INTRODUCTION / 2006+ Bluetooth/iPhone/Android DIY Kit FEELER

[firemoth]

Greetings everyone,

 

First off, I'd like to introduce myself. My name is Chris, and I'm what you would call a "tinkerer", "hacker", "maker", or "enthusiast". I'm also recently returned to the GM/Chevy Stock after taking a 12+ year detour into the world of AMC (Jeeps), and Volkswagen. I'm a father of three, and I work in the Industrial Automation Industry (I teach it). In my spare time I build or "fix" things. After repairing my 2011 Golf TDI for the "nTH" time in a year (only 60K on it and had to spend close to $8K worth in repairs, in one year, due to poor mechanical designs (A/C Failed three times (compressors and RCV, 30K, 45K, 62K), plastic radiator mount broke (killing A/C lines), DPF failed twice (32K, 58k), EGR system failed, Electrical + Window Regulators failed at 30K, I had enough of "German Engineering". I was brought into this world riding in a GM (Olds), grew up with Chevy for my entire childhood, but at 18 I bought my "first" car, a 1985 Jeep Wagoneer. I loved that Jeep, but I drove my grandfather's 1996 Chevy Cheyenne every time the Jeep was down for maintenance (I even learned to drive stick in it.) In the last 12 years I've owned 18 Vehicles (+/- 2), but just recently purchased my first GM in all that time. A 2009 Chevy Suburban LTZ (fully loaded).

 

And I gotta say, I feel like Jake "Joliet" Blues (Blues Brothers) when he "got the message" during the Sermon w/ James Brown. I have never loved a truck so much, at least as an adult. Even with all it's problems. I bought it used, 2 owners, 138K. In the first week and a half I put 1500 miles on it just to "get a feel" for it. Big surprise, the dealer lied/hid a bunch of problems, (intermittent start, faulty air suspension sensors, faulty A/C Blender Flaps, and a few other issues that did not present during the test drive, but showed up less than 24 hours after leaving the lot). Even with all the issues, they still don't overshadow the benefits of this truck. I truly am smitten.

 

This brings us to the topic at hand. Like I said earlier, I like to "fix" things, and the very first thing I found wrong with the truck (besides the mechanical problems), was the input/output opitons of the UQA (Denso DW468100-6601) and lack of Bluetooth + A2DP in the On* VCIM. Also, the Rear Seat Entertainment + Rear Audio Controls only allowed for RCA/Composite Video inputs with no Steering wheel controls, keep rubbing me the wrong way. I understand that this vehicle is 2009, and A2DP was not common in vehicles until 2010/2011, as well as the whole "Connected Car" Infotainment sectors were still pretty niche markets. It doesn't change the fact that in the last few cars I've had, they all had A2DP capability, which I became addicted to. I hate wires in the cab, and I hate distractions while driving. So I sought out a way to fix that. Much to the disapproval of my wife, in the first week I had the head unit torn apart down to the last PCB, the center console was in the garage, and for the last 2 weeks we've been having to commute 300 miles a week with no music. That all changed today. The truck is full reassembled (for now), and it's pretty much back to stock. The only permanent change so far is replacing the rear 12v Aux Output to a dual 5V USB port for the kids' iPods. My workbench however is littered with prototype RGB/TTL + ARM CoMs, deadbugged TI VD231 Transceivers, ESP8266s and an Old 3G T-Mobile USB Dongle.... Eventually, it's all going to be built in to one PCB. Over the past two weeks I've managed to rig up a system that allowed me to stream audio (Pandora) and Video, as well as have steering wheel controls of the Audio, all using the stock head unit and wiring harness.

 

Here comes the feeler. Would anyone be interested in a kit that allowed all of the above in almost any 2006+ GM vehicle? I did some rough cost analysis, and to hit good Benefit-Cost Ratio, I would have to sell the units for about $100 +/- $10 + S&H. That's at a low quantity of 50 units, and about a 45 day lead time once orders are placed. I'm almost done with the CAD work on the PCB, and I have enough parts on hand to build 3 "complete" prototypes. I'll post a video soon, once I get back from a trip this coming weekend. I did a quick search of similar products on the market but wasn't really able to find one that did everything I can do, but if anyone knows of something that can do the same thing, please let me know. I don't want to duplicate efforts or hurt another potential entrepreneur. I basically just wanted to say hello, and pop the question while I had some free time (and was riding the excitement of my own personal breakthrough).

 

Oh, and one last thing. Once the items are finalized/produced, I am going to release the entire source code, schematics, and build-instructions as open source hardware. Either GPLv2 or BSD. This way, anyone else who wants to build their own, or improve on my design, can. I'm only keeping it semi-secret at the moment to protect a potential marketability avenue. Anyone who is in my field could probably build the same thing just going off the current description and a basic understanding of automotive communication protocols.

 

Thank you, and have a great day.

[Doughboy2k3]

Hi,

You should also post this in the corvette and Caddilac forums.

 

 

I have been considering upgrading my 07 Escalade Navigation (Bose) to the 2010 that had bluetooth built in.

With this setup would it be able to connect to my truck. Would it be able to mirror cast the screen from my phone onto the nav screen? (Sony Z3v)

Otherwise I am interested and if would you consider selling one of the two additional prototypes to me? Also I justed picked up a TECH2 with Candi module so if any programming is needed by the dealer it should work.

 

Thank you, Walt

[firemoth]

Hi,

You should also post this in the corvette and Caddilac forums.

 

 

I have been considering upgrading my 07 Escalade Navigation (Bose) to the 2010 that had bluetooth built in.

With this setup would it be able to connect to my truck. Would it be able to mirror cast the screen from my phone onto the nav screen? (Sony Z3v)

Otherwise I am interested and if would you consider selling one of the two additional prototypes to me? Also I justed picked up a TECH2 with Candi module so if any programming is needed by the dealer it should work.

 

Thank you, Walt

 

 

It would be able to connect to your truck, and would work in parallel with the Hands-free bluetooth system built-in to the ON-Star module behind the radio. There is a version of the XM Module that has a "lock" if switched from one truck to another, but it can be disabled/bypassed. If I can get the prototypes into production no bypass would be needed as the PCB would replace the XM Module completely.

 

Screen Mirroring would technically be possible, but touch inputs from the head-unit would not be able to register as inputs on the phone. Also, there currently is not any mira-cast capability in the prototype, as that would require a significant amount of programming to write another layer. The prototype I have currently replaced the XM Radio module, mimicking the GMLAN Low-speed signals the XM Radio sends to the head unit, and vice-versa, I first intercepted the signals by tapping directly into the CAN Transceiver on the XM Module, then used my own system to create a command relation table. It still has a lot of tweaking needed. Like writing a better script that parses the JSON reply from Pandora, and encodes it into a GMLAN/CAN format, so the song title is displayed correctly. Right now I'm doing all of this on an ARM SoC running Debian 7 Linux, with direct GPIO access wired into the XM Module's receptacle so as not to cut the harness. It's rather very "hacky". .... I'm now using a T-Mobile Rocket 2.0 4G Dongle w/ tmo's 1GB Dataplan, this offers unlimited Pandora streaming for $10 a month + whatever else I can fit into that 1GB quota for streaming.

 

With all of that said, this would NOT require any reprogramming by the dealership or via a Tech2+CANDI. In fact, I didn't even have a TECH2 when I started this. Some other points to mention too, right now multipoint bluetooth pairing is kinda wonky with linux and the GM's Handsfree system. The Broadcom Bluetooth module in the truck is only Bluetooth 2.0 (some are 2.1), Multipoint Bluetooth was not introduced until BT3.0, so I have to do some more trickery to get it working smoothly, and your device has to support at least BT3.0 (which most now support BT4.1 standard).

 

As for the hardware: I am using a development board from AW-SOM.com with an Allwinner A20 SoC, running Debian Linux 7, An ESP8266 Serial to Wifi board to allow remote data-logging of the system, and could also be used to potentially lock and unlock the car via wifi, but I won't get into that at this time. For bluetooth I'm using a standard BK8000 Stereo BT4.2 Module. (That's another thing, the audio source from the XM Module is only Stereo, left and right channel, all SS/Dolby is mixed and split in software via the BOSE.) Internet is provided by the T-Mobile Rocket 2.0 4G USB Dongle, or via Bluetooth + Cellphone. Steering wheel audio controls are handled by the aw-som dev-board's onboard CAN Transceiver. Video is tapped into the AUX Input via an RCA Cable hacked up, right now the only videos that can be played are locally stored movies on the 32GB SDCard, they are then selected via a drop down on the ESP8266's web-server, this is because the Linux Devboard is not hooked up to display the console/desktop via it's HDMI output. Video is piped to the RCA via an RGBTTL cable I made, and a Command Line Interface command is sent to display the video via mplayer to screen1 (screen0 is HDMI), screen1 has to be configured via a FEX file..... it gets kinda complicated from here. I'm only giving people the list of hardware that I'm using in the prototype so that if they wanted to build it themselves, they could. I was premature in offering the prototypes for sale, after testing mine for the last couple months, I've found a lot of deficiencies and issues. (Sometimes the GMLAN packets get corrupted and garbage is displayed, or steering wheel inputs get lost. The issue was a bad connection.) Also, the audio stream would not disconnect when an incoming call would come in, still working on that part. I'm thinking about completely removing the video and wifi as an option. Its pretty convoluted and would take a long time to write a smoother software interface by myself. Trying to stick to the K.I.S.S. principle (Keep It Simple, Stupid). What do people want the most? Bluetooth Streaming with Steering Wheel Controls and Song Title displayed on the head unit. Which is what I think I'm going to focus on.

 

It's better to do one thing REALLY well, instead of 5 things half-assed. I'll post another update when I feel more comfortable with the design. I'm sorry for posting the teaser earlier. I was just so excited I got it working, I immediately thought of how I could monetize it without considering the effort involved in fine-tuning it, or how the user experience would be perceived.