Affordable Power Distribution Boards - suggestions?
 

After 4 years of competitive racing in our road legal "Wee1" it is finally time to get a bit more serious and take it off the road, remove a bit of weight and simplify things.

Wiring loom, headlights, heater and controls etc. all going but would be nice to not have the traditional relays, fuses etc. I see some very nice but expensive Power Distribution Boards around.

The Cartek one looks really nice but at a Thousand British Pounds is ideally not in the budget we have in mind and a bit overkill....landed in NZ with freight, tax and $ conversion would be close to $3k.

Anyone have any suggestions for a more "miata" priced entry to mid level option?

For reference, here is the Cartek one....

POWER DISTRIBUTION MODULES & ACCESSORIES - Cartek Automotive Electronics Ltd

I have been looking at either the HP8440 or HP8441 from HP Electronik

Thanks for the suggestions.

These look well priced and interesting. 6 circuits are probably not quite enough for everything. Though I wonder if we used one for the engine side - main ignition, Ecu, fuel pump etc and had the driver controls like rain light, windscreen fan etc. on a 2nd unit or just wired traditionally.

I don't understand why technically but presumably you can't just keep adding modules on the same power circuit.....(that would be too easy and cost effective :) )

So you CAN run two together without issue?

Annoyingly on further contact with the rule makers of the new class we have to run headlights, indicators, brake lights etc SO we have decided to retain the loom and keep the car road legal.

Have removed lots of unused wiring and tidied it up somewhat and no power management.

However if anyone is comsidering a cost effective PDM solution take a look at these.....most would require two units but they look pretty cool. Bluetooth configuration up to 20amp per circuit,. 6 circuits with indpendant on delay, amp setting, virtual blow x times until full "blow"....

Amplink | Rowe Electronics

• 60 Amp total capacity
• 6 High current 20A outputs
• Programmable amp limits
• Output current monitoring
• 3 programmable Input triggers
• Bluetooth control and setup
• Battery tender circuit
• Rugged and waterproof

6 circuits is more than plenty for a race car. Theseus had 5 circuit breakers distributing power to everything. IIRC I had all sensors, the ECU, wideband, and dash on a single breaker. All of those are low amperage draw, no need to break them out onto individual circuits (not even the OEM does this). Second breaker was fuel injectors, purely for ease of diagnostics, as they could be shared with ECU very easily. Third breaker was dedicated for coils, wired inline with the kill switch and ignition switch. Fourth was fuel pump. Fifth was cooling fan. A Coolshirt system would be how I'd use the 6th circuit.

so at around $250.00 US it is probably good value, once proven.

Though they are used on lots of high end sport bikes, BMW's, Ducatis etc. and they tell me on race cars as well......so you would think they would work as described.

The Amplink is the (more expensive) successor to the PDM60 that I posted. I am using two PDM60s in my new harness, and multiple units can be ganged just fine. The Amplink is much nicer in terms of relay logic than the PDM60, but I already owned two of the old units. I also like the status lights of the PDM60 more than the Bluetooth of the Amplink :)

My car is still under the knife at the moment, but one of the units has served some time in my street car, and they are quite robust.

Yes thank you, it was your post that set me up looking at them.

I was all set to buy 2 of the PDM 60 but the manufacturer talked me round to the Amplink as it offered a higher amp capability per circuit (20a versus 15 from memory) and indpendant startup delay that can only be shared across all the circuits on the PDM60.

Either would work well I think. im pretty dispaointed to have to go back to OEM wiring to be honest...because race car :)

https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/...15/142/f6c.jpg

OK, call me out for necro'ing this thread, but I think it's better to have all this info in one place.

I've been looking around for an affordable, CAN-enabled PDM for my K24Z swap. The PDMs above are still available and still not exactly what I'm looking for. The AIM PDMs are nice, but way too expensive. Heck, everything is too expensive!

But I think I found something... the Eaton mVEC

It stands out to me for several reasons.

1. Offers 30A on each channel. My MK60 ABS module, in the original configuration, is powered by two separate 30A circuits. It would be nice to power it from a PDM like all of the other "race" functions.
2. Big honking input studs. Nuff said.
3. Outputs via connectors, not loose wires. Ain't nobody got time for loose wires.
4. SAE J1939 messaging. That makes it compatible with a lot of CAN keypads and other stuff.
5. Enough circuits to run the engine completely independently of the Miata wiring system.
6. $300 from Waytek, plus connectors and terminals and stuff.

It doesn't have great heat resistance, so I think it'll have to go inside the cockpit, probably in the passenger footwell to keep the output wires short.

My concern is that it uses ISO 280 micro relays. These seem like tiny little things, especially when you consider the OE Miata relays.

Is my concern overblown? Have I missed anything that I should have considered before I drop some coin on this? Anyone running one of these?

Not solid state though. After building our first solid state, programmable relay & fuse Miata in 2011, it's hard to go back to mechanical switches.
Been a while since I looked, but I do recall at least one solid state option on the Waytek site. Not automotive specific but cheaper than a Cartek, Smartwire or the like.

https://www.waytekwire.com/images/it...EC-46066_f.png

The Aim PDM32 is the best deal I've seen for a real racing PDM. I thought the pricing had to be a pre-production typo at first.

A normal Aim logger dash (MXL2, MXS, etc.) is $2000-2600.

The PDM32 with an MXP display, same GPS and logging capabilities as the other logger dashes, AND full PDM functionality is $2199.

The relays and fuses aren't solid state, but they are CAN controlled, I think that compared to something like the AIM, you lose insight into the current going through the circuits and you also give up the ability to set circuit breaker values and do smart breaker resets like "reset three times and fail on the fourth time".

I'll try and find that solid-state option on Waytek.

In the context of buying a whole AIM system, I guess the pricing makes sense, but it totally blows my already-in-the-mirrors budget. There are only so many times I can close my eyes and pretend I don't see the bottom line on my Amex statement before I click "pay"...

Haha - I went to WayTek and this is what greeted me...

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...ee515e7d28.png

Lol. "all your personal data are belong to us"

I'm a huge fan of the Moristech P12 PDM. Not cheap, but an absolutely amazing unit.

https://www.rywire.com/Moristech-P12...istech-p12.htm

Good catch. I've seen that one before, but I did not realize their P14 is CAN-enabled...

Moristech P14 PDM

I have the P12 and the computer interface and controls are amazing. Like Emilio said, once you go solid state, it's hard to even consider anything else.

FWIW, we're incorporating a Haltech Nexus R5 as part of our K24Z3 swap in Vegas. At a scary $3900, it's not cheap. But it is an advanced ECU, PDM and data logger all in one. So, very counter to the theme of this thread.
Good motorsports capable ECU is going to be $1500 min
solid state programmable PDM $800 min
data logger with GPS, accelerometer $400 min

That's an $1100 difference and three different software programs to wrestle with vs one. Then you have to get those three components talking to each other via CAN. Then you have separate patch harnesses to connect everything, possibly running dual sensors where CAN coms aren't possible.
Big picture, I think its ultimately a better value to go big now since we're doing the harness from scratch for the new engine anyway.

https://www.haltech.com/product/ht-195000-nexus-r5-vcu/