Custom Gauge Cluster for Mazda Miata

By

Benjamin Moehring

Arduino
PCB
Consumer Product

A smaller solo project consisting simply of a custom made PCB running off an Arduino Uno R3 taking input data directly from a Miata's wiring harness and displaying that information through the use of LED bar graphs and 7 segment displays, in essence emulating the style of late 80's car culture and design. The goals of this project were to create a custom PCB and utilize it as the base upon which the cluster would be run and mounted, with it being reasonably durable, accurate and quick in order to survive daily driving while delivering information efficiently and effectively to the driver. Note: As of 8/20/2023, this project is about 80-90% complete, with a few changes to come as well as proper testing on a safely functioning vehicle. Progress for now has been halted by a cracked engine block but work will continue. Plans for the future include a new version of the board itself which will be cleaner and better prepared for direct interaction with the Miata's wiring harness, a 3D modeled and printed front cover to enhance the cosmetic experience of the product, and proper testing and permanent mounting in the Miata it is designed for. All of these and their development steps will be posted on this page as they occur.

1 Lifts 

Artifacts

Name Description
Custom PCB Requirement Video A short video showing a functional custom PCB designed and constructed entirely by me, displaying a startup animation I coded showing what it can do.   Download
Durability Requirement Video Earthquake Test style video showing me jostling around the PCB in a way to simulate a scenario in which it has come loose from its mounting or shaken hard by a bump, showing that it will still function after significant impact. Note: There are about 10 prior seconds of PCB shaking before the start of this video cut off due to file size limitations   Download
Refresh Rate Requirement Video A test video showing the PCB running a piece of temporary code designed to run the same startup animation as shown in other videos but edited to run with 5ms delays to show the speed at which it is capable of displaying varying data over time.   Download
Project Roadblock: Engine Block Cracked Unfortunately on the day of testing the device on a real car, the car it is designed to work on was unable to function safely due to a cracked engine block caused by an incorrect ECU being run on it the morning of testing day. This is unfortunate but is simply a small roadblock on the continuation of this project. Updated testing information will be posted here with a new cleaner version of the PCB and testing data from the fixed vehicle.   Download
Arduino Code The program I wrote in Arduino to handle the inputs from the Miata's wiring harness and the outputs to the LED bar graphs and 7 segment displays, along with the starting animation used to display the board's capabilities.   Download
Feedback