Thread: 2008 Impala SS - The Connected Car

It's just another AGM, but I had to laugh at its "More Power than a 100 Farad Capacitor". Der!
But be warned, apparently smaller caps will melt HC800s etc! (I've borroed that one from someone else's jest about misapplied specs.)

And please be wary when paralleling batteries - especially AGMs.

As to extra batteries, although unlike audio systems you may not worry if the alternator cannot keep up, keep in mind a bigger battery merely extends reserve time, and they still need to be recharged. (And AGMs do NOT like remaining discharged.)


UPDATE: I removed the former opening line "I just got a notification for this thread for reason unknown (subsequently deleted perhaps?), but I checked out that HC800 battery".
The reason is now known.
Some git changed my displayed order for reverse chronological. It's a great feature - provided one remembers to go to top of page 1, not bottom of (last) page 3!!

It may only power the DFG45 for 24 hrs, but it should power the sheeva for 2-3 days with no recharging. Tidder mentioned he knew of someone who had two of the kinetics blow up on him. That makes me kinda nervous.

I'm also seeing major dimming happening with my system even though bass isn't up loud, it still will dim randomly. I will need even more power from my alternator to charge this and my main battery.

On another note, I took apart one of my keyless remotes that will serve as the automatic door locking/unlocking starting feature which I'll configure based on the proximity of my phone. Here's what it looks like inside. I'm not any sort of expert on electronics. Any suggestion on how to go about hooking it up would be great!





I want to hook this up to the fusion brain for control.

Should be easy-peasy. You'll solder a relay to each side of the keypress and have the fusion brain trigger it. Those little squiggle things are both sides of the circuit. When you press the button, it just closes the circuit and the device triggers. By putting a relay on the solder points, when the relay closes, it will unlock the car.

Try it by bending a paperclip in a U shape. Then, go out to the car and bridge the solder pads with the paper clip. It ought to unlock the car.

I did this when the fusion brain first came out, used reed relays & soldered to a board. also added a voltage regulator to drop down to 5v for the tiny relays... easy

I have the same working right now for my garage door opener. The door lock wires should be fairly easy to access though, so you might be better off going directly to the car's wiring rather than the key fob as key fobs are expensive.

yeah, for just door locks they can be interfaced directly without going through an rf fob. I did mine to give me lock & unlock, window up & down, electric sliding door open & close & startup/shutdown.

So something like this:

That *appears* right - solder one wire to each pad. You can test it out with a digital multimeter set to check continuity. Put one lead on each of the pads and press the button squiggles. You should get continuity when you do that.

I took apart the sheeva today. I'm powering it via the DCDC-USB power supply from mini-box. I've got it configured in automotive mode, NEVER HARDOFF, and 5V output. Perfect for the sheeva. Just like other mini-box PSUs it'll hardoff when the battery drops below 11.2V.

Yesterday, the stock battery on my impala died. I replaced it with an optima yellow top. I also picked up one of those kinetik HC600's on ebay for $60.

Here's some pics of the sheeva "unplugged" :P