FAQ: Hacking Your Steering Wheel Buttons to Control Your PC

**dmcdlrn** · 02-23-2006, 03:52 PM

thats a little extreme and unlikely to fit... but your right... resistance is resistance... so the only issue would be if the resistance is too high or too low through your car thats when that PAC wouldn't work for you.... if you really truely believe that they are not just BS'ing you to not deal with it then look to something else... I personally would still go with the I/O interface... I wish I had a working solution to say... see.. it works, but I don't. I still am 99.9% sure that it will... fundamentally there is no reason it wouldn't.

**BlackStealth** · 09-08-2006, 01:43 PM

In case a fellow VIA SP13000 wants to try out the PAC SWI-X solution, don't bother. The SP13000 doesn't have enough CPU muscle to decode the infrared consistently. I first tried out using a serial infrared cable designed for winlirc, with a winlirc server running in the background and winlirc plugin for girder. This setup only would respond if no music wasn't playing. Useless. Then I replaced serial infrared cable using an igor version elminating the winlirc server layer altogether. This made a dramatic improvement, but only worked 50% of the time. My fast AMD desktop computer had no problems or hiccups. The best solution for VIA SP13000 owners is to purchase CarButtons as it requires very little CPU overhead.

If you have fast CPU and interested in going with PAC SWI-X solution my serial infrared cable (igor version) is available. Just Private Message me.

**JasonWW** · 09-08-2006, 10:05 PM

I'm using the serial Igor IR reciever as well. What's funny about it is that if I use the remote control that I used to program the PAC with everything works smoothly when I hold down the volume up or down buttons. When I hold the same buttons down on the steering wheel the PAC either spits out the code too fast or too slow and causes a jerky response. So I usually have to tap the volume buttons which I don't like. Keep in mind I'm using the older PAC SWI-2. The newer SWI-X may not have this problem.

I've got plenty of CPU grunt so I don't think that's the issue, but I think I'm going to try the USB-UIRT and then use my one serial port for the XM radio controller cable.

**Simon123** · 10-11-2006, 04:15 AM

I haven't had the money to make this a priority, but this guys site says he sells a keyboard emulator that is designed to interpret resistance changes directly into keypresses. It's about $90 shipped from where he is to the states but looks likes its plug and play if your front end accepts key inputs.

- madhacker.org -

**Gredd** · 11-21-2006, 12:42 AM

I have the resistive network buttons in my saab and I get a voltage signal from 0-5 volts dependning of buttons pressed. I will use a LM3914 LED driver IC to translate the voltage into different pins. Those pins will go into optic couplers (right word?) instead of LEDs and the outputs will be used as switches for a hacked USB keyboard. I'll let you know how it ends up. Total cost will be like 15 bucks or so.

**Bugbyte** · 11-21-2006, 12:57 PM

That sounds very cool! Please post a how-to if you get it working.

**Iceman_jkh** · 11-21-2006, 08:13 PM

Gredd> I had the same idea. And even bought all the parts. I then wired the outputs (LEDS) from the 3914 to some transistors which then outputted to the pins on a USB keypad interface. (ie: it pretended to trigger a keypress). Trouble was, the 3914 output rises/falls to the final value. So if the output is LED6, the 3914 will light LED 1...LED2...LED3...LED4...LED5.. then finally stopping at LED6. You can place it in DOT mode, so that it only lights 1 LED at a time, but that still doesnt stop it from lighting the LEDs in order as it makes its way to the final value, therefore triggering all the keypresses along the way

. Perhaps if you put a cap inline with each LED output it would reject any signal with too short "ON" time, but this would be a trial and error design. You would have to find the balance between a proper keypress ON time and the rise/fall sweep ON time or it would ignore your actual output value as well.

In the end I purchased an LCD8/8/8 phidget - has a million more features, easy to program and has a cool little LCD

**Gredd** · 11-21-2006, 10:27 PM

90 bucks for a phidget

Are you using the outputs connected to the keypad or is it able to directly produce keyboard data?

**Iceman_jkh** · 11-21-2006, 10:59 PM

I think it could produce keyboard data, but I'm actually getting it to talk directly to Roadrunner - it depends how you code for it. It cost me about $200 Aus

, so $90 should be peanuts for you mate

**JasonWW** · 11-22-2006, 08:39 AM

Has anybody gotten PC control on a car using the GM style single wire system?

I would like to be able to control RoadRunner, but I really don't know anything about Phidgets or that USB controller over on madhacker.org.

How do you tell the interface what signal should do what?