Project Worth The Wait

[blake]

This project has been in the works for years and has stalled repeatedly. It has been such that I've been reticent to even talk about it like it might actually ever finish.

In the years since its inception things have changed dramatically. It was to be the first Mk3 running a Motec (this was before the AEM was even a rumor), it was to be the second Mk3 running an SP63, and so on.

Well it's time it actually got finished. And I don't intend to "Just get it rolling" like I've been tempted to before. It's no longer going to be the first at much, but it's going to be worth the wait.

Looks like a blank slate to me =)

P.S. Those of you with really good memories might remember me as WilLyons from supraforums. My e-mail address on the sogi list was WilLyons as well.

 

[Supra469]

I agree!

That's a good starting point! Nice.

 

[blake]

Well I lied about the blank slate. A quick trip in the wayback machine:

You might remember SP selling these a while ago. I don't know if anyone actually bought one, but I do know who they made the first one for =)

All nice and shiny, even the CPS housing. And thanks to Arz I'll have a matching CPS cover soon.

Speaking of shiny things, here are some valves I got from PowerHouseRacing in TX (with springs, retainers). I've long since forgotten the details but they are 1mm Oversize.

Ah but time is a harsh mistress, and that which shines brightly...

Not a very good shot of the rest of it, but you can see the thermostat housing, CPS, and valve covers have lost their finish.

"But that's just a picture from SP's website!" you say? Well ya you're right it is. They've been using my engine as their mockup for 7M projects for years. If there was any doubt: That's also my HPF Bronze clutch disk that's been collecting dust on the valve covers forever.

For those wondering why this has sat so long, I'll keep the explanation brief: I get the blame for the first year or so of delay, SP gets the blame for all the following years.

 

[Mr. Sinister]

Good to see you're still around (with car).

For those wondering why this has sat so long, I'll keep the explanation brief: I get the blame for the first year or so of delay, SP gets the blame for all the following years.

What happened? I remember your car at SP at least 5 years ago.

 

[blake]

Good to see you're still around (with car).

What happened? I remember your car at SP at least 5 years ago.

Life Happened.

----

I wasn't going to say much more than that as I don't want to be seen to be assigning blame in a situation that's taken place over years and in which nobody really remembers all the details. I had to refer to spreadsheets even for this post.

But even after my 'keep it brief' comment, you asked for more and I suppose if I'm sharing about the project it's an inevitable question. But go ahead and skip the rest of the post if you like, I assure you it's not that interesting =)

The initial stall was due to, shall we say, 'funding prioritization' on my end (a situation I'm pleased to say is long since resolved).

But after that, I suppose to a certain extent the guys at SP just got used to having the car around, and I got used to not having it.

You'd really have to ask Larry/etc I guess. Maybe it always slips in priority because they're not confident I'll pay the next bill? Still, I've had a positive balance with them for almost 4 years now (I changed my mind on some parts but had already paid), and they're welcome to ask for a deposit (and haven't).

I've been a bit bipolar on the issue myself. It has crossed my mind to just send them 10k and say "if we don't use it all, I'll pick up a check for the remainder with the car". Or conversely to 'legally request they return my previous payments for non delivery'.

Both parties bear responsibility for stalling things, so I don't plan to dwell on the issue. There are no hard feelings, as far as I know. I'm happy so long as it gets done.

If for some inexplicable reason you want to know more, feel free to PM me.

 

[88mk88]

That such a clean bay and your motor looks sick! Did you paint the exterior of the car to match the engine bay?

 

[blake]

Exterior repaint is on the list after the car is running.

There were a few things that needed attention when it went in (a small dent in the targa, a chip out of the paint on the hood, discoloration in the front fascia and rear bumper, the upholstery of the driver's seat) but after sitting for so long there is inevitably going to be quite a bit more.

 

[funky_monkey58]

Hey man what part of Mn are you from?

 

[blake]

Living mostly in St Cloud right now, though I still crash at my Dad's place in Orono (west suburbs, Lake Minnetonka) quite a bit.

I've fallen out of touch with the local Supra guys (ever meet Glen K?). Nice to know there are still a few around.

Nice build thread, btw =)

 

[blake]

Picture Not My Car (people seem to get confused easily when skimming threads, so I thought I'd make it clear)

Picture is from this post in the Elite Engine Thread.

Everyone seems to have their own idea of how to do the PCV routing once the stock rats nest is ripped out. This is my current favorite. Though I'll have to do something slightly different as I'm retaining my ABS Block and Charcoal Canister.

 

[GrimJack]

LOL - just noticed that engine has an HKS AND A TIAL bov.

 

[blake]

Hedging his bets I guess =p

 

[blake]

Parts!

First, the biggest part:

Thanks arz! I don't intend for this to be the last part I order from you. Your contribution of your CNC skills is a real asset to this community. I can't wait to see what you do next.

And the next part:

At this point you're probably wondering wtf in the world that thing is. Here's another image for scale (I didn't have a 1 or change... vending machine ate it all today):

What it is (non-geeks can skip this part):
The brand is 'gumstix'. It runs a special version of linux on hardware which is essentially a PDA. It's about as powerful as an iPhone actually (1-2x as fast as an 266mhz PC, depending on the task) and runs the same type of CPU. This one has a 400mhz CPU, 64M of RAM, 16 of onboard Flash plus a microSD card slot which I've got a 2GB card for. It has USB-Host (so it can run other devices like USB/Serial adapters, Storage, Audio, Hubs and so on, rather than just talk to a computer as a USB-Client), 802.11b/g Wifi, Bluetooth, 3 Serial Ports, 10/100 Ethernet on an RJ45 connector, some general IO ports and probably other stuff I'm forgetting. And above all: It will run Python code well (my language of choice for some years now, Java before that, Perl before that, Scheme/Lisp before that, C before that... you get the idea).

Non-Geeks can start reading again.

Lots of people put a whole PC in their car (carputer). mp3car.com is probably the most popular site devoted to it. It's called mp3car because at the time it started that was the primary reason to have a PC in your car as even the aftermarket head units that would play MP3s off of a CD weren't common yet and the iPod + Car Adapter thing hadn't taken off. Now it's roughly the same stuff high end nav systems include. GPS Mapping, etc, etc. But I've actually kinda decided my iPhone fills those needs pretty well now.

The nice thing about the gumstix is its ridiculously low power consumption. At full tilt it's about a Watt. At idle it's more like a quarter Watt. So I can leave it on all the time and it won't drain my battery. The car battery probably discharges more on its own just sitting there.

It's going to listen in on the Motec M600 ECU. I'll probably just setup Serial Telemetry first as that will be easier, but I can get a USB device that listens to CAN as well which will let me log more samples per second. I might start experimenting with sending data back to the ECU at some point, but one step at a time.

I can program it (in a high level language) to do things the ECU shouldn't be bothering with, doesn't have the CPU power to do, doesn't have the interface to do, and so on. MoTeC's ADL fills alot of the same roles. It's FAR more configurable in a much more general way than the ECU with a great deal more resources. But for me (because of my programming experience) this gumstix is a lot more flexible.

Some totally random examples: turn on my iPhone, select the Wifi Hotspot called "Supra", it'll authenticate (I haven't settled on what mechanism to use yet), and then load the default web page and select 'Unlock'. Or see a telemetry readout (I can use javascript/etc to show live updating data). Or use it as a remote-start, or see how much time is left on our favorite 'turbo timer' function. Like I say, it's flexible, and it's a programming environment I'm very comfortable with (like some people on this forum are comfortable with a welder, or a CNC Lathe, f'ex).

There are a couple other devices, in particular, that this gumstix will use to interact with the outside world.

One is a 5.6" touchscreen LCD which is driven via USB (or Serial). Since it's USB based I can add more than one on a hub for more displays in different places for different purposes. There are also smaller versions if needed. This fills the display function of the ADL. It's been ordered, but hasn't arrived.

The second is a Ethernet/USB based 'Data Acquisition' device with several dozen IO connections like analog input, Digital IO and PWM, etc (this fills the control function of the ADL). I've had this for months and actually written quite a bit of Python code to handle it (personally ported from C, then totally rewritten so it's Python-esque because I hate C).

And a little USB-based 'dial'. Like a volume nob, with like 20 'detents' per rotation. I plan to stick this (and a couple buttons, probably) where the stock TEMS controller goes and use it very much like Audi's 98-2003 Trip Computer/Nav system, not quite so elaborate as BMW's iDrive controller. This is for functions I use while driving and don't want to be looking at a touch screen. I've ordered this, DHL tried to deliver it today and wouldn't leave it at my door without a signature. I swear I had a release for them like I do UPS and Fedex, oh well.

I'll give more details and photos of the latter few items Soon™.

 

[funky_monkey58]

Nice to see another St.cloud supra owner. Sometime in the near future we should touch base. And if you ever want some work done locally feel free to give me a shout and I can give you hand.

 

[speed]

Any pics of the whole car? the engine bay paint looks GORGEOUS. Looking forward to seeing the rest of it come together!

 

[blake]

I scavenged up a bunch of photos and dumped them into iPhoto. Most of them are actually from when I had a page on SupraSport.com (I was tech support for his first online store, heh). I lost the HD that had the originals but the shrunk ones I pulled back off the server. Here are a few random samples of those.

It's been in storage so long now it's probably not an accurate representation

Here's my LoTek gauge pod with AFR and EGT (I was bipolar about color at the time):

Here is a photo by Geoff Mohler of the Bushings from the Group Buy he did in 2003 (we used a mailing list to coordinate it, not a forum, weird huh?:icon_razz). I still have mine in a box in the home office:

This is part way through pulling the engine for the rebuild I started and Glen K deserves massive thanks for helping me finish (I'd do it again if I had the choice to make again, but I was in over my head, the engine only made it 1300 miles):

This is how we managed to dislodge the main pulley crank bolt the first time. After the short block was reassembled once it sat until the winter. Then I tried to dis-assemble it again with the propane heater going full blast, but it was not to be: I broke the bolt off in the crankshaft. Had to have a local machine shop remove it. Not a good day.

For some bizarre reason the check engine light on my instrument cluster didn't work. I had the whole thing apart trying to figure out what was wrong with a multimeter. I think I concluded that the PCB Trace leading just to the check engine light was bad. So I made use of the pre-89 headlight washer button for a replacement LED.

 

[blake]

For those more interested in the carputer/gumstix aspect, I've started another thread over at mp3car.com that might end up with some relevant comments:

http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/linux/118079-gumstix-now-w-usb-host.html

 

[blake]

A few more 'old' photos.

Here is where I installed my Greddy Turbo Timer. I rather liked this install. Though I'll be implementing that function in the gumstix in future so I'll be needing a replacement for this panel.

This one highlights the material you need to remove to fit a standard 5.25" speaker in the rear speaker boxes. Instead of setting into the opening on the box, the speaker seals nicely to the top surface.

And I was quite pleased with how this mounting location turned out for the tweeters of the front separates.

 

[blake]

Here is the Data Acquisition Device (DAQ) I referred to earlier.

You can see I have a few random lights dials and switches on the easy access pins on the left. Those are just for testing the feedback loop through my software. There are break-out boards connected on the right which include many more pins than the left and also duplicate pins on the left. Once finally installed I'll just have two D-sub cables as the end of the wiring harness, but for now the screw terminals are really handy.

The LJ is quite the device. The full specs are on their website ( http://www.labjack.com/labjack_ue9.php?prodId=26 ). The main selling point for me is the Ethernet connection so I don't have to worry about drivers. Every platform does TCP/IP, and I can write my own code against that.

Here's another photo that gives you a broader picture of how things are to be connected:

Edit: The ethernet cables run off to my desktop switch for now. That way I can talk to the devices from the laptop to test code more quickly than installing it on the gumstix.

The little male to male USB adapter will end up being a hub for multiple devices. In this case it's only plugged into a USB/Serial adapter (I bought several of these little FTDI ones from Parallax) which in turn is plugged into one of the AEM Thermocouple Amplifiers. There are two TCs plugged into that.

The AEM TC Amps are pretty neat in that they provide both a serial data stream and a 0-5V analog signal for each of the 4 Thermocouples (that explains the wires going from the AEM TC Amp to the LabJack, another test channel) and for cheaper per channel than most TC Amps of any sort from MoTeC or even those meant industrial, or the lab, or whatever.

Alternatively:

I'm considering using a MoTeC E888 in place of the AEM TC Amps. The E888 feeds its data to the M600 via CANbus. The cause for reconsideration is that with the latest version of the M600's software I can send arbitrary telemetry data via the Serial telemetry stream. So the E888 sends its data to the M600, and the M600 rebroadcasts it (alongside other data) to the gumstix. This way the M600 knows all 6 (or 7) EGTs. The alternative was to wire the 7th channel via one of the analog outputs into the M600 so it would have an EGT feed. With the E888 I don't use an analog input on the M600, and I get several additional analog inputs + digital IO that can interact directly with the M600 or just be passed along to the gumstix.

 

[SilverSupraT]

I'll be watching this thread like a hawk! It seems that you're going along the same lines as I'm trying to do with the computer setup. Although, you've thought it out quite a bit more! I haven't gotten into the details of any engine management stuff this far I've only focused on the creature comfort side. So I hope you don't mind me bugging you from time to time on how you've set up certain components!

I'll be looking forward to more updates!