Cost effective split lap timer/DAQ system

Kevin Butler · **Posted:** Sat Apr 15, 2006 4:43 pm

I'm wanting some way of monitoring my lap times while in car, if not record them as well for later analysis.

The AmbIT is too pricey for what it does, and it only works if there is an up to date AMB system running.

I kinda like the Traqmate, but it's pretty pricey. Forget the Race Technology stuff - it must be made of unobtainium. There's the BlackLine Fuel system that has promise, but at present, it can only record, it has no display for real times.

The Ultra-Lap does the same thing as the AmbIT for about half the money. It is triggered by a trackside infrared light, I think. The Hot Lap is pretty similar to the Ultra-Lap, but is a lot more bulkier. I hate to spend the coin they go for when I know I will ultimately have something like the Traqmate

Right now, I'm inclined to hold off and save up for the Traqmate. In the meantime, I may velcro a kitchen timer on the steering wheel. :shock:

Kevin Butler · **Posted:** Sat Apr 15, 2006 5:02 pm

I copied this over from the GPS thread from the lounge.

Donnie Barnes wrote:

I honestly can't imagine trying to do what you want that way. The units like the Traqmate and Race Tech DL series use accelerometers along with the GPS to get the data they get, and without the accelertometer portion, your data isn't going to be very good at all. Combine that with the fact that I simply can't see a PocketPC lasting long in a race car environment, and I think you have your answer.

I've used a Traqmate and it was okay, though not great. The biggest drawback for me is that you either have to hook a laptop up via a USB cord basically to the cockpit -or- remove the brain to download data. It's also limited in data amount to just a couple hours at reasonable data rates, which I also don't find acceptable. Oh, and it the one I used had a very stupid "feature"...when the memory *did* fill up while on track, the display just went to "MEM FULL" and wouldn't keep at least giving me cockpit lap times. Very stupid.

I've got a DL1 on order, which I understand also has a couple of annoying shortcomings (though I'm not sure what they are *yet*). But it does use CF for storage, and a 2G CF will store three days of data, so it should handle a complete 13 hour enduro at VIR. Plus you can yank the CF and swap it quickly if you want your data but don't have time to download *now*. Also, and this is the best part, the DL1 works fine with autocross whereas, at last check, the Traqmate did not (though they are promising support, they have been for months).

I really hadn't considered using any kind of timing system for Autocross, though it wouldn't hurt. The present objective is to have a way of telling if one lap was faster or slower than the previous at HPDEs. I'm hoping it will enhance the learning process on track. A recording GPS/Accelerometer system would be icing on the cake...and I got a bit of a sweet tooth.

Donnie, what are you going to use for a display on the DL1?

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Sat Apr 15, 2006 10:31 pm

Oh boy...this could take a while.

First, the Ultralap is okay, but not great. Note that the receiver and display units have a fixed length cable and no plug between them. I don't believe it's backlit, but I've only used mine on gokarts (and thus out in the sun). It uses one AA battery that's located in the receiver end, so don't go physically mounting that somehow that makes it hard to change the battery. The battery level indicator is useless...they just start going wonky on you when the battery is dying and you'll think it's broke. Change the battery and it works.

I've seen some weirdness that I can only attribute to vibrational issues on the karts. That said, every race car I've ever been in was a pretty harsh vibrational environment, too. I'm not sure the Ultralap's machined aluminum casing is a good thing since it helps transmit vibration. I've had them apart and there's no damping inside...the pcb's are hard mounted to the casing. I've had one actually go bad, and they did not replace it. I sent it back and they repaired it and sent it back to me. They did a very fast turnaround, and their hq is in Atlanta, so UPS ground is one day.

Personally, I'd stay with a Hot Lap for in-car use. While bigger, I like the plastic casing better for that application. Never had one go bad on me, but I've never tried one on a kart (and couldn't due to the size, really). Also note that many DAQ systems will let you use a hot lap as a trigger, which can be nice. I know the Traqmate, in particular, can "miss" the start finish from time to time. It seems to not be great at hitting it if you set it somewhere where the track is wide and you end up running a much wider line once or something (like passing at start finish). Had that happen, and find it quite annoying. But I don't think the Traqmate can take the Hot Lap trigger. I believe the DL1 can.

I didn't order a display for the DL1 because I currently plan to use it for autocross only, and if I use it for road racing then I'll just use a Hot Lap or Ultralap for my in-car timing needs and just load data later. If I get a display, it will depend on what car it's for and what I plan to do with it. It's unclear just how programmable the displays are from the web info available, so I'm hoping more documentation comes with the unit itself on that (or I'll try to find someone that's used the displays...just wasn't an issue right now for me).

My recommendation would be to try to find a used Hot Lap from someone and get that for now. Then save your pennies. Past that, I'd still recommend the DL1 over the Traqmate, personally. While it doesn't have the display, I think overall it is better technology and the company seems to be putting more resources into continued development. The Traqmate folks left a lot to be desired as far as support on their own forum, IMHO (of course, I haven't seen a forum at all for Race Technologies, but they just seem to have a lot more development going on).

There's a Hot Lap on eBay right now ending in 2 days that's at $122. *shrug* I'd bet you can find one around $125 or less if you scour some racing boards.

And I'm still pissed about that "MEM FULL" thing not giving me laptimes during an ECR, dammit. So I'm probably a bit biased.

--Donnie

Graham Jagger · **Joined:** Fri Aug 29, 2003 12:53 am **Posts:** 1718

Another option is Datacam. The Datacam2 version will plug right into an OBDII port to collect data.

Datacam2

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Sun Apr 16, 2006 11:14 am

Graham Jagger wrote:

Another option is Datacam. The Datacam2 version will plug right into an OBDII port to collect data.

Datacam2

I've got one of those, too. *sigh* Yeah, I know, I know.

Anyway, the good and bad...the model with accelerometers is okay. The biggest problem with them is that OBDII is 9600 baud, which means the data rate off of it is pretty low. My understanding is there is no way to "request" multiple data pieces. So the Datacam2 must request RPM, get RPM, request speed, get speed, request throttle position, get throttle position (it gets brake data, but that isn't available on OBDII...you have to wire to your brake light switch for that, so that piece of data doesn't affect sampling rate). So, given that, you can actually tell that your sample rate is fairly bad if you're stepping through video frame by frame trying to discern where you're getting on the gas, what RPM you're in, etc. They talked about doing a version that would let you configure to only get one or two of the three params, but I don't think they ever did that (which would effectively up the sample rate significantly).

The other drawback for me is that you *have* to run video. Since there's still no cost effective solid state recording device, I find that pretty annoying. I have gotten to where I hate messing with camcorders and tapes. But if you're used to that and don't mind *and* you are already using (or don't mind buying) an external camera, the Datacam2 works well. You can't use it with *just* a camcorder because you have to "pass through" the video to get the overlay to work, and I don't know of any camcorders with a pass through setup (though most have a camera input). The RaceCam from Northeast Microelectronics is by far the best camera I've used. I've got a ConeCam as well and while I *think* they've upgraded it lately, I get a *lot* of white balance problems with it and NEVER get that with the RaceCam. Again, spendy.

I've got a Datacam 200 (I think, I'll have to check) system with the Spec Miata wiring harness that's never been installed in a car. If anyone is interested in buying one of those, let me know. I'll verify what I have and sell it for a good bit cheaper than a new one now. It's the same basic concept as the Datacam2, but it's for pre-OBD cars. Post here or email me if interested. If I go back to using video, I'm going to get the VOB module for the DL1 so that I can more easily sync the video with data (and get a solid state video recorder).

I'm gonna hold on to my Datacam2 as it may be useful in cases where I don't want to move the DL1...at least once I also have a solid state video recorder.

One thing I have also noticed...you *need* to mount these boxes to the car more rigidly than just with velcro. Some kind of strap that really cinches it down is a requirement...well, at least if you're using the accelerometers. In absence of that, you see some really awesome lateral G's...like spikes of 1.9 and such. I'm pretty sure our Spyder wasn't *really* seeing that many G's and attribute it to the fact that the box would sling over on it's side a bit and abuptly stop when the corner of the box hit the base it was mounted on (effectively levering over using the velcro as a tilt point...obviously more velcro would help, but I just think to get *good* numbers you want that sucker rigid).

--Donnie

Kevin Butler · **Posted:** Sun Apr 16, 2006 2:12 pm

I did a little looking in the SpecMiata forums. Some folks felt that the HotLap and UltraLaps were sensitive to working properly on bright days. One guy said he switched to a MyChron Light TG and hadn't had any problems since. They're all closely priced at under $250.

http://www.laptimerholders.com/products.asp?cat=21
http://www.racerpartswholesale.com/hotlap.htm

I guess what's bugging me the most right know is how to mount the reciever on a hardtop equipped Miata?

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Sun Apr 16, 2006 2:46 pm

Mine is on the rollbar on the passenger side pointing out the open window.

--Donnie

Graham Jagger · **Joined:** Fri Aug 29, 2003 12:53 am **Posts:** 1718

That's a little dissapointing to hear Donnie. The Datacam2 looked like a nice little package. Since the C5 already has acceleromters and monitors yaw rate etc.. I was hoping that tapping into the OBDII port would make it a simple configuration. I did read about the need for a lipstick cam to tie into the feed back to a camcorder. That isn't a problem since I already have a Sony VHS-C camcorder mounted to the bar. I've seen video from a C5 with 4 lipstick cameras multiplexed in and the output from the Datacam. It looked pretty slick. I guess ODBII output was never designed for real time data acquisition. Maybe one of these days I'll try one.

Graham

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Sun Apr 16, 2006 6:11 pm

AFAIK, all cars have accelerometers now, even if they don't have traction control. That's what they use for airbag deployment. I've never heard of that data being published via OBDII, though. And as you said, since it wasn't designed for DA, it wouldn't matter if the data were published, because it simply isn't published fast enough.

I was always surprised that brake data wasn't published via OBDII as well. I think it would be nice to have a brake pressure sensor along with accelerometer data since with both those you could tell better the subtle differences between how two different drivers jumped on the pedal. Some folks get to it hard but are still smooth with the application, where some folks just hit it too hard initially. That woudl be easy to prove with brake pressure sensors, but isn't as easy to prove with raw accelerometer data.

I would like an OBDII module for the DL1 just to get throttle position data with. It's easy enough to just install a real RPM sensor, and if OBDII is just being used for the one data set, it is just fast enough.

--Donnie

Rich Anderson · **Posted:** Mon Apr 17, 2006 8:06 am

Donnie Barnes wrote:

I was always surprised that brake data wasn't published via OBDII as well. I think it would be nice to have a brake pressure sensor along with accelerometer data since with both those you could tell better the subtle differences between how two different drivers jumped on the pedal. Some folks get to it hard but are still smooth with the application, where some folks just hit it too hard initially. That would be easy to prove with brake pressure sensors, but isn't as easy to prove with raw accelerometer data.

--Donnie

Brake pressure data is generally gathered by the ABS computer. While some cars may have an integrated PCM that has ABS and ESP in one unit with the engine ECU, I don't think that is typically the case. Clearly there is some talk between the two units, as evidenced by some cars doing less than desirable things when the brake and fly-by-wire throttle are simultaneously activated, but I don't know if brake pressure would be required for that. I imagine that there would be a way to capture that data, but as I understand it, there is no universal protocol for ABS controllers such as OBDII for PCMs, so essentially you would be on your own. There are analog brake pressure gauges and I am sure someone with some technical savvy could easily figure out how to log pressure data. Just four more channels needed in the data-logger.

Marty Howard · **Posted:** Mon Jun 26, 2006 1:54 pm

What about Some of the ones suggested:

G2X by RacePak
http://www.g2xtreme.com/main.htm

Geez cube

Karl Shultz · **Posted:** Mon Jun 26, 2006 2:49 pm

Kevin - I'm not sure if you're after the same information I was after, but I researched GPS-based DA systems for quite some time before going with the Traqmate. My findings, along with those of several others, are here:

http://www.roadrace-autox.com/bbs/forum ... 51&start=1

(Might require a login, not sure)

I was down to the Traqmate and the G2X. I think the G2X is more feature rich, and the dashboard is a superior display to the traqmate's for sure. But the large Traqmate presence here in the Southeast, especially at the SCCA club races I race in, was too big a factor to ignore. Being able to compare llaps with Bowie and the rest of the fast ITA guys was too much of a draw for me to pass up.

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Mon Jun 26, 2006 4:56 pm

Well, I just wanted to add a little more fuel to the fire. I've now used my DL-1 for several Solo events and I also let Eric and Chris use it at the last Sanford event. In the middle of all that, I used a Traqmate again at CMP for the double SARRC (I rented a car from OPM and they have them standard as part of the rental).

The Traqmate is definitely more widely used in SCCA Club Racing in these parts, so if you have someone in a similar car to share data with, well, it's a good option. If I were in Karl's shoes, I suppose I would have done the same thing.

That said, if you *don't* have anyone in a similar car, I'm more convinced that the DL-1 is better technology. The software is *much* more powerful, IMHO. It is quite a bit more expensive, though, when you consider that to be apples-to-apples you have to buy the DL-1 *and* a display (DL-1 has no display standard). That said, I talked to the Traqmate guy at CMP over Memorial Day and he said they are *still* planning to add autocross support to the Traqmate in the "next version." But he said that on the forums about a year ago, too.

Because there's no Solo support in the Traqmate *and* because you don't need a display for Solo, the DL-1 is definitely dominant among soloists. There are quite a few folks at national events that have them now.

--Donnie

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Mon Jul 17, 2006 9:32 pm

Another update...I did my first "hard" install of a DL-1 into the Spyder over the weekend. Used a radio install kit from Crutchfield as it was a cheap non-hacky way to get power, plus I wanted the plastic mounting bits to put it in (light, cheap, and functional). That also put the DL-1 in a very convenient place for seeing the status lights, hitting the start/stop button, and grabbing the CF card.

I also decided to poke at the wiring diagram and find the right wires to get RPM and throttle position into the DL-1. Found them, ran the wires, and tested it today. Worked like a champ! I just did a quick test today and got graphs of throttle and RPM and can view those against graphs of any other data I want. I am *digging* the DL-1 a *lot*.

Next up I plan to install a shock position sensor on a shock and collect data, but that's going to have to wait until after my Denver/HPT trip. I also hope to install a brake pressure sensor. Will be neat seeing braking differences between drivers.

--Donnie

Kevin Butler · **Posted:** Sat Jul 29, 2006 10:17 am

Here's a cost effective offering that employs a pocket pc running OS no older that WM2003.

http://www.maxqdata.com/MQGPS.htm

Has anybody seen this application show up at the track?

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Cost effective split lap timer/DAQ system

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