So your friend tells you he just got this awesome new parking camera installed. "Bro...you gotta get one....You gotta bro." So, backup cameras are useless mostly, but I could use a curb camera and a front view camera to keep an eye on my freshly replaced lip:




Those side vents are nice...It'd be a shame if somebody cut some carbon fiber to size and installed a camera in there:



That front grille needs more holes:



This car now has hella relays all over...as in Hella waterproof relays:



You gotta run your wiring through stock locations bro. You know it:



Remove the bootleg Chinese power connectors from the camera and replace with waterproof ones...and also waterproof the RCA connectors more or less.



USB relay with some small changes...a diode a day keeps the usb relay at bay?



Oh wait the front grille is off. Time to fashion a bracket and install this big *** Bosch Aegis IR illuminator:



Anyway back to the cameras. Throw a multiplexer on the rear SAM to combine video from the cameras. Look at all that space just waiting to be filled. Oh, use some sort of video noise suppressor...all those RCA cables and power wires together will have noise.




Wait....what about the rear bro...needs more lasers. I mean Audi had a fog light laser thing on their cars at some point. Aight...time for a trip to Home Depot. Hmmm...



Oh look the laser mounted itself on an adjustable custom bracket...



This might actually work. Needs a water proof plexiglass window.



Look at that...painted and windowed and everything.



Time to make some speed holes in the rear bumper.



Make some holes in the spare tire well as...well. That thing is a huge piece of fiberglass...plastic thing.



Epoxy the hell outta that laser in there. Can be removed and adjusted from the top. Nice. Also, make sure the wiring is clean. Nobody likes messy wiring.



hehehehehehe.



So yeah...cool. Time for a break and make sure the parking cameras work when you throw it in reverse...and you know...obviously you have to be able to turn them on from the HUD as well. obviously.


You know what tho'...that front night vision camera case is an eye sore.



Time to 3D print one and make it look nice...maybe replace that rain sensor cover altogether.



Gotta color match it to that anthracite interior. It would've been easier if it was black...but what can you do.



Time for some tape and some trim and it's ready to go back up. Oh Harbor Freight industrial strength super glue is the ****. Get some...use it.



Well that's a definite improvement




Well till next time when I'll have a better video of all this crap in action

***Disclaimer: Pictures above may not realistically depict the countless hours spent designing, 3D printing, coding, testing and making all this crap fit together and work properly.

 

Awesome additions! What was the hole in the rear bumper for? What does the laser do?

 

The rotors are great so far. Their ceramics and rotors leave me never guessing on brakes. Had a really hard stop behind a guy in the rain the other day cuz he decided he didn't wanna go that way anymore and I stopped easy peasy. Slight squeak sometimes but eh it's ceramic. And apparently I don't have one of it installed but I think that's a lie. Lol but this is the final product photo the guy sent me. 2 months after it was supposed to be done.

 

You are outdoing yourself again. I love it.
Innovations in action. The 3-d printer has really made project engineering within reach.
Your garage looks more like a university research lab but we all have our hobbies.

Keep it up Bro

 

Haha thanks. It's like a lab just lately because I'm focusing on electronics. I'm already through the mechanical phase so I'm just loading it with electronics now. The 3D printer is good mostly. It has its limitations though...and it can be very annoying to set up correctly.

The laser projects a straight line behind the car. Works well in fog/low visibility, better than a rear fog light...and works even better for people tailgating you.

The Aegis IR illuminator lights up the neighborhood for the night vision camera. It has no effect on the FLIR camera.

Voice control/commands are up next and then it's time to move on I think. I was thinking about CL63...or something in that direction.

 

If we could only tie the OEM fiber Bus into external components.
I read many post ago that yours is deleted but it would make life simple. The Mercedes D2B/Most fiber system is mis understood or ignored.
They work really well when configured properly.
The CL 63 sure has a lot of real estate for building a high tech car like you have now.
I like to read about this car and hope you are around here for a while. A 6.3 or 6.5 V12 might change me as well.

Best Gator

 

It would be doable but honestly I don't see the point. OEM components are pretty crappy usually when it comes to electronics so it makes no sense to try to tie into a standard that's only used by OEMs. I guess it would be of help if you're trying to add components to a stock system and keep it simple.

Yeah, I am interested in the digital display on the CL63 and the navigation screen. It would be a shame if somebody were to...you know...look into it and replace it with some nicer gauges and you know...throw a windows/linux PC in there. Also, it helps that it's twin turbo from the factory with all the bells and whistles...so not much modding to do there.

I'll probably stick with Mercedes for a while. I like how they're built and I like their philosophy in general.

 

damn, this is some cool stuff!

 

Insane build. So much props on the complexity and execution!

 

wow, super cool stuff!!!

You're not in Houston by any chance are you? Interested in doing this on a customer car? : )

Here's a CL65 for you:
http://bringatrailer.com/listing/200...benz-cl65-amg/

 

Thanks guys. No, unfortunately I am not in Houston. If you come to NJ we can talk

That CL65 was super clean...but I am looking for one of the new ones. Maybe I'll do a HUD 2.0 on that one.

 

So, no I haven't been quiet because I wasn't up to anything. This time I remembered to take lots and lots of pics

I never felt the need for PDC (parking sensors) but I always liked how the display was built into the W209 dashboard...so I got myself one and took it apart:

Interstingly they come with the middle button blocked and this particular one was missing the clips for the center speaker, even though it was the correct part for my car.



Of course they stopped making 'anthracite' parts for my car...they replaced it with black...which is nowhere close:



So let's see if we can match the color. I generally keep old pieces so let's use a dashboard end cap. Turns out, the panel is one color in the inside, another color on the outside....and a very different color from the top of the dashboard. Great.



Time to get the airbrush out and perform some tests on a piece of the dash that I cut out at some point...and kept...thankfully.



Many layers of paint later, we have a match. Also, don't clear coat the paint as it will change the color altogether as you can see in the corners. The paint matches much better in person than in the pic.



Next let's remove the guts of the old display unit. Nice...looks sturdy though it doesn't exactly do much.



Now, let's replace it with something much, much better.



Let's cut some holes in it and see if we can fit 2 of these things in there...and a new display. Hmmm.



Well the new display is bigger so we gotta dremel away some excess board. Don't try this at home...



Now, let's fire up that 3D printer and print some boxes for our new sensors...this new screen has to display something after all. We have, one gyroscope/accelerometer/magnetometer, one GPS, one digital light meter, and one temp/barometer. The temp sensor is not visible int the pic. Also, let's create some decent connectors so it doesn't all look bootleg.



Cool, now let's start wiring this whole thing up.



This thing is gonna be packed...let's see if we can squeeze an adjustable power source in there too that can handle a wide range of voltages.





Would you look at that...it all fits. I should've used thinner gauge wiring...well there's always next time.





Now let's see how we are going to mount this new unit and still be able to take the display in and out etc...Get that 3D printer fired up again. Cool...the new brackets keep the display and the plastic cover sandwiched together, the box slides into part of the old mounts and the rear bracket aligns everything together and keeps it in place. Secure.



Speaking of plastic covers...time to sand down that old paint and refinish the piece then paint it again to accommodate the much larger screen. Here it is paint removed and refinished.



Let's throw the display in there and see how it looks.



Yup, it all fits. That exposed circuit board at the bottom is the temp sensor.



Now...where are we going to mount the rest of our stuff. While in this huge empty box that used to be functional vents, obviously.



See that middle piece...that holds the vents permanently closed. It's a very weird and crappy solution. We're gonna have to get rid of it and screw these shut.



Let's also 3D print something to keep everything in there leveled and give it a nice flat surface to stick stuff to.



We have to make sure that light sensor gets accurate light readings...so let's use some plexiglass to get some light right on top of it. Let's also use some reflective surfaces to shoot some light towards that plexiglass piece. The foam is to make sure there are no holes you can see through once it's all back together. Overthought? Sure...but it works



Cool...now let's throw it all together and throw a speaker in there too. Why? Why not...



Obviously...we need to write quite a bit of code to get it all working but I like the results.


Well that was nice...let's start with the second quarter of the project and start making some small holes in the front bumper trim and drilling some mounting holes in that front crash bar.



Next let's fashion some adjustable brackets...like 3 of them and relocate the horn. It's getting crowded out there. We have the FLIR camera, Netradar, 2 laser jammers/parking sensors.



Let's clean up the wiring so it looks neater.


Looks good.




That's it for now...next time we bring it all together

 

So next up I had to decide how to install the rear "sensors". I decided to make holes in the plastic part of the trunk lid. If you take that off, the metal piece of the trunk actually has 2 holes predrilled with grommets in place. Thanks Mercedes. This way no wires are visible. Also, 3D print some pieces to level out these sensors. They need to be perfectly horizontal.



RUn wires from the back to the front of the car. Always a pain. That back seat panel is a pain to put back in. Came out clean though...no wires visible at all.



Next up let's see if we can create something to tap the ALP and get directional arrows aka radar in front, rear or both, on our new display.



There...3D print a case and everything and close it all up.



Now, trim the dash to install the 2 new GPS antennas, wire everything up and make it fit....that makes a total of 4GPS antennas. Hmmm.



Fits and the paint seems to match nicely.



Yaaaaaaaay




Aaaaaaaaaand here it is all in action



Bonus...take it all on a 1000 mile drive...on the way back pull over for gas, get back in the car and try to start it and have everything just shut off. Have a major heart attack and start thinking about all the wiring in the car, start sweating and panicking. Pop the hood and realize you forgot to tighten both battery cables when you put everything back together . So, you can drive a minimum of 750 miles before completely loose battery cables become a problem...apparently.

 

So...on to the next project.

Looks like there may be enough room in the instrument cluster for a display. Interesting...very interesting. It's going to be super crowded in there with the HUD components and all the necessary boards to run the display but it may be doable.

 

Question for you.

On my 05 c55, I have the euro parking sensors on the bumpers and I have the on dash display.

How hard is it to do the wiring on those and what exactly will I need?

 

Very nice,
Batman could not have done better. The wire type and size can be cumbersome but you managed.
We always size the wire to the load and environment. In a car oversize is AOK.
Software integration is always challenging as well. Algorithms, drivers and a compatible graphics library
Enjoy reading about concept projects in real time. Next IOT in car?
Cheers, Gator

 

So we had some nice weather the other day...finally...and I took some pics. New carbon fiber interior...and some general shots.

[img]






















And some projects are already in the works for this (already has spoiler, LEDs all over, upgraded electronics, tints etc):[img]



[/img][/img]

 

Man that CF interior is sexy... where did you get it?

 

Yeah it's not bad. I like it. I had it done locally by a shop. Everything was 900$ and done in 4 days...so don't let the vendors on the forum BS you with 1500$ "promo" or intro prices ha

 

awesome. I will DM you for the shop info. Might get another clk and want a CF interior.

thanks!

 

Love your mods! You have such a sweet setup. I just bought a Cadillac Thermal FLIR Camera just like yours and I was wondering how you hooked it up to power. All the posts I've read about doing it are vague. Did you also add an in-line fuse to protect the camera? If so, what size amp fuse did you use? Thank you ahead of time.

 

Man that's like...back in the day. Here is some info I found saved:


C1 Design 1
Connector Part Information
12162209
6-Way F Metri-Pack 150.2 Series, Pull-to-Seat, Sealed (BLK)

Pin-Wire Color-Function

A PNK 14 Volt Reference

B BLK/WHT Ground

C YEL Night Vision Video Low Signal

D DK GRN Night Vision Video High Signal

E BLK/WHT Ground

F BRN Ignition 3 Voltage



C1 Design
Connector Part Information
15324922
6-Way F Metri-Pack 150.2 Series, Pull-to-Seat, Sealed (BLK)

Pin-Wire Color-Function

A PNK 14 Volt Reference

B BLK/WHT Ground

C YEL Night Vision Video Low Signal

D DK GRN Night Vision Video High Signal

E Not Used

F Not Used


C2
Connector Part Information
12162734
2-Way F Metri-Pack 150.2 Series, Pull-to-Seat, Sealed (BLK)

Pin Wire Color Function

A BRN Ignition 3 Voltage

B BLK/WHT Ground


As far as I remember it was power, ground, video +, video -, and power for the lens heater. I always use fuse taps. I don't remember what the fuse I used was, probably around 5 amps. I can take a look at the camera later and see which pin is which. Also, there are 2 versions of the camera. Which one do you have?