Tuesday, December 23, 2014

R19

News:
  • HV Fitness is now an additional analytic
  • Resistance measurement (new PIDs required)
  • Orion BMS support (select it in the options) 

  • Near-critical (10% difference) cells are now highlighted


Saturday, December 20, 2014

R18

New version available:

  • HV Battery Fitness: check your HV battery health
  • New PIDs for battery fitness: read the FAQ
  • Battery Block chart



HV Battery Fitness

The HV Battery Fitness sheet gives an overview of the battery block behavior

For every battery block, the following parameters are reported:

Avg Bias: every block value is compared to the max value of the whole battery. The difference of the block value from the max value is called Bias. This is the average bias over all the trip. This should be as little as possible. High bias may be a clue of a faulty block

Max Bias: maximum observed bias in the whole trip. A high value suggest the block is fluctuating more that the others

Highest Voltage: highest voltage the block has reached. At least one faulty block has been observed having both the highest and the lowest value of the whole battery

Lowest Voltage: lowest voltage the block has reached. Deteriotated blocks may have lower voltage than the others

Std Dev: standard deviation from average value: Blocks that fluctuate more have higher deviation. This is another sign of anomalous behavior.

Avg Local Delta: each block value is compared to its neighbours

Max Bias @stress: this bias is measured only when the battery is used with high current values. This should give a measure of how well the block behave under load.

Max Resistance: maximum measured resistance. Degraded cells may have higher resistance.

%Time @MinV: Time in the whole trip, the block was the one with the minimum voltage. This parameter filtered on delta above 0.2V, as lower values are considered not significant.

Max Est. R: maximum estimated resistance

Avg Est. R: average estimated resistance

Red and green highlight best and worst blocks for every measure.
Orange values are within 10% of the worst value.

Other measures are related to the whole battery:
Long sequences of delta values above various thresholds are primary suspects of impending battery faults, as explained in this article: http://artsautomotive.com/publications/7-hybrid/140-predictive-battery-failure-analysis-for-the-prius-hybrid/

Required PIDs:

HSD3:
"Batt Pack Current Val"
"Battery Block Voltage -V01"
"Battery Block Voltage -V02"
"Battery Block Voltage -V03"
"Battery Block Voltage -V04"
"Battery Block Voltage -V05"
"Battery Block Voltage -V06"
"Battery Block Voltage -V07"
"Battery Block Voltage -V08"
"Battery Block Voltage -V09"
"Battery Block Voltage -V10"
"Battery Block Voltage -V11"
"Battery Block Voltage -V12"
"Battery Block Voltage -V13"
"Battery Block Voltage -V14"
"Internal Resistance R01"
"Internal Resistance R02"
"Internal Resistance R03"
"Internal Resistance R04"
"Internal Resistance R05"
"Internal Resistance R06"
"Internal Resistance R07"
"Internal Resistance R08"
"Internal Resistance R09"
"Internal Resistance R10"
"Internal Resistance R11"
"Internal Resistance R12"
"Internal Resistance R13"
"Internal Resistance R14"
"Temp of Batt TB1"
"Temp of Batt TB2"
"Temp of Batt TB3"

HSD2:
"HV Battery Current"
"HV Battery Block-01 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-02 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-03 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-04 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-05 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-06 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-07 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-08 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-09 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-10 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-11 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-12 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-13 Voltage"
"HV Battery Block-14 Voltage"
"Internal Resistance R01"
"Internal Resistance R02"
"Internal Resistance R03"
"Internal Resistance R04"
"Internal Resistance R05"
"Internal Resistance R06"
"Internal Resistance R07"
"Internal Resistance R08"
"Internal Resistance R09"
"Internal Resistance R10"
"Internal Resistance R11"
"Internal Resistance R12"
"Internal Resistance R13"
"Internal Resistance R14"
"HV Battery Temp 1"
"HV Battery Temp 2"
"HV Battery Temp 3"

While not strictly necessary, additional PIDs like Speed and SOC, may give a better overview of what's going on, as in this investigation.


Monday, December 15, 2014

Monday, December 8, 2014

Torque Log Analyzer needs you!



Android programmers wanted!



Torque Log Analyzer has been appreciated by several dedicated hybrid drivers around the world, and I'm willing to try the next step: bringing the level of analysis featured by my Log Analyzer to a real time, on-the-road application.
While I'm able to do some programming, I'm completely out of the Android development world, so I'm searching for an experienced developer willing to join forces on this project.
Here is a brief statement of work: if you're interested, get in touch with me.

Abstract
The standard dashboard of Toyota Hybrid cars show only minimal information about the car status; the base version of the new Yaris even lacks the battery level indicator.
An Android app can show car parameters that are missing from the standard cockpit with the aim of improving your driving.

High level draft
The app should read data from the CAN bus of the car by using a standard Bluetooth adapter.
The app may be a Torque plugin or standalone, if it has the ability to read CAN bus directly.
In case of a Torque plugin, the app should be able to add a predefined set of custom PIDs to the ones Torque already has.
PIDs and trigger values are specific to each car model, PIDs for Yaris, Auris and Prius are well known and already available.
For the ease of user experience, there should be an app version for each supported car.
Those versions may come from the same source code, just compiled with different defined constants.

Results
The app will display at least two sets of values.
Real time values:
  • Battery charge value
  • Engine coolant temperature
  • Current from battery
  • Brake usage (friction pads or regenerative)
Statistical (or cumulative) values:
  • % time of engine off
  • Km run in EV mode
  • Number of brakings
  • Braking efficiency

Code license
I'm not a professional programmer and I'm not planning to earn significant money from this.
As this is just a hobby for me, I favor the option of going open source for this project and releasing it for free on the market.
Different options may be considered. If a paid version is considered, I'm willing to evaluate how to share revenues based on the contribution of each of the parties involved.

Sunday, December 7, 2014

The missing cockpit

It's my opinion that, for the sake of simplicity, the current Toyota Hybrid cockpit is missing some valuable information for the driver.
Even the touch screen, that would be the perfect place to show more data, maybe out of an advanced mode, has little use.
Here is a Torque layout that shows what I consider the minimum useful info:

  • RPM: see if you're running on petrol or on battery, and when you're riding a sweet spot.
  • Battery State of Charge: as the Yaris charges the battery during the S1 phase, make sure you don't park the car with a full battery.
  • Battery Current: useful during the S1 phase, to check if you're demanding too much power from the battery.
  • Wheel Cylinder Pressure: check if you're braking using pads and thus wasting energy that would be recovered by the regenerative braking system.
    Note that the chart widget shows 10 seconds of history, so you can check braking performance later, without putting yourself in danger while driving.
  • Coolant Temperature: the S1 phase lasts at least until 40, and this guage will help you measure effects of winter radiator cover.