Gauges..

tach is pointless imo. I run trans temp, oil pressure, coolant temp, volts.

don't care about a speedo and run a sight tube for the fuel cell. :cool:

mine seem to be holding up well for several years to rain and some pressure washing (they were in my truggy for a couple years before going into the buggy)
 
^^^ this, no tach.

Never looked at it in my zuk, and very little room in my buggy, so...I'm a cheap zuker
 
meh...as much cam as he is talking about running he may actually have the ability to float it if he stays on it. I could see a tach being useful. But likewise I didnt have one in the buggy.
 
I love my tach, even have a shift light. I was able to tell when my trans was going out last time b/c of slightly higher lock-up rpms but it didn't have a trans temp at the time which would have also been a tell tale. Plus it looks cool.....
 
^^ I thought about that as well but finding a way to get all the senders to talk to the tablet got to be a PITA. Getting the tart to read obd2 is easy but getting the info to the ecm from the gauges wasn't cheap or as easy as it should be
 
NCJeeplover said:
I've wondered about using a tablet as gauges with an obd2 motor and bluetooth reader. Does anyone have any experience with that?
Click to expand...

There are various obd2 to WiFi or Bluetooth devices, which then work off software on the tablet with virtual gauges. Some years ago when I was doing hardware consulting, I designed the canbus to WiFi hardware for one such device that never made it to market because there were too many competing products coming out at the same time. There's a number of things on the market that can do what you're looking for though.
 
rockcity said:
finding a way to get all the senders to talk to the tablet got to be a PITA. Getting the tart to read obd2 is easy but getting the info to the ecm from the gauges wasn't cheap or as easy as it should be
Click to expand...

You may be thinking about this all wrong... there's only one set of "senders" (the same used for the engine to run) and the OBD2 is read for those values.

I've been using a $5 OBD2/Bluetooth reader and accessing it with my phone using a free version of TouchScan. The "dashboard" section can be customized to show *anything* the ECM is monitoring and display it in analog, digital, or both "gauges". A $75-100 droid tablet from the pawnshop will go a long ways... including supplying tune-age :D
 
But how vibration, dust, heat, resistant is that tablet? And what about water.
Been kicking this idea around for another build. Heck even creating a custom GUI to display the values is super easy. Its just about the robustness of the display.

I mean heck in the industrial engine world we have been taking canbus data and outputting it to building management systems through Lonworks and now Modbus with a data dump and the display just maps the register values it cares about and viola. Customer GUI.

But again those touch screens are ~18" and cost $10,000 and arent vibration proof enough to survive in a buggy.
Maybe a $30 cheap tablet and a bad ass case and keep a spare tablet at camp.
 
Do some research on this:

ag_ecx.images_amazon.com_images_G_01_electronics_cat_1300_garmfd55bf8d7ee9c84e89c26ff8f085098e.jpg


Which is actually an interface device, Garmin GPS sold separately.

Garmin Mechanic with ecoRoute™ HD | Garmin

You can send OBD2 data to a compatible Garmin device (that has Bluetooth), and supposedly configure the gauge screens as well.


There's also ways to do that through cheap OBD2 interfaces and some headunits that support app linking if you have an iPhone.
 
Fabrik8 said:
Do some research on this:

View attachment 195652

Which is actually an interface device, Garmin GPS sold separately.

Garmin Mechanic with ecoRoute™ HD | Garmin

You can send OBD2 data to a compatible Garmin device (that has Bluetooth), and supposedly configure the gauge screens as well.


There's also ways to do that through cheap OBD2 interfaces and some headunits that support app linking if you have an iPhone.
Click to expand...


I do have an iPhone and the Garmin setup is intriguing.

Not sure how durable it is but it is pretty interesting.
 
Yep...and if you run a VSS signal the insight will give you speedo as well.

Rob, that is the newest iteration of the tuner that as in my truck. It can just display more values. It pulls the full register map and can be very useful tuning diagnosing as well. I had an idle air sensor go out one time. Truck was idling like shat. Looked through parameters and saw that intake air was 640 degrees...no wonder the fuel trim chart was f'ed up. Nw sensor and ...happiness.
 
IMG_3407.JPG IMG_3409.JPG
or go minimalist, programable to read anything your ECM supports thru OBD2/CAN
ScanGauge2 with XGauge 5x2", mount in a water proof enclosure, buttons can scroll thru multiple gauges supported by ECM ( will do fuel pressure if your ECM supports it)
TFT is trans temp on my Tacoma that had to be programed in.
 
Seeing how I have a Lowrance, it would be worthwhile to consider the Lowrance series of gauges that work with any NMEA 2000 network. The gauges will read whatever sensor I install and there seems to be a way to convert the OBD2 to a readable format for the gauges.

image.jpg
 
You would need a way to convert the CAN stream (or whatever ODB2 physical layer protocol the vehicle uses like ISO9141 or J1850) into the NMEA2000 format. NMEA2000 uses standard CAN transceiver and bus controller, so you're already ahead if the vehicle uses CAN for OBD2, but the protocol won't be compatible. So you need something to read the OBD2 stream, unpack the data, convert to NMEA2000 CAN packets, then send out over a CAN network to the gauge. A device like this probably exists already.

That's a Siemens/VDO gauge it looks like, with a Lowrance private label on it. Actually, maybe not, but very similar. The Mercury Smartcraft gauges are virtually identical. Faria makes some as well but not like that; they're an analog-looking gauge with stepper motor guts that are NMEA2000 input.
 
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mcutler said:
That's how mast motorsports does their can/bus network gauges, vdo hardware.
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Yeah, the CAN hardware is the same, the gauge firmware is just written for a different CAN protocol like J1939 instead of NMEA2000.

Spek actually makes some really nice CAN gauges as well, but they're $$$$. A lot of the Sprint Cup teams use them (that's what they were designed for). They're quite pretty.
 
Fabrik8 said:
You would need a way to convert the CAN stream (or whatever ODB2 physical layer protocol the vehicle uses like ISO9141 or J1850) into the NMEA2000 format. NMEA2000 uses standard CAN transceiver and bus controller, so you're already ahead if the vehicle uses CAN for OBD2, but the protocol won't be compatible. So you need something to read the OBD2 stream, unpack the data, convert to NMEA2000 CAN packets, then send out over a CAN network to the gauge. A device like this probably exists already.

That's a Siemens/VDO gauge it looks like, with a Lowrance private label on it. Actually, maybe not, but very similar. The Mercury Smartcraft gauges are virtually identical. Faria makes some as well but not like that; they're an analog-looking gauge with stepper motor guts that are NMEA2000 input.
Click to expand...


Livorski makes controller that can export CAN engine data to NMEA 2000. Lowrance told me to call the engine manufacturer... Even when I told him it was a LS1 from a Corvette/Camaro. :shaking:


But Livirski does have something. Really, it depends on cost and how many items are being read by the OBD2 system.
Speed I can get from the GPS, trans temp and fuel will have to be different senders from the ECM, but I could get oil pressure, water temp, and rpm from the ECM. I'm sure there are others that I could pull as well
 
you COULD get trans temp from the ECm if you ran a stock electronic trans....and you wondered recently why I was insistent on it .... ;)
 
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