Arduino, what do I need?

[CorsePerVita]

I have never done this microcontroller stuff. But damnit, I want to learn and I want to do it. Here is what I want to do:

I want to have 2 led readout displays.

1 that visually can show a number of resistance. This will read the resistance off of a sensor on my car (O2 sensor to be exact). So I can see rich/lean.

1 that will visually display a number based off of another sensor that can read temps of up to 150F. Highly doubt i'll need to go that high but rather something like 80-100F.

Is there any good tutorials where I can learn to do this and also, what will I need? I'm good with wiring and not at all intimidated by digging in and going head first into this kind of stuff. Just never done this kind of stuff before on the smaller scale.

[SXRguyinMA]

A good place to start is with something like this kit (http://www.adafruit.com/products/193). As for interfacing with the car there's tons of people that have interfaced their Arduino's with an OBDII system (like this one (http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10039) or this one (http://www.arduinodev.com/arduino-talk-with-car-through-obd-ii/)). And as for interfacing with a temp sensore there's TONS of resources online for reading a thermistor and displaying it on an LCD. You can pick up a 16x2 or bigger LCD screen and display everything on it.

Take a look at my Maximum Security mod. I have the Arduino chip reading coolant temp and flow rate and displaying both on a 16x2 LCD with an RGB backlight. It also handles the door opening and closing functions.

[AmEv]

Second odbii link is dead....

[CorsePerVita]

OBDII wouldn't work, I'm megasquirt EFI standalone.

However, the first link looks tasty. I think I could make something cool out of these:

https://www.adafruit.com/products/335
https://www.adafruit.com/products/176
http://www.adafruit.com/products/193

[CorsePerVita]

Would something like this be more than enough to display multiple functions?
https://www.adafruit.com/products/618

[SXRguyinMA]

you'd be best off with this: http://www.adafruit.com/products/358 as it comes on a PCB which will make things a whole lot easier lol. I've never interfaced with one of those but those LCD's you can set up any way you want them as far as display goes.

Oh, and for using the Arduino with Megasquirt check this out: :D http://www.ay60dxg.com/wordpress/loguino-data-logger/

[CorsePerVita]

So much info... brain exploding... lol I'm seriously trying to sit down and read it and take it in piece by piece but there's so much info. Hard not to be slightly intimidated by it all.

[CorsePerVita]

Ordered a starter kit and the screen I wanted :) Can't wait to get going on this stuff.

[SXRguyinMA]

niiice! A lot of that stuff is way beyond my skill level as well so I know what you're saying :D

[CorsePerVita]

Waiting for my nice readout screen. But so far I'm getting the hang of this.
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd58/koihoshi/yesssss.jpg

[SXRguyinMA]

nice :D

[CorsePerVita]

My new fancy LCD came today. Whipped up some code to get it working and started playing with thermistors. The top two are dummy values so you can get an idea of what it will look like when done. The ambient temperature is fully functional. It needs calibrated a bit more but it's getting there.

http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd58/koihoshi/IMG_20120724_010546.jpg

The best part about this LCD is that with the simple flip of a few tiny switches I can configure my LCD how I want in real time (when it's done anyway).

Not bright enough during the day? NO problem, go blue
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd58/koihoshi/porsche/display/arduino4.jpg

Don't like blue?
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd58/koihoshi/porsche/display/arduino3.jpg

But man at night time that glare kills. Go red.
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd58/koihoshi/porsche/display/arduino2.jpg

Don't like red OR blue? Go to a neutral color, tan.
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd58/koihoshi/porsche/display/arduino.jpg

I can also do ridiculous green, a darker green and a few other colors. Literally think of an RGB combo and you can make it happen.

1 sensor down 2 to go!

[SXRguyinMA]

nice! keep it up :)

[CorsePerVita]

Yeah man this is fun! I am loving arduino. One of my coworkers started a meetup group for it so we had our first arduino hack night last night with 5 people. Learned a LOT.