2024 July Update

-

 Center Console Progress

So I had spent quite a lot of time designing, printing, test fitting, modifying, and re-printing all of the various parts of the center console for the Nova. After many different iterations, I finally have a working candidate. 



I am not sure how many hours I spent designing and tweaking the 11 individual segments of this thing, but I believe it was worth it. 



The shroud section is made up of 5 segments, each with two 10mm thick flanges on each end that use three M4 bolts to hold it tightly in alignment with the other pieces. There are also arched reinforcements on the bottom that are molded to the floor to add additional support.



The top is made up of 5 main segments, plus 1 additional segment for the cup holders. Each of the primary 5 segments are held together with a dovetail joint, and then it snaps firmly into the top of the shroud, held in place only with friction. I do need to add some sort of snap/clip based retention mechanism for the final product, but friction is working just fine for right now.








I also 3d printed a fill panel for the stock radio that holds 4 rocker switches.... well 3 rocker switches and a voltage gauge/dual USB charger. I also managed to get a dual USB passthrough bulkhead port that fits into the volume/tuning knob openings perfectly. 

The way I have this setup is that the top USB port is a pass through to the instrument cluster, which has my Android Auto integration. The bottom USB port is a pass through to the Pioneer head unit for their weblink integration (which sucks to be honest). I have a USB DAC hooked up to my instrument panel that outputs the audio into the AUX input of the Pioneer head unit to provide all audio. So I can have my phone plugged into the top port of the USB bulkhead fitting and connect to android auto for my maps, amazon/youtube music, etc. I can also plug my phone into the bottom port for the weblink based casting. 

I will say that weblink is probably the worst automotive integration I have seen. Simply opening the app and immediately turning your phone off will result in your phone's battery being completely drained in about 2 hours. Any time you use the weblink app, you MUST be certain to kill the weblink process on your phone after you are done. This was a horrible oversight on their part. The touch screen integration is ridiculous, as it does not even maintain the correct orientation with the phone... it is always rotated 90* from what it should be, and there are zero settings you can use to adjust that. Finally, weblink is a simple mirroring protocol.... so if your phone's screen turns off, the head unit goes dark. 

Anyway, right now the whole setup is printed out of basic Overture PLA, which will not stand up to the heat/UV over the long term. But with its fast printing it is an excellent prototyping material and it is working extremely well for my testing purposes. With this first V1 iteration of the center console, I am going to use it for the rest of the summer and figure out what I would like to change for the final design. Once I am happy with the changes, I will print the final thing out of either ASA or CF-Nylon.

Three changes I do want to make already are:
  1. Adding a holder for the cell phone in front of the shifter, so I don't have to waste a cupholder to hold my phone
  2. Add a dual port USB bulkhead (that hooks to a 5v 5A buck converter) on the very back of the shroud so the kids can charge their devices
  3. Make the cupholders 5mm larger in diameter so my water bottle will fit














Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2023 mid-year update

-
Image
I have done quite a lot in the time since my last post. Electrical, electronics, interior, lighting, and more. I did get the LT4 completely installed and running, and it runs  extremely  well. It also gets 25-27 mpg while cruising on the freeway, which is just astounding. LT4 and 8L90e installed and functional Shortly after I got the LT4 swap completed, I needed to replace the headlights because I simply could not see anything after dark, which made for one rather stressful drive home one night. So lets start out with:
Read more

Upgrades complete! Time to upgrade!

-
Image
So, previously I acquired a pair of billet 72mm turbos to replace the cast 67mm ones that died. Teardown of the 67's The Teardown: Teardown of the 67mm turbos showed that the passenger's side turbo was oil starved. Upon closer inspection, I realized that the oil feed adaptors I was using were actually oil restrictors. On top of that, the passenger's side one was clogged with only about 25-30% of the oil flow able to get through. I believe the source of that clog was from when my Fram oil filter came apart and sent parts of the paper element throughout the entire motor. So I am actually pretty impressed that the turbo lasted as long as it did. Most of the damage was to the bushings within the turbos, which ended up depositing most of the material onto the turbine shaft. The Rebuild: I wanted to save these turbos, as we are building a turbo LM7 to put into dad's 67 cutlass. So first was to see if we could get the turbine shaft back into spec. First step was to mic out the
Read more

I was going to do some welding today, but. ....

-
Image
Well I had planned on working on the nova today and finish welding up the AC/Heater patch panel on the firewall and maybe even some intercooler piping, but we had a bit of an accident at grandma's house after luca's baseball game. Grandma was pulling some tools out of her shed for me too take home, when we hear a bang and Riley crying. Riley comes around the corner and his shirt and entire right side of his face is covered in blood.  Apparently he was chasing Luca around the living room and ended up running directly into the door frame of the kitchen, which has no moulding. The corner of the sir frame hit him right above his right eye, splitting it open all the way down to the skull. So needless to say we rushed him to the ER. After the initial shock of being hurt, Riley returned back to his normal, hyper self. He had blood running down his face but wanted nothing more than to get down and chase Luca around the ER and play with all of the neat medical instruments. The only ti
Read more