Goldy's Flappy Paddles Build Thread

[Goldy]

Quick update :

Spent an hour or so this evening sorting out some of the wiring. I've run the 7 core cable from the ecu to the switch next to the gearlever.

I took the plunge and snipped the wires Stated the car up and took it for a drive, D was overdrive as per the BGB specs when the solenoids are disconnected, so it appears those are the correct wires. The car didn't throw any fault lights which is a bonus.

I've soldered the wires onto the switch and i'll give it a test run tomorrow to see if it works ok to disconnect the solenoids. Hopefully i'm going to lash the box in there later this week if I get chance.

End of this week i'm off to Hong Kong for 3 weeks with work so i'd like to try and get something running before then!

[Paul Woods]

Fantastic progress mate.

[Nod]

Lyndon, I looked into wireless paddles but decided it wasn't reliable enough for gear change. I like the idea of LCD screens in the steering wheel, though I think thats more your speciality ;-)

Works fine on Play Station3 and Wii controllers ;) BT is quite cheap now and given the Transmitter and Receiver will only be separated by a few inches I can't see the signal dropping out.

[Goldy]

I had a revelation last night in bed..... that I had wired the switch up wrong. Yesterday, in a mad rush to get it together before the light went, I had wired the 3 ECU wires to the middle contact of the switch. This would mean that it would be switching the ECU between my control box and the solenoids, when it should be switching the solenoids betwen the ECU and the flappy box.

Anyways the situation was rectified with the soldering iron this evening.


Following that I soldered the 3 wires onto the switch that would connect to the flappy paddle box. After a bit of thought I decided to put the control box in the glovebox for the moment, for ease of access, this means I can update the firmware without having to take too much stuff apart. As well as this there was a handy hole in the side of the glovebox to run the wires.



I thought I should take it for a little test to see if the switch works. As soon as I got out onto the road I knew something was wrong. The geabox was stuck in either 3rd or overdrive no matter what position the switch was in.

I checked the continuity at the switch and ecu with the multimeter, one of the solenoids wasn't connected.... it turns out my colourblindness meant I had wired up solenoid 1 to the red wire instead of the brown. A quick swap round and the second road test was fine. The car works in full auto with the switch off and sits in overdrive with the switch on.... as expected!

I've put the geartrim all back together.... tomorrow hopefully going to get the box fitted and wired up to the power :icon_razz:

[Goldy]

Well..... it Runs!!!!!

Wired up the power this evening, put on a crappy set of switches hung over the steering wheel cowl and drove it round the block. The gear changes are really snappy going up and lockup in 3rd and 4th makes a really difference. Changing down is an interesting experience, when you change down into 2nd or 1st the engine revs dont rise at all, I figure this is because the torque converter only works rotating in one direction so effectively you are coasting.

Next up is to sort the flappy paddles and have a play with the software to see what I can do with the torque converter lockup...

[Paul Woods]

Excellent, the way you describe it sounds like exactly the same results we had when we fitted it to the Camry, almost instant gearchanges! Makes you wonder why big manufacturers have had problems in the past getting good gearchanges?

[Maxim9]

Interesting, so engine braking isn't used?

[Jiff Lemon]

Next up is to sort the flappy paddles and have a play with the software to see what I can do with the torque converter lockup...

Just a thought chap, but what about making the normal gearlever have a secondary position where it can do up/down shifts?

[Maxim9]

Can the shift mechanism be modified so the shifter shaft can move to the right or left? It might not work depending on the linkage and how the transmission knows that the shifter is set to drive. Because of the way the shifter work it might only work with the kind of configuration below of a Jeep Commander.

This shifter is cumbersome because a single shifter left or right is used to Initiate Manual mode, then a second shifter is needed to actually shift. Very problematic. If the MR2 shifter were modified to work like this one then there would have to be something to keep the shifter in the middle, and of course the switch would be need to switch the modes so that a double shifter isn't needed to initiate the manual mode. If the switch could be moved to the shifter itself it might work out well.

But I like the paddles since they'll likely require less modification to get installed.

[Goldy]

For me personally it's all about the paddles! My mazda had the stick shift and it was ok but you can't beat the buttons on the wheels in my opinion! Plus I think it might be a massive pain in the arse to make up a shifter that would fit.


Maxim, there is absolutely no engine braking whilst the torque converter lockup isn't engaged. I need to figure out a way of locking it up in every gear even when braking but making sure the car couldn't be stalled. I'm thinking we need a speed and revs signal...