I built a gauge...it replaces the clock...

[Starkiller]

Originally Posted by robot

I miss having an sti. And I have two kids now. One of which requires me to climb into the backseat and perform gymnastics to get him in and out.

I completely understand, man. What do you think it would take to complete that project that you started on? More importantly, HOW MUCH do you think it would take?

[robot]

Originally Posted by Starkiller

I completely understand, man. What do you think it would take to complete that project that you started on? More importantly, HOW MUCH do you think it would take?

Which one...the gauge cluster one or the clock one.

[Starkiller]

Originally Posted by robot

Which one...the gauge cluster one or the clock one.

The gauge cluster one. LOL. You were trying to incorporate an oil and water temp gauge, correct? I think that is an awesome idea.

[robot]

@Starkiller I had some time to kill on an airplane today so, here are my thoughts about this in a jumbled order:

Status of the speedometer conversion

Stepper motor selection
-I have picked the vid28-05 stepper motor for several reasons. 1st the dimensions should roughly fit within the casing over everything without too much modification (This is in terms of thickness of the assembly.). 2nd there is a wonderful Arduino library (https://github.com/clearwater/SwitecX25) for controlling Switec stepper motors and the vid stepper motor I have selected (VID (http://www.vid.wellgain.com/support.aspx) makes switec copies that are said to be as good). 3rd there is a source for getting one’s hands on this particular motor. There are only really a handful of manufacturers who make a stepper motor with a shaft within a shaft design to drive two needles on one gaugeface. Switec makes one with the dual motors stacked (so it is thick) and it is a pain to get. There is a minimum order from the US Switec distributor in Alabama that is several hundred dollars. Luckily the 28-05is readily available in tiny quantities from china via Alibaba and Aliexpress (ships slow, but they only cost a few bucks and you can buy them in single quantities). The cool thing is that the vid one is really just a side by side copy of the switec motor. So, the code *should* work without any tweaking if you wanted to switch motors. Other similar motors do exist, but don’t have a library already written for them, are only available via contract (as in OEMs pay them $$$ to produce them under contract), and don’t have easy to look up specifications.
-Mounting the motor is not easy. It only fits one particular way behind the PCB of the gauge and even then it sort of bumps up against some components. I am a little worried that depending on how it gets mounted it would lead to premature wear on those components. The furthest I got with this was to temporarily hold it in place with 3M body molding tape.
-The motors have to be disassembled and the contacts in them flipped to the other side. Normally when a manufacturer produced a stepper motor they usually make several variants. Usually one mounts below the gauge face and one mounts on the top. They only make one that mounts on the top and not from behind like we need. Luckily the gauge is easy to take apart and they left in holes in the casing that the contacts and poke through on the other side.
-One has to de-soldier the OEM stepper motor and unclip it. This actually fairly easy as the pads are big and not really next to anything else.
-One also has to drill out the hole in the PCB that the motor shaft pokes through to accommodate the new motor with its shaft-in-a-shaft design. Luckily it is only a few mm and does not interfere with any surface mounted parts in that region.

Needle design and gauge modification
-I have 3d printed (and had professionally printed) and messed with a number of shaft adapters with varying depths and sizes to fit both the hole in the face and depth of the assembly (you don’t want the needles hovering too high in the air above the shaft, or too close to interfere, or to close to each other. The mechanical issue here is pretty much solved.
-The biggest issue with these is lighting and coloration. I have found a testors model paint that gets very close to the red used in the needles. The issue is you can’t 3d print translucent. So, I had some prototypes for the under pointer laser cut from plexi glass. (I’ve reused the oem one for the top, but had to cut it off of its shaft). I have not been able to test this lighting issue as I haven’t figured out how to safely power the cluster without breaking it and I’m not ready to plug it into a working car yet. I suspect that without a fully translucent shaft attachment that the light reaching the needles might not appear as bright as the OEM ones (also caveat this by saying I’m doing this for the FRS which has slightly different needles and lighting than the brz).

Re-labeling the face
-I’ve designed a relabel of the face that works for most oil psi and oil temp readings without being too disruptive. The issue here is lighting and how the face is designed. You only have a few options here based on how the face is printed. It is a multi-layered piece of screen printed plastic that lets in certain light with certain shades in certain colors. For instance changing the number is nearly impossible. Numbers are already filtered through cutouts. Also, you cannot move numbers around to other positions because the plastic “frame” layer that the face sits on has individual “light wells” for each set of numbers (I guess if you really wanted to get creative you could start drilling new holes and figuring out how to put identical LED setups at the bottom of them…and power them correctly and have it all fit in the assembly. However, this is way too much modification for a kit and would probably lead to some error.)
-You could reprint a whole new backing face. That would be cost prohibitive and never look OEM.
-My solution is to screen-print decals that sit on top of numbers and labels to make them make sense for oil temp and pressure and to largely reuse the numbers that are already there. I have mocked these up and printed some on inkjet paper to test out. So, far this looks like a good solution. BTW this is more of a pain I the rear for the FRS cluster due to the space invaders pattern printed on it. The brz should be easier.

Code
-90% of it is done. I really only need to test it some more. It drives the motors just fine and all. I just need to test it with the sensors some more. Sensor code exists and works. I used it for other projects. I use autometer sensors because of cost, support, and reliability. You email them and they send you a spec sheet. You don’t get the same response from Defi or some other manufacturers.

All in all I’ve put a ton of effort into this and I’m not sure I want to make all of the design or code open source. I would love to get a nominal fee from some manufacturer who wants to make a kit. I’d be willing to do consultation work for them and it wouldn’t cost too much. But then again I'm trying to sell the car and get back into an sti. So, who knows.

[Frita]

Great Project


I have all hardware collected. I am stuck at code compiling.



oledOBDgaugeSmall - This code with no error



oledOBDgaugesSmallIrvinedLib - With this code i get this error:

"C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\tools\avr-gcc\4.9.2-atmel3.5.4-arduino2/bin/avr-g++" -c -g -Os -w -std=gnu++11 -fpermissive -fno-exceptions -ffunction-sections -fdata-sections -fno-threadsafe-statics -MMD -flto -mmcu=atmega328p -DF_CPU=16000000L -DARDUINO=10805 -DARDUINO_AVR_DUEMILANOVE -DARDUINO_ARCH_AVR   "-IC:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\cores\arduino" "-IC:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\variants\standard" "-IC:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\libraries\SPI\src" "-IC:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\libraries\Wire\src" "-IC:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\Adafruit_GFX_Library" "-IC:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\Adafruit_SSD1306" "-IC:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\ELM327" "C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Temp\arduino_build_439581\sketch\sketch_jun22b.ino.cpp" -o "C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Temp\arduino_build_439581\sketch\sketch_jun22b.ino.cpp.o"
In file included from C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\sketch_jun22b\sketch_jun22b.ino:6:0:

C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\ELM327/ELM327.h: In function 'void loop()':

C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\ELM327/ELM327.h:265:8: error: 'byte Elm327::runCommand(const char*, char*, unsigned int)' is private

   byte runCommand(const char *cmd, char *data, unsigned int dataLength);

        ^

sketch_jun22b:57: error: within this context

   Status = Elm.runCommand("2101", data, 130);

                                            ^

Użycie biblioteki SPI w wersji 1.0 z folderu: C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\libraries\SPI 
Użycie biblioteki Wire w wersji 1.0 z folderu: C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\libraries\Wire 
Użycie biblioteki Adafruit_GFX_Library w wersji 1.2.3 z folderu: C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\Adafruit_GFX_Library 
Użycie biblioteki Adafruit_SSD1306 w wersji 1.1.2 z folderu: C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\Adafruit_SSD1306 
Użycie biblioteki ELM327 z folderu C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\ELM327 (legacy)
exit status 1
within this context

Do you know how to get this working?

[robot]

Originally Posted by Frita

Great Project


I have all hardware collected. I am stuck at code compiling.



oledOBDgaugeSmall - This code with no error



oledOBDgaugesSmallIrvinedLib - With this code i get this error:

"C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\tools\avr-gcc\4.9.2-atmel3.5.4-arduino2/bin/avr-g++" -c -g -Os -w -std=gnu++11 -fpermissive -fno-exceptions -ffunction-sections -fdata-sections -fno-threadsafe-statics -MMD -flto -mmcu=atmega328p -DF_CPU=16000000L -DARDUINO=10805 -DARDUINO_AVR_DUEMILANOVE -DARDUINO_ARCH_AVR   "-IC:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\cores\arduino" "-IC:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\variants\standard" "-IC:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\libraries\SPI\src" "-IC:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\libraries\Wire\src" "-IC:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\Adafruit_GFX_Library" "-IC:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\Adafruit_SSD1306" "-IC:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\ELM327" "C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Temp\arduino_build_439581\sketch\sketch_jun22b.ino.cpp" -o "C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Temp\arduino_build_439581\sketch\sketch_jun22b.ino.cpp.o"
In file included from C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\sketch_jun22b\sketch_jun22b.ino:6:0:

C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\ELM327/ELM327.h: In function 'void loop()':

C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\ELM327/ELM327.h:265:8: error: 'byte Elm327::runCommand(const char*, char*, unsigned int)' is private

   byte runCommand(const char *cmd, char *data, unsigned int dataLength);

        ^

sketch_jun22b:57: error: within this context

   Status = Elm.runCommand("2101", data, 130);

                                            ^

Użycie biblioteki SPI w wersji 1.0 z folderu: C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\libraries\SPI 
Użycie biblioteki Wire w wersji 1.0 z folderu: C:\Users\x2\AppData\Local\Arduino15\packages\arduino\hardware\avr\1.6.21\libraries\Wire 
Użycie biblioteki Adafruit_GFX_Library w wersji 1.2.3 z folderu: C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\Adafruit_GFX_Library 
Użycie biblioteki Adafruit_SSD1306 w wersji 1.1.2 z folderu: C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\Adafruit_SSD1306 
Użycie biblioteki ELM327 z folderu C:\Users\x2\Documents\Arduino\libraries\ELM327 (legacy)
exit status 1
within this context

Do you know how to get this working?

I'll look into it.

Is it because I edited the ELM library but you are using the "stock" version of the library? Or maybe now Arduino is enforcing some pre-compile checking that it didn't do in the past?

I also know that you might run into compatibility issues as the adafruit graphics library has been updated several times since I published this.

I'll try to update everything on my machine and see if it needs to be refactored because libraries and such got updated.

[robot]

Originally Posted by Frita

Great Project


I have all hardware collected. I am stuck at code compiling.



Do you know how to get this working?

I think that you need to use this ELM library which is just has minor changes to initialize stuff with the CANBUS on the BRZ/FRS: https://github.com/stirobot/arduino-ELM327

Are you using this version?

[Requiem240sx]

I know this is forever old, but I wanted to thank you for all the hard work and effort put in. Very cool project, and lots of very useful information!

My Adruino and can bus shield will be here soon and I can't wait to start diving into this!

[robot]

Originally Posted by Requiem240sx

I know this is forever old, but I wanted to thank you for all the hard work and effort put in. Very cool project, and lots of very useful information!

My Adruino and can bus shield will be here soon and I can't wait to start diving into this!

Thanks for the kind words!

I don't own a brz anymore. Now it's an sti hatch. This is my current project: https://www.instructables.com/id/Wif...32-Car-Gauges/

Feel free to leave questions here in this thread and I will probably (eventually) get back to you.

[alex87f]

Has anyone tried replacing the OBD2 + UART translator with this?

https://freematics.com/store/index.p...&product_id=83

I'm a bit of a novice when it comes to this, but it should be able to talk with the Adafruit directly, as well as power it, right?