1 Topic by Bored Engineer (edited by Bored Engineer 2023-08-17 07:01 PM)

  • Registered: 2023-08-15
  • Posts: 1

Topic: Pit Engine Notification and Information System @ Autobahn

Had a very pleasure-full time at Autobahn this weekend. Humbly spoken but also widely reconized, it was all about our quite impressive Pit Engine Notification and Information System.

Trademark is Pending. Investors accepted to enlarge operation. No onlookers, skin-in-the-game is a must.

https://cdn.myportfolio.com/bde5626e0caad05156b5f979e7014f75/01b544f7-6f6f-478f-aa0a-9551c8284a8d_rw_1920.jpg?h=6d12766af2fe3da3554387cc4811d40b

youtu.be/ZfYyofqdvOk

Feel free to express your creativity as youtube comments if you like what you see. I know you do.
(edit: You will say: "But not many are in, it looks pretty empty, deserted." It's better to be an early adopter, trust me.)

  • It's very ergonomic to grab, fills well a hand. You can literaly hold it all day long, shaking it around, without getting tired. It is a 3D printed design so you can also modify dimensions to better fit your body. We are all about inclusivity, to have all in.

  • It has your attention in a timely manner and with an unambiguous message every time. Today through audible warnings, vibration mode under dev.

  • It holds for at least 10 hours without a break.

  • It feedback's information: Temperatures, Rates, all to allow a full performance diagnostic during the act.

  • Max. blindspot window at Autobahn from pits was at about 14 seconds without any clear Line Of Sight. If you have it from a higher place, it works better (3 seconds from expectator hill).

  • Testing showed white body easily shows wear, so we'll quickly move to a darker one.

  • You can take it all around. RV, restaurant, bike ride,.. It would inevitably become visible in the bathroom and I couldn't help noticing it did draw folks attention. "Wow.. what is that!?!". Yeah.

Video is not so much over my gear as I also don't want to throw that at your face too hard. So mostly good (questionable) old (but I feel young) racing (or so they say around here).

A.K.A. (pre-rebranding): LoRa Backup-Comms and Telemetry System. All hail to Jay for the far more proper Lemons-fit branding now. Joe enabled all to take place, so more thanks to him as well (therefore also the proper channel for the Fun Police in you).

Thank you. Congrats for the event and participants. The crazier the car the more unbeliveable and fun it was to race against you.
(I did not find that "Alpine" in the participant's list to give it proper credit. I must say it was my favorite build and with proper driving.)

  • Registered: 2013-11-15
  • Posts: 673

Re: Pit Engine Notification and Information System @ Autobahn

I have been playing around with something similar, but I sure have P.E.N.I.S. envy now.

Team whatever_racecar #745 Volvo wagon

3 Reply by rozap_ (edited by rozap_ 2023-08-21 01:31 PM)

  • rozap_
  • Ripened Lemon
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  • From: Olympia, WA
  • Registered: 2019-01-21
  • Posts: 128

Re: Pit Engine Notification and Information System @ Autobahn

I love the packaging, it looks really idiot proof and rugged. We've built a similar system and the basestation side is plugged into a laptop which displays timeseries graphs and does alerts and stuff, except the dog kept getting tangled in the laptop power cord and pulling the laptop off the table. We have a tall mast antenna that we mount to a teammate's very tall truck, which has helped a lot with the occasional LoRa blackout.

Our P.E.N.I.S has saved our engine from certain death multiple times, as the the water pump belt routinely makes unscheduled exits from the engine bay. The alert noise is the windows 98 error sound, in accordance with our theme.

I'll be adding GPS and an IR tire temperature sensor for the next race.

BSOD Racing, 1987 Fiat X1/9
  • Registered: 2020-07-15
  • Posts: 22

Re: Pit Engine Notification and Information System @ Autobahn

Awesome! We've also built our own telemetry system, which we call "TeLemontry". We've been using it successfully for several years and it's saved us several headaches.

We use a LoRa backhaul, generally with a yagi to get solid coverage. Features include GPS, accelerometer, predictive lap timing, all sorts of sensors (oil temperature, oil pressure, water temperature, water pressure, fuel pressure, front brake pressure, rear brake pressure, throttle, fuel level, battery current, alternator current, radiator fan state, low-brake-fluid-level sensor, and more), TPMS on all wheels (for temperature and pressure), a connection to the car's ECU (which we use mostly to be able to monitor/clear codes), and drivers for both our fancy RGB door boards and our RGB edge lights. All data comes back to the pits at a 5 Hz update rate, where we have a PC-based data viz system.

We also have pit-to-car features to be able to control the RGB lights from the pits, push race status info to the driver (position in class, next car ahead, previous car behind, official lap timing, etc.), and show short text messages to the driver in case we lose voice comms (e.g., when [not if] one of our drivers unplugs his earbuds).

New for the upcoming true-24 is an updated car-side board plus a full-color dash-mounted LCD.

Here's a photo of the new version of the car-side board on the left and the old one on the right:

https://www.keacher.com/files/dir11/new_vs_old.jpg

(Telemetry fist-bump!)

Jeff

Turbo-Encabulators -- 1999 Mazda Miata -- Winner overall, BFE GP '22, runner-up a bunch of times
  • rozap_
  • Ripened Lemon
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  • From: Olympia, WA
  • Registered: 2019-01-21
  • Posts: 128

Re: Pit Engine Notification and Information System @ Autobahn

That looks pretty advanced. What is the part number for the brake pressure sensor you're using?

BSOD Racing, 1987 Fiat X1/9
  • Registered: 2020-07-15
  • Posts: 22

Re: Pit Engine Notification and Information System @ Autobahn

rozap_ wrote:

What is the part number for the brake pressure sensor you're using?

We're using a couple of the AiM 0-2000 psi sensors, as they're physically compact and we already have many of them on our other cars (and thus spares).

Jeff

Turbo-Encabulators -- 1999 Mazda Miata -- Winner overall, BFE GP '22, runner-up a bunch of times