. A lot of aircraft have dual oil pressure/temp gauges, and I know I have seen some automotive gauges modeled on them.

Keep in mind you already have oil temp available through OBDII. If you run Torque, you can display it. I prefer to pair oil temp with coolant temp, where you can see them follow each other. The coolant temp gauge on the dash is actually fake, so I almost completely ignore it now and just monitor my Torque dashboard instead.

Personally, I would prefer to replace the stock gauge cluster altogether rather than patching it here and there. The only thing on it that I actually use is the tach. As you said, the speedo is useless. I monitor my fuel in actual gallons remaining through torque. As I said above, the coolant gauge is fake in that it doesn't correspond to actual temperature. It hits the center "normal" position at about 170° and stays there at least up through 210°, which makes it little better than an idiot light.

I would really like a custom solution with a combination of needle gauges and a configurable Torque-like screen that matches the interior styling of the car. There are some custom dash options available, but to me they all look like they came right out of the 80s Knight Rider tv show. I'd like one that actually looks like it belongs in this car.

Gauges require extra wiring and extra sensors. They also make your engine appear more like a mess with the extra wiring. Why not to utilize what is already available?

Agree 100%, I'd much rather have a digital dash that allows configurable views of all monitoring, as well as size scaling, alerts, etc. Basically, a tablet crammed in there. But I figured that'd be pretty cost prohibitive, or at least very skill prohibitive (for me).

I may just go with a Torque option, but since oil pressure isn't viewable, I got to thinking about how to monitor oil as top concern. But seeing AFR, coolant temp, IAM/KC, and ethanol content (if possible?) would be awesome. Ideally it'd be in the cluster and not where the radio is, to keep glare down, and keep it easily viewable for the driver, but again, we're now talking about a complete overhaul of the cluster system.

Here's my current Torque setup:

http://i315.photobucket.com/albums/l...dog/Torque.jpg

That's an old Galaxy Note I wasn't using any more as a phone, retasked as a dedicated engine computer. I rooted it and flashed it with Paranoid Android to keep the OS and battery usage light. I leave it in airplane mode with bluetooth enabled so that the unused cellular radio doesn't run down the battery faster, then turn on wifi if I need an internet connection from my phone. It's mounted to the little triangular window in the door and powered by a 2.1 amp USB power supply I have mounted under the dash on the cross bar under the steering column.

It shows me everything I need except oil pressure. For that, I have all the pieces I need to install an oil pressure gauge out of a wrecked Beechcraft airplane. I just haven't been able to find the time to do it working six days and having two Jeeps that need more attention. This is the type of gauge I have:

http://aircraftpartsandsalvage.com/i...-100-C_945.JPG

That's actually a cylinder head temp gauge in the pic, but I have the oil pressure version in that same slim case (couldn't find what box it was in to take a pic). The display is the same size as that stupid clock in the center stack, and I have an extra center stack frame and clock unit to cut up and plastic weld back together. The clock is actually on a single board that also has the hazard switch and passenger airbag light, all buttoned up in a plastic housing. Rather than trying to rewire that board, the plan is to relocate it behind the climate control unit. Then I'm going to use the spare clock housing I have and plastic weld the oil pressure gauge where the clock was and my radar detector remote faceplate where the airbag light was and wire in jumpers from the hazard switch to the board behind the dash so that it still works. I need to practice my plastic welding, but my hope is that the final result will look like it came from the factory that way.

Wow, definitely post a pic of the new center stack once you have it done. That seems like a great idea.

I've seen an ethanol gauge in place of the clock that would be nice (for me, anyway), but your idea also sounds useful.

Because 1) sometimes what you want isn't available (oil pressure), and 2) the stock sensors don't have enough data/refresh rate for certain applications.

Again: gauges are great if you know what you want out of them. There is no wrong way to getting the data you need, you just need to make sure what you have setup-wise is sufficient for what you are using the car for.

-alex

I've been fiddling all the options for gauges/apps. I have OFT already but I am going ECUTEK/FI here in a month.

What all do I need to purchase in order to run the Torque app?? After reading this threas, I figured I would run Torque App with an Oil pressure gauge