GPS Touch screen Dashboard

[cyclicscooby]

Hi guys..

This started as just a remote control for my lights, but has grown into....

RC Dashboard...

A wireless touch display with GPS and Car data, plus a light controller and Inclinometer....

It still operates the lights, as was its original intent..

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... There is also a "Tilt" Screen

And now the Dashboard Screen.

http://s94.photobucket.com/user/cyclicscooby/media/Models/Cars/Landy/RC%20Dash%20v1/04%20Dashboard%20screen.jpg.html]

It all works, displaying live data from the car. GPS speed, Rx throttle position (RPM), drive battery voltage (fuel) and a temp gauge..

Preliminary testing shows a range of 80-100 ft, but aerial orientation might increase that..

Luv Chrisie.. xx

Edited August 5, 2015 by cyclicscooby

[cyclicscooby]

In raw prototype stage,

Two Breadboards. The top one is the `Tx` with Screen. A microcontroller, a 2.4G Radio, and the 2.8" touch screen.

The lower one is the `Rx` that sits in the car. Same microcontroller and radio, but with a GPS module and Magnetometer+Accelerometer for the Tilt data. There`s an HPI 2ch Rx and two servos plugged in for testing on the bench..

So... It works.. 3600 lines of code in the Tx and 2500 in the Rx to get here.

Time to build..

The Tx Board

My MOD electronics instructors would turn in their graves if they saw this wiring, but I was trying to save space..

Tx Board and LCD

Tx Board with LCD plugged in

Tx, in a box i got from Maplin. Not the prettiest looking box, but sufficient for the moment

Luv Chrisie.. xx

[cyclicscooby]

When turned on it defaults to the dashboard screen and does a needle sweep like an Aston or Lexus..

You can side swipe left or right to the other two screens (Lights and Tilt).

If you swipe Down, you get the main menu screen

The setup screen..

Here, the servo`s can be reversed, just for this, not the car. Just touch to toggle Normal or Reverse.

The `Fuel` gauge can be setup for 2s or 3s.

The mileage trip reset. The Odo and trip are stored in EEPROM on the Rx.

...And the calibration screen entered..

I`m really chuffed with the calibration setup. It shows the raw PWM value on screen and a bar with min max, centre values. It`s not complex, but it`s my favourite bit.. There`s a clip of it in the video at the bottom...

The Rx side of things is not finished enuf to warrent building just yet.

I`ve cable tied a lovely pink box to the top of the Landy and strapped the breadboard in for outdoor testing..

Luv Chrisie... xx

[cyclicscooby]

Heres a video ive knocked up. Sorry about the poor sound, but it conveys the idea..

RC Dashboard V1:

[The-Man-From_Uncle]

That's pretty awesome. Not many things impress me but I take my hat off to you. Nice to see some scratch building and good ideas

[cookie666uk]

Thats one of the coolest things I've ever seen on an rc car. Patent it quickly before China notices!!!!

[J.K]

This is the coolest build I've seen in a while - excellent work! I have no idea what most of it means but the final product is awesome!

[.AJ.]

Very impressive!

[evssv]

wow!!

[cyclicscooby]

Thanks guys. Appreciate that..

It's not finished yet.. There are a few bugs to iron out, but it was nice to see the speedo working after weeks on the bench reading 0mph..

The 'lights' bit is coded on the screen and sends the correct packet data to the Rx, but there's no 'lights' code in the Rx yet, altho I've only gotta modify the radio version and copy it over..

And the tilt data.. It's transmitting over the radio, but the screen needs coding to display it..

Probably about another 2500 lines of code shud have it sorted...

Once I get a idea, I stick with it, but get blinkered, so if there is anything else you can think of, that you think would be cool, please say..

i.e. - Im thinking V3 is gonna have a super tiny Oled dashboard IN the car. Either a 0.96" black n White or a full colour 1.5".. Dependin on if the 1.5" fits..

Would look ace with an FPV setup, especially as my steering wheel works with 2.5 turns lock to lock..

If I thought I could code it, a lidar type radar scan of objects in front of the car would be pretty cool too.. Just for the hell of it, it's not really necessary..

Luv Chrisie... xx

[cookie666uk]

What about a starter button connected to a sound device. U could do a horn and maybe shouting some abuse at a bad driver?! Lol

[Coops]

Pretty damn impressive that, and showcases what can be achieved. Wouldn't have an idea where to start to do that but hats off to you.

Sure plenty of enthusiasts would pay good money to have that replicated.

[cyclicscooby]

LOL... "Oye.. GET OUTTA MY WAY, YOU MUPPET"..

Summut like that

I have been looking at adding sound.. A recorded car horn is possible.!! Even the abuse..

I'd like to add a diesel engine which responds to the throttle, but need to learn more about it before I venture there...

Good idea tho... I'll definitely be looking into that more..

Luv Chrisie... xx

[cyclicscooby]

Pretty damn impressive that, and showcases what can be achieved. Wouldn't have an idea where to start to do that but hats off to you.

Sure plenty of enthusiasts would pay good money to have that replicated.

Thanks Coops..

I have mentioned producing it before, but the price quickly puts peeps off..

At the moment it owes me

[cyclicscooby]

If you like flashy LED's, search tube for "Neopixels".

Individually addressable full 16 million colour RGB leds, that only need one wire to control hundreds...

I've already made a ground effects kit with 60 Neopixels for a Hpi Mustang, bought just for the lights.

I did strap them to my Landy but 3 people said 'NOT ON A LANDY', which I can't disagree with, so bought the Hpi Mustang for the purpose..

It's controlled via a 1.5" colour Oled screen and 3 buttons.

20 odd fading and pulsing patterns on front, rear and sill undersides, wheelarches, grill, headlights, tail, fogs and interior roof.

A microphone allows for a VU meter effect, and also a spectrum analyser mode for the full effect..

Just needs the pixels installing in the car, but put on the back burner while doing this..

Luv Chrisie.. xx

[cyclicscooby]

HI guys..

I originally made the speedo read up to 20 mph, which sounded about right, but it turns out my Landy can barely break 5mph with it's 'trail' setup, so the needle barely moves..

To overcome this, I've added another feature, a selectable speedo range..

Now there is another button on the setup screen that toggles 3 different settings..

"Speedo range" = 0-10mph / 0-20mph / 0-40mph.. Should cater for everyone from crawlers to racers..

And here are the dials..

Luv Chrisie... xx

[Tamiyacowboy]

a patch antenna plate on the tx 

on the rx side the 2.4ghz module radio, shave out/ disect that antenna  expose some of the rail and solder a micro coax connector to it.

then plug in a fourleaf 2.4ghz clover. that should help better than those little surface mount antenna traces .

 

then you just follow the signal with the patch antenna on the handset . 

 

 

could be a possible way, hide the antenna clover leaf inside the machine so its not so in your face outta place.

 

if you want to tinker with something populated have a look at multiwii quadcopter boards 

 

 

this is what i have , its very much so a arduino Uno  (45mmx45mm square) fully populated.

Baro

Mag

accel x3 axis

gyro x3 axis 

 

and all the pins a uno would have, its also flashable with arduino and codable to via ftdi. (bottom right and above is Uart) to the left of ftdi is the ISP 6 block header

you can also leach from the top left of the board an I2C connection ,

 

could give you a very small footprint and carry all thats needed in a small package

Edited August 12, 2015 by Tamiyacowboy

[HYPER-BOY]

Outstanding work on this 

[cyclicscooby]

On my existing V1 stick twiddling lights, I measured the PWM from the Speky Rx during R&D, then hard coded the values into the program.. Problem is, it doesn't like change..

My Ascender underpinnings needs 2 clicks of left steering trim, but then my lights think the steering is NOT Centre, and don't work properly..

The new V2 has full calibration, so this won't be a problem anymore.

As I'm sure you already know, the standard PWM signal from a Rx, that controls a servo or ESC, is between 1000 and 2000ms, with 1500ms being centre stick.. In reality these values vary a bit. User setup, like dual rates, end points, etc, but also between different brands of radio..

This PWM (Pulse Width Modulated) number is what's displayed on the calibration screen..

Once you've pressed the calibrate thr/str/tilt buttons, the following sequence is automated. No touching is required, just moving the sticks on the Tx, as instructed..

Here's the calibrate Throttle sequence..

First a boring safety warning that pops up for a couple of seconds...

Once that's gone, you're asked to apply full forward throttle.

The actual value is displayed live the bottom, while the bar on the left visualises the reading.

The current value has a white bar that moves with the stick, while the max value, so far, is shown as a Green bar..

When you release the stick, more than half way back, it takes the maximum value and displays it with the number next to it..

You're then asked to apply full Reverse..

Same as before, only now a Red bar indicates the Minimum value..

Now just release the stick and allow an average Centre value to be read. It reads it multiple times and averages it out.. I put in some chevrons that turn from white to yellow to suggest a progress bar..

Once that's done, the min, max, centre results are displayed and a 'calibration complete' message displayed..

This stays on for a couple of seconds, then returns to the main setup screen..

It expects the value to rise as you apply throttle, and reduce during Reverse. If you have that channel reversed on your Tx for normal operation, then you use the 'Throttle Direction' button on the setup screen, to reverse it.

It doesn't effect the car or Radio, it's just how the lights system reads the signal..

That's it for now..

I'm concentrating on the Tilt screen next. It's gonna have Pitch and Roll angles in Dials, but also current direction (compass), direction to home, and distance to home (Home being where you first turned on the GPS), altitude, and perhaps a climb rate (metres/min).

I also want to display the Raw Latitude and Longitude, but I'm having trouble breaking down the 'long' 32 bit number into two 16bit 'ints', so it can be transmitted over the radio...

If anyone can help..???

Luv Chrisie... xx

Edited August 12, 2015 by cyclicscooby

[Tamiyacowboy]

I'm concentrating on the Tilt screen next. It's gonna have Pitch and Roll angles in Dials, but also current direction (compass), direction to home, and distance to home (Home being where you first turned on the GPS), altitude, and perhaps a climb rate (metres/min).

I also want to display the Raw Latitude and Longitude, but I'm having trouble breaking down the 'long' 32 bit number into two 16bit 'ints', so it can be transmitted over the radio...

If anyone can help..???

Luv Chrisie... xx

 

not sure if this will help 

 

https://mikeisted.wordpress.com/2014/08/04/project-006c-microview-gps-displaying-data/

[cyclicscooby]

a patch antenna plate on the tx 

on the rx side the 2.4ghz module radio, shave out/ disect that antenna  expose some of the rail and solder a micro coax connector to it.

then plug in a fourleaf 2.4ghz clover. that should help better than those little surface mount antenna traces .

 

then you just follow the signal with the patch antenna on the handset . 

 

 

could be a possible way, hide the antenna clover leaf inside the machine so its not so in your face outta place.

 

if you want to tinker with something populated have a look at multiwii quadcopter boards 

 

 

this is what i have , its very much so a arduino Uno  (45mmx45mm square) fully populated.

Baro

Mag

accel x3 axis

gyro x3 axis 

 

and all the pins a uno would have, its also flashable with arduino and codable to via ftdi. (bottom right and above is Uart) to the left of ftdi is the ISP 6 block header

you can also leach from the top left of the board an I2C connection ,

 

could give you a very small footprint and carry all thats needed in a small package

That's very interesting TCB... I will look into that. A lot of quad stuff seems to be arduino based tech.

I was using an A-star micro, an UNO clone, but quickly ran out of memory. They only have 32kb. 28 after the bootloader..

I'm now using Teensy 3.1's. Mainly cuz they have 256kb, but it's also a 72mHz Arm cortex processor, that's way faster and more capable. Cost

[cyclicscooby]

Fair play, I appreciate the link..

That's the data I want to send, but to six decimal places.

My GPS is accurate down to 1.8 metres and supplies 52.123456. After looking into it, I found out that the sixth dp digit is accurate to 11cm, 5th dp to 1.1 metres, 4th 11 metres, and so on..

For an RC car that doesn't really go that far, it would have to travel 1.1km for 52.xx to change..

Don't get me wrong, I'm being a bit anal, but...

To transmit, I need to get rid of the decimal places cuz you can't send a float. To do this you multiply the number by 1 million so it reads with no dp.

i.e. 52123456.

Problem is, that's too big for a 16bit, 0-65000 'int' field, so has to be a 32bit 'long'.

I've already dealt with splitting a 16bit int into 2 x 8bits, for saving the trip and odo to EEPROM (Only stores 8bit in each address), but splitting 32 to 16 isn't so easy.. !?!

Luv Chrisie... xx