Project "Better" Stock Clocks....

A teaser of what I had in mind.... Maybe if I have time tomorrow, I'll extrude the drawing to get the full effect.

 

Really liking it. Have you considered adding some sort of logo to the bottom portions of the gauges? If you are spending all that money going custom, why not make it TRUE custom? Add in a personal touch, or maybe a stylish model, like 'XJ650' on the speedo and 'custom' or 'racer' on the tach?

Just personal preference, but I would put in something extra.

Hell, even if you could find a digital clock to put in the bottom of the tach, or maybe get a 750 tank with the fuel sender and put a fuel gauge in the bottom of the tach.

No matter what you do with it from here, it does look good so far. Just be sure the gauges are a matte finish so you don't blind yourself in the afternoon sun during an eastward travel!

 

The lower portions may be covered by the stock gauge enclosures... I haven't cracked one open to see if I can take them out.



Either way, the speedo will have a small lcd screen displaying information. The tach with have the shift light just below the "6" or maybe off set... not sure yet.

I was thinking about getting some tuning forks in there some where.

 

A few renderings of the faces...

Plain Jane


With tuning forks



The tuning forks version may not work.... BUT if I can get it in there, I think its a winner!

 

I like the tuning the forks. if you can pull that off it will look really nice. are you keeping the odometers in the speedo housing or moving then elsewhere?


Edit: manual g my autocorrect.

 

Not without breaking the glass I'm pretty sure.

You could get a vynil in carbon fiber and lay it over the aluminum piece. Then you get the look.

 

has anyone thought about the ratio change if you were to change the gauge face decals,,, since it will have numbers at different degrees than originally?? cause the way i understand this thread is we want to change just the decal and not the actual mechanism(s) behind "the scenes". at least that's where I thought this was going...

I, myself, have been pondering a change on my cluster but if the numbers are not in the same location as before, then it won't correctly read the right output (tach & speed).

www.productiondecals.com

they have a whole variety of gauge face decals, yet none for XJ series
waiting on a response from them too about this similar question as well

 

No, it sounds like he's planning on redoing the whole insides too, with microcontroller + servos. In which case there would have to be quite a bit of calibration going on...

 

BA! I would still have to cut out all the letters and those decals never look all that great.

I was looking at the parts drawings of the tach and speedo... from the looks of it the lower raised area covering the bottom of the gauge is part of the gauge and not the enclosure... so that may be promising and open up some more opportunities.

This is correct! A whole new set of guts with the stock enclosures.

A quick update. I'm waiting for a hall effect sensors... They are key to getting the speed and RPM information.

A simple lesson of how I see this working.

A hall effect sensor senses when a magnetic field is near, and when it does, it sends a signal that is easily interpreted. Just like a switch turns a light on

No magnetic field = 0 volts
Magnetic field = 5 volts

"But Rob, how will you read the engine speed?"

It should be fairly easy to fit a small magnet on the timing wheel under the left side crank cover on the motor and a hall effect there. Every time the motor spins once the hall effect will see a magnetic "pulse". Using these formulas in the mircoprocessor we get RPM:

RPS = Number of pulses/second
RPM = RPS x 60 seconds

"Ok, well what about the speed?"

Same system, same application, different sensor and magnet location. This time the sensor will be located on the inside of the fork (on the rotor side) and the magnet will be stuck in one of the rotor bolt heads. We get speed using these formulas:

WPS = Number of pulses/second
DPS = WPS x ((3.1416 x Wheel height in inches)/12)
DPH = DPS x 3600 seconds in an hour
MPH = DPH/5280 feet in a mile

I'm sure I'll have to play with the sampling rate (pulses/time unit) because at lower speeds, under 5mph we'll say) the pulses/second may not be greater than one. So effectively the computer will think that there are 0 pulses/second because the wheel does not make it all the way around in 1 second. Remember, the sensor is on or off and the computer does not know anything else.

Another way to correct this is to use two magnets and divide the MPH by 2.

I have a few more ideas to read RPM, but I will try them as I have to.

I will be starting the printed circuit board design soon for the brains of the project. And have been sourcing parts (temp sensor, hall effect sensors, SD card socket, Real Time Clock circuit, LEDs, etc.)... I still haven't had luck getting a hold of the gentleman who apparently has a set of gauges for sale...

For those curious, here is a sample of my printed circuit board handy work... This one is a wireless temperature and humidity sensor node for data logging.

 

This is really cool to read about. Would love to read about how the stock gauges work as well, would help me diagnose mine.

 

I just had my gauge cluster apart. It appears that those pieces are removable however I believe they are glued in and holding the glass. So you'd probably have to make some kind of ring that would fit in to hold the glass.

 

Well then here you go: http://xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic/t=15303.html in detail and with pictures.

 

Brief update... I have goodies on the way...

A nice little screen I'll be testing out for the display... It's got a built-in micro sd slot, which will be nice because I'll be storing mileage, trip and setting parameters on it. I bought a real time clock module rather than making one... I wouldn't have saved more than a buck or two making it and it would have taken some time so...

I think I finally got a set of busted clocks for my "parts bin"

I have been toying with some of the code but no "real" progress...

 

this thread blows my mind, yet i can follow it completely. i love it!!

 

Circuit board is done... I made it more generic because I have to order in batches and I don't think I'll make ten XJ clusters.... or will I... hmmm. :wink:



Anyway... It will take 4 weeks to get these printed so I have some time to get the program written and get the enclosures, which I got for $20!!! Got most of the other parts in today but I had to replace my water heater so I didn't really have time to play with any of it.

 

Gentlemen....

A little demo video of the very basic design... The screen read out that is really blurry is printing "34 pulses per second", which is about 2040 rpm...

The really chunky "needle" movement is because the fan with the magnet taped to it is bouncing around and can cause bad readings. The servo movement needs to be smoothed out (maybe).

Let me know what you guys think.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjEpvbHCKIY

 

Just a little more work tonight...I didn't have much time, but I wanted to test the screen. It's SO small, the size of my thumb, and I was really concerned that I would not be able to read it at arms length. I love it! I can read it from 5 feet away with the larger font and 3 feet away with the smaller font. The video shows a test of the screen, first line is Odometer, second is trip "A", third is temp and forth may just be a status line (change oil, refuel, who knows....). Then the screen displays and counts a fake RPM in a small font to show the refresh rate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOXfHDY5oS4

This picture was taken 36" away...

 

Ok... so as it turns out, the hall effect sensor I'm using can and will pick up all sorts of noise from the coils and plugs Trying to read to RPM off the timing wheel caused it to go haywire.

Back to the drawing board for now.

 

Quick update...

The wiring itself may have been the problem. The bike's ignition is so damn noisy that the unshielded wiring for the signal from the hall effect was picking all the high voltage noise. I'm changing it all over to shielded wiring and trying again.

If I can't get this to work I may just watch the coil primary wiring for the 12v pulse each time the coil charges.

 

Sorry for the lack of progress... I have been testing out ways to filter the tach signal. I have also noticed that the servos I'm using are too darn slow... and kinda big. So I'm in the market for some peppier servos.