Hi folks, I've got a bit of a challenge on, hopefully you guys will have some ideas! A friend runs a race car in a small championship, his car runs on an Omex S400 ECU, which has a serial port to output data/alter the map from. Until now he hasn't used any GPS/ECU data when looking at his racing, but there's a desire there, since the ECU is so easily accessed (it sits on the floor in the passenger footwell). Omex provide two pieces of software - one to alter the map, the other is a comprehensive data logger. The software is pretty old, so it should run OK on a Pi, but a) Can the pi run Win95/XP under emulation? b) Will I be able to get the software being emulated to use a serial port properly? c) Is this a stupid idea? The reason I'm looking at a Pi is because it's cheap, light, and small - I can pack it all into a tiny project box and bolt it down to the bulkhead without too much modification. If, on the other hand, you have another suggestion for a small, light windows-capable machine I'm all ears, I was considering some kind of netbook as well.
It could probably be very fun doing on a Pi, but a used netbook would probably be easier. And it would have en inbuilt screen for on-the-fly adjustments.
Hmm... Maybe you're right. There's no on-the-fly adjustment, as the environment in the car when it's running is simply too harsh and too busy to be fiddling with anything. This is purely a passive system for capturing ECU data and run a GPS add-on. What about one of those VIA Epia Mini-ITX boards? They're pretty small and light, could they be smaller than a net-top?
when you factor in the case, harddrive, PSU and other bits and bobs it would probably be larger than a netbook. And you would still need some sort of power for it. With a netbook you can just make it removable and have it charged whenever he is not running.
It'll be a little larger perhaps, but it'd have to be powered on the car's systems, which isn't difficult for a Mini-ITX system as they're often used in car PC's. Then we've got the problems of getting it running near-automatically once the power is on, as the less stuff for him to do before a race/qualifying session the better! Maybe I need to abandon using the Omex software and look at other logging stuff, that way I might be able to resort back to a headless, slim OS'd Pi that can be easily powered...
That might be a good idea. We went from "Lets build a small Pi powered system" to "Hey, a M-ITX system with dedicated PSU from the car would be great".. Might be a bit out of the reasonable spectrum.
I'm still hoping to get the Pi working, as there's a few folks out there trying to interpret the outputs into something meaningful, but the backup is definitely something like that.
If you're set on going down the Pi route, just be aware that you'll only be able to use one of the Pi-based Linux distros - I don't think it's got enough oomph to emulate another OS. Perhaps you use a two-tier system - the Pi to record, log and analyse the running data, perhaps with a laptop/netbook to alter the mapping if/when it's needed?
Yep, that would be the plan. The only thing to change on his map is the rev limit for launch control - it doubles nicely as a pit-lane speed limiter. Other than that the map won't be touched, as it's beyond any of our expertise, and with a couple of grand of engine to lunch it's not something to mess with!
Kirikkit, I'll throw this one out there to you for a suggestion. There's a gadget that you can get fairly affordably second hand now called a joggler. It's a touchscreen photoframe system with a small arm processor and inbuilt flash disc with sound and wifi/Ethernet. In its standard state is pretty crap since O2 have albut given up support, but it's useful for one thing. It can boot from external USB flash drives. There's a community at the joggler wiki that have installed numerous operating systems on it including windows. I use mine for a squeezebox server that outputs via an external dac to my hifi but was tempted to fit it in the car for a carpc. So you could if you found the desired system, boot from a USB flash drive on a hub, and use a USB to serial converter to retrieve the data from your system, process on the fly and alter it with the touchscreen interface? It's not as meaty as an i5 powered itx box, but could be more convenient?
Ooh, interesting idea PUK, that's 2nd on the list after a Pi! The XP setup looks very doable, and they're cheap enough that I could hack one up if necessary without worrying. Processing power isn't needed, it's just getting something that will survive the vibration of a racing car that's small and easily mountable enough to make it practical.
I use mine everyday tbh, have had various Linux distros running on it over the last year or so before I finally settled for making it an everyday useable squeezebox. I've had mine apart and added some ram heatsinks as it currently sinks through the metal stand and is pretty straightforward to pull apart. I'm not sure why the joggler never took off a bit more in this community as its a cool gadget and as you can now get them for sub £40, I'm half tempted to fit one in every room! Anyhow food for thought. Best of luck with the pi!
You won't be able to run the software on the Pi, as it has an ARM CPU, not x86. Your only options are to get a small XP/98 box running in the car, or reverse engineer the software to give meaningful input to the Pi.
I think you'll struggle with XP though. I know that GPS works on the Pi - I have a USB -> Serial -> GPS Mouse setup, and that works perfectly with GPSD on the Pi (in Debian Squeeze - I haven't tested Wheezy yet). You may be better off configuring the GPIO port to read serial data (or use another USB-Serial bridge) and then just logging the serial messages for analysis later?
That's the current plan actually - there's a chap over on a VW forum doing the same thing atm, but how far along we'll get I'm not sure. It's a good excuse to get a Pi and do a bit of hacking anyway.
