Those look really nice!


The ricer in me wants to know if they can be had in illumination other than blue, though.

 

They apparently are switchable between blue and white illumination. Instructions say to just hold down the button until it changes, but mine don't appear to do this. I like blue though..

Still fishing for suggestions for how to easily mount a temp sender in the trans

-Ryan

 

I just got the Longacre SMI Gauges installed. I am quite fond of them so far. I also added a cheapo digital voltage gauge sourced from amazon.


Going to add a water pressure warning light and call the gauge setup done for the moment.

 

Whats that GPS using doing on the dash? Get that thing outside of the car so you get better reception and have a chance of getting useful data from it.

 

Huh, I never considered that, good suggestion. TBH I've never had an accuracy problem with it where it is. It always seems to lock onto a bunch of satellites and is almost always within .05 of the organization provided amb transponders.

I'll give it a shot in and out of the car this weekend and compare it back to back.

 

The problem is more when you change directions and the windshield and stuff start to block satellites. Yeah you can have a great lock with 7 or 9 satellites, but when you switch from 7 to 9 your position can change enough to be noticeable on the data. Even driving close the the grand stands or whatever can cause it to get weird. People had been having problems with solostorm doing it and thats the conclusion they came to after plotting locked satellites with the rest of the data.

 

Well I'll be damned. I'm headed to the track this weekend so I'll give it a shot. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

Erik, that looks great!

 

Have you ever compared times with and without the GPS? I plan to do the same so I am curious. Also I am guessing you are using Trackmaster or are you using something else on your phone?

 

Yes I have actually. I accidentally forgot to check if my Qstarz GPS was synched with my phone before the first two sessions at WSIR last time I was there. You'd be surprised how accurate the in phone GPS is. It doesn't do a great job of corner to corner data but overall lap times were within .1 to at most .2 of speedventures amb system.

With the qstarz though it's nearly dead nuts if not dead on. And you can actually use the data along with gopro video to see what you're doing. I'm currently using track master but to be honest I think Race Chrono does a bit better job of breaking down sectors and showing more useful data from within their own app.

 

Not gauge related directly, though I love this thread (Emilios suggested crimps and so on are now on my purchase list)

...eerock I love your panel, particularly the usb connection.

The ecu usb cable floating around the cabin (I stuff the end in the glove box) is a small bugbear for me and I love this solution.

Are these panel mount usb connectors commonly available?

 

Agreed on the solder grip heat shrink butt connectors. After reading emilio's post i bought 50 of the things. They... Are... Awesome!

Regarding the radio block off panel. The stuff I used should be readily available down there by you. The USB socket is sold as a USB gender changer. It has a female USB A on one side and a female USB B on the other. The housing for it is metal and the finish is great on it. It's a really trick piece and it's reversible... the way it appears in the amazon link is the way it comes... all you do is take the screws off of it and swap the gender changer around in the housing.

I bought mine on amazon but neutrik is an industry standard for stuff like this so I'm sure they are available down there.

For the other stuff in the panel... the voltage meter is also sourced from amazon for a whopping 5 dollars.

As is the metal momentary switch.

And the two powered usb ports are sourced through china... from ebay. :P
1pc New DC DC Converter Module 12V to 5V Duble USB Output Power Adapter 3A 15W | eBay

All very cheap stuff but it makes for a nice little setup in my humble opinion.

 

Your GoPro phone mount is a great idea! What did you do for the back of the phone part of the mount?

 

Thanks. TBH I use a gopro tripod mount and just siliconed it to the back of the phone. It's had no problems holding the phone tight without vibrating (excessively) and in the blistering socal heat/sun.

You can sorta see how it's done in this picture. This is the previous phone I was using which has since been retired for the large screened Galaxy S3.

 

On my version of the phone mount I connected 2 go pro sticky mounts together and stuck the other one to a broken otter box external hard shell. This requires buying a longer bolt at the hardware store and some trimming/sanding of the mounts to make it work. Could also stick it to an extra phone battery door. Or if its a dedicated phone you could just stick it right on the phone.

 

That's a good call. My initial plan was to do the same... sacrifice an otterbox 2 layer style case that had a hard plastic shell to make a mount. The plan was to source either a truss head or flat head 1/4-20 screw to screw from the inside of the phone case into the screw of the tripod mount. I eventually ran out of time and got lazy and said efff it and siliconed the effer.

 

Yeah I was thinking that picking up a cheap silicone case would work too. Easy in and out.


Thanks guys!

 

For iPod/iPhone mounting in an NA for cheap, hard to beat this:

https://www.miataturbo.net/race-prep...unt-nas-77517/

Takes awesome video and really visible for laptimes.

Doesn't work for NB/NC guys though.

 

On the topic of gauges I got my arduino based ones working. Temps, Pressures and voltage readings are accurate. Also the displays flash when out of spec. I still need to add a master warning light and a few other small changes. The red and yellow displays are readable even in direct sunlight. The green not so much. The packaging is kind of meh but I dont have very good tools for this type of metal work.

 

Ha! Love it!