New in car PC

MatBat · Post by **MatBat** » Sun Mar 20, 2005 7:58 pm

Well, I have finally got my incar PC setup
though using a video out the quality is not great.
though fine for DVDs

The trouble I am having though is interference on the screen and in the sound, I think it's associated with the power.

Murf · Post by **Murf** » Sun Mar 20, 2005 10:43 pm

sound wise,is it like alternator whine?
might be a ground loop, have you got all your gear earthed at the same earth point?

MatBat · Post by **MatBat** » Mon Mar 21, 2005 12:00 am

yes, power is taken from the battery, and the earth is to the battery

Murf · Post by **Murf** » Mon Mar 21, 2005 12:14 am

have you tried putting a noise supression capacitor across the terminals of the alt? richard suggested this in the past!

Jamo · Post by **Jamo** » Mon Mar 21, 2005 1:52 pm

MatBat wrote:yes, power is taken from the battery, and the earth is to the battery

You really want the earth on the car body no the battery, also what gauge wires are you using?

You'll want ground isolation loops on the alternator and on the RCA leads as well

SanPhire · Post by **SanPhire** » Wed Apr 13, 2005 4:12 pm

Issues of noise are an arse in these cars!
As my lecturer is fond of saying it's a hostile environment (I'm frickin hostile when handling electronics on the 480!!!)

A few hints- Ferrite beads are cheap as chips - slip them onto every wire going in and out of your PC - they add inductance to the wire - filtering out high-freq noise.
Suppress the altenator, plus the heating and cooling fans with a ceramic (non-polarised) capacitors across the terminals - also RS/Maplins etc sell noise supression blocks to push into the power supply lines to remove noise from the car electronics for ICE installs.
You can also buy shielded ignition leads next time they need replacing. They help lots if you don't have them already.

Ground your power to the car body as near to your pc as poss to avoid picking up extra noise from the engine bay through the earth cable. A really good earthing point helps.

Still getting noise? Twist a thin-insulation copper cable around the power cable while it's in the engine bay and then ground it at both ends. This creates a farraday-shield which will shield RF interference being picked up from sparks/injectors/ECU/CEM etc. as nothing is properly shielded in the 480.

If it's still getting through then you're in dire straits - but not that suprising as the electronics in the 480 were designed by the devil - so I'd say next step is to move the battery into the boot, or better still, fit a second battery (i.e. a Lesiure/Caravan) battery that trickle charges off the main battery and then use that to power the PC.

Good luck my friend - and good on you!

martinholmesuk · Post by **martinholmesuk** » Wed Apr 13, 2005 4:16 pm

Mat sold his incar pc setup.

Was kool while he had it.

catgroom · Post by **catgroom** » Thu Apr 14, 2005 8:51 pm

Why is it better to earth ICE to the body as opposed to the neg terminal of the battery.Always wanted to know this one!!!!!

Steve.

Im sooooo chuffed with my new Alpine

Jamo · Post by **Jamo** » Thu Apr 14, 2005 9:48 pm

catgroom wrote:Why is it better to earth ICE to the body as opposed to the neg terminal of the battery.Always wanted to know this one!!!!!

Steve.

Im sooooo chuffed with my new Alpine

Because the car is negatively ground, grounding using the car body allows better flow of current back to the battery (unless you use 0 or 2 gauge amp on the amp to battery).

Simply put more free electrons in car body due to greater surface area of metal.

Using a cable back to the battery cause a bottleneck and you normal get noise on the amps during playback.

For best results you want the shortest possible length of ground cable to the car body, normal within 18" or shorter if possible.

If you want a technical explanation search the web.

SanPhire · Post by **SanPhire** » Thu Apr 14, 2005 11:00 pm

Yeah - think of the car body like a massive wire returning to the battery - gives less resistance/capacitance and other nasties than a wire back to the batt.

/ALSO/ wires running through the engine bay should be avoided if you can. They pick up so much interference from the ignition/spark plugs and the four odd computers these 480s have it be horrible! <<Volvo once got slated from health and safety bods for the amount of electrical noise in their cars... they said the S40 was worse than mobile phones>>

/ALSO/ heavy guage, good quality wire for ICE power is expensive!

Red · Post by **Red** » Sat Apr 30, 2005 11:19 am

Hello!

now i have one car-pc too, it was a lot of work but im very happy withe the result

martinholmesuk · Post by **martinholmesuk** » Sat Apr 30, 2005 1:09 pm

wow! That really looks awesome! Is that a infocenter on the screen??

Jamo · Post by **Jamo** » Sat Apr 30, 2005 5:21 pm

Is that real or a photoshop job?

Red · Post by **Red** » Sat Apr 30, 2005 6:52 pm

thx, yes its a 480 infocentre skin which i made for the car-pc software, in the middle of it is a small 480

and yes it is a real job. does it look unreal?

Website · Post by **coyote1980** » Sun May 01, 2005 9:09 am

Red wrote:does it look unreal?

It looks too good to be real

Nice job, can you post more photos? And give a little more info about the setup? As in, what can you do with it?

SanPhire · Post by **SanPhire** » Sun May 01, 2005 7:05 pm

So pretty - me wants, me wants
Is it hooked up to the electrics in the car? How did you do the interfaces? Printer port? USB? Tell us all my friend!

Big Brother · Post by **Big Brother** » Sun May 01, 2005 8:56 pm

Adam Wants

Adam is going to get

Red · Post by **Red** » Mon May 02, 2005 6:27 am

Here is a pic of the mainpage:

and here is the carpc in an old cd-changer housing:

the setup:
via epia m1000@1200mhz, 7" touchscreen, 256Ram, 30gb hd, slim dvd-rom, onboard sound and grafic-card, gps-antenna.
i`m planning to get an additional sound card to improve sound quality and a rs-card for connecting it to lambda sond etc.
still to do: ir-port and fixing the heat problems

Adam Wants Adam is going to get

ok i`m warned

SanPhire · Post by **SanPhire** » Mon May 02, 2005 11:25 am

So very sweet.
New summer project!
Is it powered off a mains converter, or have you got it running from 12+ DC?
You;ve done a wikid job fitting the screen into the dash!
Tell us all, we are leaches for information on pretty gadgets!

pol · Post by **pol** » Mon May 02, 2005 11:47 am

That looks fantastique! Do all the functions on the interface work as they should?

pol

Volvo 480 Club Europe

New in car PC

New in car PC

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