Data logging for Android

Sun Mar 04, 2012 8:30 pm

Maybe getting a bit ahead of myself at the moment but no harm in planning..

I've come across this Android app, Torque:
http://www.appbrain.com/app/torque-pro- ... owl.torque
Has anyone used it? This particular app comes preloaded with most UK tracks.

Apart from general lap timing and speeds, another good feature of this softare is reading live data from the ECU, and so came across this on my travels:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bluetooth-Diagn ... B004KL0I9I
Again, has anyone used something like this before? I'm thinking this could be attached to a converter for the diagnostics plug on the M52 engine and fed into the cabin, and connect to my phone via bluetooth. Or have I misinterpreted what it's capable of?

What other methods are people using for data logging that doesn't cost a bomb?

A video of it in action:
[youtube][/youtube][/youtube]

Sun Mar 04, 2012 9:06 pm

Have http://trackmaster.trackaroo.com/ trackmaster on mine. Does a decent job I guess, and you can export to your PC.

Mon Mar 05, 2012 12:57 pm

M52 is too old, anything 2007 or newer will just about cope with data output from the ECU. So any app you buy dont expect it to work with your engine telemetry.

Mon Mar 05, 2012 2:55 pm

Jimbob,

That bluetooth diagnostics scanner only works on OBDII cars, i.e. anything post 2001 when an industry agreed diagnostics standard was adopted. Up until that point, there is no common diagnostics standard so cheap diag kit was simply not possible.

This stuff is aimed at diagnosing emissions based engine faults too, so really not convinced it would give accurate enough, frequently refreshed data. That video you link above is very impressive if that is all pulled live from OBDII though.

Personally, if you are serious about trying to datalog a pre OBDII car, I would suggest a dedicated datalogging solution is really the only way.

I use a Starlane GPS-3 laptimer and datalogger. Not cheap, ~£600 and does need some splicing into the car's wiring loom for sensor input, but does work a treat. Synchs nicely with video using a bit of software called Dashware too.

Martin.

[youtube][/youtube][/youtube]

Mon Mar 05, 2012 6:34 pm

Demlotcrew wrote:M52 is too old, anything 2007 or newer will just about cope with data output from the ECU. So any app you buy dont expect it to work with your engine telemetry.

Why is it too old? The M52 ECU gives out most of that live data anyway, just looks to be a case of wiring an OBD2 plug inside the car to me

Mon Mar 05, 2012 7:22 pm

Dan an e46 cannot even output real time data, believe me I've tried, I have all the gadgets.

Andrew

Mon Mar 05, 2012 8:05 pm

There's plenty of guys on the yank forums that are running these on their E36's. It's all down to the quality of bluetooth adapter though, but the Torque development forums highlighted that fact anyway.

Mon Mar 05, 2012 8:10 pm

I don't believe you, the ecus are not capable of live 1/24th or 1/30th or 1/50th of a second data sample, even mega squirt et'al are not capable of this, all they have is a cheap mobile phone diagnostics interface.

Mon Mar 05, 2012 8:16 pm

You're right that it won't be reading at that sort of speed, but for a £20 dongle and £5 app I wouldn't expect that. There are no hard times mentioned on the other forums but it's described as being between 0.5 seconds and 1 second. Granted that's far from efficient but to have a general idea of how everything is performing I'd say that's not bad for £25 worth of kit.

Tue Mar 06, 2012 10:43 am

Jim, the quoted times will be for one channel data feed at best! If you want more than just the RPM or the Speed, or the Narrow Band, or the Injector Duty cycle you will need something a lot more powerful, only the latest modern ECU's are capable of anything remotely like whats shown in the youtube clip above and even then, if you start to monitor more than three channels at a time, the data flow starts to slow down, for real time video data overlay you need something thats capable of outputting at a minimum of 1/24th of a second.

Yeah sure, as a handy pocket diagnostic £25 is a bargain!

Tue Mar 06, 2012 10:59 am

Demlotcrew wrote:Dan an e46 cannot even output real time data, believe me I've tried, I have all the gadgets.

Andrew

I wasnt reading in depth sorry, as far as data logging I agree, its a waste of time, but for useful info/diagnostics then yeah its ok

Tue Apr 03, 2012 7:51 pm

Agree with above, data logging is a pointless investment unless your racing, a proper data logging system exported to an interpreter such as MoTec is however the only way to reliably increase the performance of a car on track, but it costs a shed load of cash, if you want valuable data I can recomend an investment in potentiometers for measuring bump and droop, you can evaluate a lot from this info and if you have a accelerometer fitted in conjunction with adjustable dampers you can make serious gains on laptime. below is data from a dallara f3 that I have been investigating around the old snetterton track, all that was included for telemetry was a g long and g lat meter along with velocity- distance channel

By antonmayo at 2012-04-03