Ethics In Engineering: Volkswagen’s Diesel Fiasco

September 23, 2015 by Brian Benchoff 360 Comments

Every so often – and usually not under the best of circumstance – the field of engineering as a whole is presented with a teaching moment. Volkswagen is currently embroiled in a huge scandal involving emissions testing of 11 Million diesel cars sold in recent years. It’s a problem that could cost VW dearly, to the tune of eighteen Billion dollars in the US alone, and will, without a doubt, end the careers of more than a few Volkswagen employees. In terms of automotive scandals, this is bigger than Unsafe at Any Speed. This is a bigger scandal than the Ford Pinto’s proclivity to explode. This is engineering history in the making, and an enormously teachable moment for ethics in engineering.

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Using Old Phones As An Intercom In Your VW Bus (or Anywhere Else)

June 8, 2012 by Caleb Kraft 68 Comments

In case you haven’t noticed from my many comments on the subject, I drive a VW bus. It is a 1976 Westfalia camper with sage green paint and green plaid upholstery. I absolutely love it and so does the rest of my family. We go for drives in the country as well as camping regularly. We have found that the kids have a hard time communicating with us while we’re going higher speeds. These things aren’t the quietest automobiles in the world. Pushing this bread loaf shaped hunk of steel down the road with an engine that might top out at 75hp results in wind noise, engine noise, and of course, vibration.

I decided to employ a really old hack to put two functional telephones in the bus so my kids can talk to my wife (or whoever the passenger is) without screaming quite so loud. This hack is extremely easy, fairly cheap, and can be done in just a few minutes. The result is a functional intercom that you could use pretty much anywhere!

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Fixing The Control Scheme For An Aftermarket Headlight Assembly

January 12, 2012 by Mike Szczys 18 Comments

The headlight enclosures on [Bill Porter’s] 2004 Passat had yellowed with age and were not outputting the kind of light they should. He decided to replace them with some aftermarket modules that also incorporated LED strips. When they arrived he was surprised at how easy there were to drop into place. But when testing he was certainly not satisfied with how they worked. The day-driving mode used the HID bulbs at full power, where the factory assembly had dimmed them during the day. He set out to alter the electronics to work as he prefers.

Always the mad scientist, [Bill] started off by making a truth table showing how the lights reacted to the various states of the ignition and headlight switches. What he came up with is an AND gate built from a relay and diode. It allows him to have the LEDs on as the running lights (without the HIDs on at all), and leaves the rest of the functionality unaffected.

Enhance Your Key Fob Via CAN Bus Hacking

April 26, 2011 by Mike Nathan 30 Comments

[Igor] drives a 4th generation Volkswagen Golf, and decided he wanted to play around with the CAN bus for a bit. Knowing that the comfort bus is the most accessible and the safest to toy with, he started poking around to see what he could see (Google translation).

He pulled the trim off one of the rear doors and hooked into the comfort bus with an Arudino and a CAN interface module. He sniffed the bus’ traffic for a bit, then decided he would add some functionality to the car that it was sorely lacking. The car’s windows can all be rolled down by turning the key in any lock for more than a few seconds, however this cannot be done remotely. The functionality can be added via 3rd party modules or through manipulating the car’s programming with some prepackaged software, but [Igor] wanted to give it a go himself.

He programmed the Arduino to listen for longer than normal button presses coming from the remote. Once it detects that he is trying to roll the windows up or down, the Arduino issues the proper window control commands to the bus, and his wish is the car’s command.

It’s a pretty simple process, but then again he has just gotten started. We look forward to seeing what else [Igor] is able to pull off in the future. In the meantime, continue reading to see a quick video of his handiwork.

If you are interested in seeing what you might be able to do with your own car, check out this CAN bus sniffer we featured a while back.

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Tailgating This Car Carries A Heavy Penalty

July 21, 2010 by Mike Szczys 68 Comments

This hack seems simple enough:

1. Open hatchback
2. Insert jet engine
3. Profit

Actually, the guy who added a jet engine to a VW Beetle has a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford. He claims this is street legal, and even has a snapshot of the police trying to figure out what to charge him with after stopping him on the road. There’s plenty of details and we’re not questioning [Ron Patrick’s] competence, but having the intake for the turbine inside the cab of the vehicle seems a bit insane. He remarks that “it’s a little windy but not unbearable”… yeah.

One the same page you’ll find his dual-jet modified scooter. The starting cost there is considerably less, especially if you build your own ram jets.

[Thanks Goldscott]

Driving The Car Without Going Anywhere

April 23, 2010 by Mike Szczys 34 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psAZSPK4pWc]

This video game controller is a factory fresh VW. Much like the racing simulator from earlier in the week, the video game data is being displayed on the instrument panel. This takes us to a much higher level now because control for the game is taken from the car’s CANbus using and ODB-II connector. If you don’t speak in automotive jargon, that means that the sensor readings from the steering wheel, shifter, and pedals are being picked up and exported as joystick commands to the PC running the driving game. The only place the experience uses a substitute for the real thing is the sound, which is being played through speakers instead of emanating from under the hood. Looks like you just need to add a projector and screen to your garage in order to turn it into the hottest new gaming device.

Double Clutch Transmission Model

January 4, 2010 by Mike Szczys 44 Comments

[Alan] did an extraordinary job building a computer controlled model gearbox. His project from several years back is based on a dual-clutch Direct Shift Gearbox that was developed for VW and Audi vehicles. His design uses a gear head motor to provide the locomotion to this transmission. Shifting is computer controlled through serial cable, with servo motors providing the physical motion to change gears. Seeing all these moving parts in the clip after the break might make you a bit dizzy.

This is some extreme model building. It reminds us of the guy who built that aluminum aircraft model that was all over the Internets in December.

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