Thread: USB Relay Controller

very good idea though

im not adverse to taking my amps apart and removing components anyways

i could then simply wire them up and have the controls at the front of the car or use a regular relay board to control everything.

any ideas for the aircon heater bits though because they are just mechanical

Mount a servo into the pot. That would look a bit odd for sure.

I would be interested in one of these for sure. As long as there is some sort of code that I could enable that shuts off all of the relays when the computer goes off or looses communication. I was talking about this on another thread and this is basically the same thing. I need SOMETHING to be controlled by the touchscreen that will turn on and off certain lights. But for obvious reasons, when the computer goes off either due to me turning off the key or because it froze or whatever, the lights need to go off too...

How much were you thinking for one of these in kit form? I'd personally like a TON of outputs, then I can play (7 is not enough).

Digitial In will be easy - the analog in will be interesting (altho it should be fairly trivial...there's plenty of sample code) I would end up being paranoid and add optoisolators for dig and any random stuff I could think of...

Alot of the PICs have built in ADC.

TheLama: Yeah all of the USB2 PICS have ADC if I remember right.

BMW: Since the outputs from the PIC use USB power to drive the transistors as soon as windows shuts down or the comp is turned off all relays turn off. And I can add plenty more relays if needed.

If I wake up early enough tomorrow I'll try to whip up a board design before work. I'll be using Sparkfun since it seems he has the best prices.

ZAC would all of the relays be on the board? That'd be kick a$$. Also I guess screw type terminals to each relay on there or something thats really secure and clean looking. What do you think this would cost? Also are you going to provide a Visual Basic example program? Thanks!!! -BMW

Yes to everything except the VB - I'm working with the code in VC6...I'm sure someone can port it to VB though.

BTW - Anyone here good with Eagle CAD? I want to do bodily harm to myself while trying to figure out this assbackwards program....

I hope this project will actually get finished unlike the other one that was going very strong and then just died one day. Good luck...

i hope this can be made available at below $40....the dashworks parallel is a good deal, however.....who uses parallel?