Champagne

A two color design would be much harder to implement. We are trying to keep the costs down while still coming up with a lighted control panel. That is one of the reasons for making our own buttons.

That will give us the opportunity to modify and customize the faces, to offer different options. But, said buttons are lit from behind with a LED that lights both the halo around the button and the pictograph on the face.
We can make it any color, but only one color.

Paul

User 040621

how about this for the temp symbol.......pulled this from Google images......

Champagne

WOW, I personally like that a lot

Thanks

Paul

blown 87

With a arrow to show which way to turn for hot and cold around the outside, like in the older Volvo's.

shmark

Here's a thought. Can you vary the color of the LED that lights the temp ****? So full heat is red, full cool is bright blue, and it fades between the two? Means mid-temp will be purple.... It could be something as simple as a filter attached to the back of the **** with a red/blue fade. Purely mechanical solution.

BTW first time I've posted to this thread, looks fantastic. Got a solution for the early cars yet?

Alan

Like this (more or less):

blown 87

Yes, the label could have a tapered red and a tapered blue arrow with the sun and snowflake symbols.

Alan

So Paul semms you have merged the defroster vent and DEF mode on a single button - how do you anticitpate this will work? double press for DEF or a longer press for DEF? something like that?

Then cycle somehow Off -> defrost vent -> DEF -> defost vent -> Off etc

I assume the footwell and defroster vents buttons work independantly so you can have neither, one, the other or both on at the same time ?

Alan

Champagne

I think that's the winner

Thank you kink Sir

Paul

Champagne

That is pretty much it.
Hans will chime in with more details, he is the one working on the board.

Paul

hans14914

Hi All. Sorry for the delay, I was out working on the remote waterpump project. Special thanks to Brett Jenkins for coming over and lending a hand.

To answer several of the posted questions, particularly Alan's:

Yes, the defrost vents and defrost mode both use the same buttons. Pressing the button will toggle the defrost vents on or off. Holding the button for a 5-second count will engage the defrost mode as standard per normal porsche operations (overide all other existing settings). Pressing the button again will toggle, as per normal, so turn it off. There are two status LEDs for this function. One amber/orange and the other red. Red denotes the defrost mode (if you couldnt tell it was on), and the orange color is just standard vents on.

All modes are independently selectable. You can have both defrost and floors as well as recirc and AC all on, all off, or anywhere in between. The only function that will defeat all other modes is the special "factory" defrost routine.

Having a stationary center is possible, but will greatly increase the cost of the design. It would require gears, cam/spring and switch combo, or concentric shaft mechanism. As cool as it would look, I think the final cost would make it un-marketable. The simple solution around this would be to make a custom button that would essentially be a round rockerswitch that pivoted on the center-line. This is possible, and would essentially function the same way a rotary encoder does, and after you look at the costs between making the button, and buying the rotary... it may be about the same cost. We cant fully develop both, so Paul and I will have to discuss it tomorrow.

I need to do some further work on the PWM fanspeed control, so that is the next major task. I need to find a combination of frequency/duty cycle to make the control of the fan linear from the input. I am thinking about simplifying the code, and only doing 20 steps of 5% increments for fan control if I cant find a linear combination naturally. In order to do this, I need to measure the actual speed of the fan itself, so need to rig an optical tachometer type device to log input-vs-output. I would like to get started on this over the weekend if the budget allows a new hardware purchase.

Thanks,
Hans

rayfinkel

Hans,
Your my hero!

If my next child is a boy his name is Hans! Ah heck, if its a girl her name is Hans too!
Well maybe I should discuss it with the wife first.

Alan

Hans - I understand - but I'm convinced this is a bad design choice.

The DEF mode needs to be immediate - no delay. Functionally for me this is a critical requirement.

DEF is really to defog the windshield when it mists up badly. This can happen almost instantaneously under certain conditions.

This has happened to me - From perfect clear screen to completely fogged in perhaps 2 seconds. This is a super scary thing and is exactly what DEF is designed for. It really has NOTHING to do with DEFROSTING the windshield where 5 sec may have been quite OK (despite what you all think - e.g. there are far faster ways to defrost/deice).

Consider - when you are going at 70Mph and suddenly can't see anything - 5 seconds is a long time and also very very long distance...

When you need DEF you needed it 2 seconds ago... you can't afford to wait...

Alan

svpmx83

Agreed, defrost should be independant and immediate.

S4ordie

I like Alan's idea as well except it is not symmetrical. Make the icons for cold and hot larger put at 9:00 o'clock and 3 o'clock then put curved arrow above pointing to the right for warmer and the same arrow reversed, pointing to the left for cooler. Upper arrow is red, lower arrow is blue.