Battery Vehicle Society

qdos wrote:I was referring to Roger's suggestion to rip out the dash. I've driven an Insight and I too agree it's a lovely instrumentation design There's no way I'd be ripping it appart either.

Knowing Roger I know that was very much tongue in cheek, he like me would regard the Insight dash as hallowed ground

Greg

I have tweaked the Analog Slave code to include the improved formula provided by Mindaugas. Can you try it and report on accuracy etc please.

You will need to adjust voltage constants and cpu speed to your parameters.

You can try adjusting the Constant 'RefVADC' If accuracy is out at the start.

symbol RefVADC = 63200 ;Fixed Ref Voltage Calibration LM385 1.235v * 1023 * 100 / 2 = 63200

We used 1270 before which works out at 63500 but that shouldn't be right really. Can you have a tinker and report back please. I don't have a low voltage adjustable power supply or I would do it.

www.solarvan.co.uk/bms/SlaveAnalogueOnO ... _v1_09.txt

If you include the 'debug' command on the line immediately after the voltage is calculated you should be able to see the CellV value displayed in the program editor if you leave the programming cable connected

I've e-mailed the 'CANTOP' youtube guy Andrew to see if he want's to come on board and perhaps could modify his nice display software to deal with my/our Master serial data It would be good if he could. We shall see.

Peter, I will try out the new software. Instead of opening my battery boxes, I will build another slave to test the software on the bench (I still have a few boards). If it all works o.k. I will then test on the car. It may be next week before I report back though.

Last week I did adjust the values 50mv lower and seems to be working better. The current values are;

CPU 250 khz

Max Cell Opto On = 3.75V
Max Cell Opto Off = 3.60V

Load On = 3.60V
Load Off = 3.55V

Min Cell Opto On = 2.40V
Min Cell Opto Off = 2.50V

The only problem is that the charger never finishes, it now cycles on and off, so it needs a timer, easily done in my management module. I can just start a timer of say 3 hours once it sees the charger switch off the first time.

A better solution would be to implement the proportional control, so I will probably wait until I have my master built before I do anything.

retepsnikrep wrote:I've e-mailed the 'CANTOP' youtube guy Andrew to see if he want's to come on board and perhaps could modify his nice display software to deal with my/our Master serial data It would be good if he could. We shall see.

I was just looking at the Nokia N810 and thinking that should be able to run the CANTOP software with a little work. The display is 800x480, transreflective and adjust automatically to ambient light conditions. Also has gps built in and wireless connectivity.

The reason I was looking was that I mislaid my old Palm TX and was thinking I would need to replace it, sadly my wife found it behind the sofa.

Still that unit seems ideal for this application, just have to keep an eye out for a bargain.

GregsGarage wrote:The only problem is that the charger never finishes, it now cycles on and off, so it needs a timer, easily done in my management module. I can just start a timer of say 3 hours once it sees the charger switch off the first time.

A better solution would be to implement the proportional control, so I will probably wait until I have my master built before I do anything.

It might work better as well if we gain that extra 20mv of resolution using the new formula.

The present Master code has all the proportional control REM'D out at present as I can't test/develop that much until I get my charger and finish my install. I'm pretty sure that will be horribly buggy at present

As we discussed many moons ago I'll be trying to pull the charger voltage down as cells go over MaxV using the same Zivan NG3 mod Cedric used, but controlled by the Master opto isolated output, which will ramp up the opto drive power as the cell voltage rises.

The AbsMaxV setting is used/reserved to control the Charger mains relay in case control cannot be maintained (broken/shorted control wire) or a cell has a problem.

Does your charger have an adjustable output voltage pot? Could you hack it like I'm doing?

GregsGarage wrote:I was just looking at the Nokia N810 and thinking that should be able to run the CANTOP software with a little work. The display is 800x480, transreflective and adjust automatically to ambient light conditions. Also has gps built in and wireless connectivity.
Still that unit seems ideal for this application, just have to keep an eye out for a bargain.

It looks nice but I think whatever we use will have to have some sort of serial port at present. Does it have one what are the specs?
I can only provide data from the Master in serial form

Unless we can get some sort of serial to usb adapter that is

We will need some serious help on interfacing from some gurus out there

It does have a usb port. So a serial to usb adapter should work.

I was thinking a serial to bluetooth adapter is what we need, don't know if such a thing exists.

I agree that help would be needed on the interface, but I think it has potential. You could just leave the pic to monitor data and move all the display processing to the N810. Maybe a possibilty for Master version 2.

Just remembered I already have a Picaxe USB to Serial Lead.

I bought one to program the Master on the move using my EEPC Asus thing.

It's well documented as well and cheap enough from the Picaxe people.

It works with Linux as well as some mobile devices it seems.

So we can get data back to the PC, now we just need the fancy display!!

http://www.rev-ed.co.uk/docs/AXE027.pdf

This is my Sat Nav which was a bargain from Maplins at only £49



It has a USB port comes with an infra red remote and SD card it runs Windows CE and has a touch sensitive screen. It's easy to hack into and reprogram simply by connecting to a PC via the USB and then navigating the directory structure as with any other networked computer. So effectively you got a palm PC too for £49. Fair bit cheaper than the Nokia

Oh it also plays MP3s so keeps you entertained while figuring out why you're in a field and not on a road