I have looked for the pad spacing in the documentation but was unable to find it. I will measure center-to-center on the pads, but I won’t be with the VIM3 for several hours.
I mentioned that excessive heat could damage the PCB, but this is true for practically any modern PCB. If you have experience with soldering, it should be OK. However, if you are new to soldering, I would try to find someone with experience, or an electronics repair shop, to solder leads on to the XPWR pads for you.
Proper tools and materials should be used, such as flux+electronics solder or solder paste, as well as a temp controlled soldering iron or hot air. That being said, someone with soldering skills could do it with a regular pencil type soldering iron.
If you have an interest in soldering and you have the tools(not expensive), it is not so difficult. Plenty of Youtube videos to help learn soldering, I assume. Find some old disposable electronic devices and practice soldering until you feel comfortable about your ability.
I have no experience with the silver adhesive you linked to. Personally, I would be reluctant to use an adhesive. Among other things, adhesive could complicate rework should the area need work. Devices mounted in a mobile environment can be subjected to vibration, impact energy and sustained high heat, I have no idea if that adhesive would hold up well in that situation. If it conducts adequately, it might work, while I would not try it, the decision is yours.
Anxious to watch as your project advances. Layout looks great.
thank you for the advice. I have some experince with soldering. The $100 i paid for the board makes me doubt myself. I will try though.
I must say this has been my best “forum” experince.
Looking very nice so far.
Some firmwares on other devices I have will allow you to hide system or notification bars in settings. Maybe this feature can be added by Khadas to their next VIM3 firmware.
It maybe possible to modify the build.prop file to hide them, but I do not know how.
Maybe @goenjoy can offer you some guidance.
It may be that a custom firmware(ROM) by superceleron has the feature, I can’t recall. I will try his ROM on my VIM3 and check for it. It will be tomorrow night before I can do it. If you are curious about his ROM, see here.
As for the soldering, remember to first tin the leads and the pads, that will reduce the amount of time needed to heat the joint. If possible, set your iron to just above the lowest setting that melts the solder you have. Low temp solder and also low temp solder paste are available.
I have developed an issues.
Sometimes my screen trys to rotate?
Some of my gauges are turned 90° and I can’t select them for deletion.
Can you give me advice on what setting to check?
I had already swapped to the superceleron ROM when you replied with the app name. So I tried it on his ROM. I installed the lite version and I have no OBDII device, but it seems to run correctly. I added some gauges, dials, and graphs. When the app is first started, some of the added displays start in the wrong orientation but they quickly rotate to the correct orientation. This can be seen in this video, note also toolbar can be hidden.
In the app at Settings/Settings/General Preferences there is a setting for Auto rotate. It appears set by default, perhaps turning off that option will resolve your rotation issue.
I had no trouble deleting displays in superceleron’s ROM.
I will swap the firmware back to the latest Khadas Android 9 and see how the app does there.
@tschultz Brand new VIM3 Android firmware from Khadas. See release notes here.
how do i check my firmware version? and if needed. how do i update it?
“captin super noob” I know. super new to this and very excited to see it to the end. Im very thankful for all the help, and video! thank you for your time!
I have installed the new Khadas Android 9 firmware.
Go to Settings/More Settings/Device Preferences/About, scroll to the bottom, you will see “Build”, the version is listed there. Likely it will be similar on the firmware you have installed now.
A couple of methods exist to install(flash) firmware on the VIM3, those are in two basic categories.
1.) Using a PC, a USB-C to USB-A cable special software and an image of the firmware you wish to flash.
2.) Making a Burning Card to flash the firmware using a micro SD card.
Some methods are available for both Windows and Linux(Ubuntu).
Have a look. OK if you need assistance, we all start somewhere.
By the way, the latest Khadas firmware has a setting to remove the status bar(the buttons at the bottom). The setting can be found at Settings/More Settings/Device Preferences/Status bar control.
Also the Torque Lite seemed to work as expected, but you recall I have no OBDII device for deeper testing.
that was short lived. now the app just hangs up and quits. it frezes the VIM3 before it quits too.
its 3am here, had a long day, calling it quits for the night, going to be very unhappy! Maybe i will wake up to some good news?
Deleted the app. Downloaded the .apk file for it and it seems to work well. I got a layout done last night, and let it run when I was sleeping. Woke up and it’s all good.
The one thing I can said that I don’t like is it has seemed to resize the screen? The bottom and the right side are cut short of the edges.
The screen rotation in the app only makes it worse.
I will update again when the actual screen shows up and I try it there( not in the house on my big screen.)
Glad you were successcul in loading the new F/W. My fault, I should have(and usually do, was oversight) mentioned data would be lost after upgrading firmware, my apologies.
For the future, Khadas Krescue can be used to backup the entire eMMC including user data and settings, so one can always get back to where they were. Also an app called Titanium Backup can save/restore user apps and data.
Does the app resize the screen or is the effect also in the GUI? If it is the latter, in display settings there is a setting called Screen Position, it can scale the screen to fit in some cases.
Did you work out a solution for the XPWR pads already?
I don’t believe the app resizes? I have run it on my phone(unlocked BLU vivo XL4) and a tablet(Samsung Galaxy E tab. It didn’t.
It almost feels like the x and y sensors are try to be used by the app and the VIM3 doesn’t support it? Not sure, talking from an end user point of view.
I just ordered a new soldering iron
As far as how it functions is still kinda of in the air. The DEI528t will work, I just need a delay timer and a second DEI528t. One will pulse with power on and close the contact, the second will have a delay timer that will pulse a second one when the circuit goes low(no power) for a second contact closure when I turn the key off.
In my head the works, on paper too?
I will order the couple of parts I (think) need. If it works I will posts part numbers and what not.
But I still cant wait for it to be in my truck!!
