Tesla head unit install (pre2016 LC) - first impressions and a couple bugs to figure out (1 Viewer)

[greynolds]

Yep, that was why I originally bought a Wifi-only dongle, and then I had the same annoying experience as you where my phone wouldn't connect to the internet while I was using it. It turns out BT solves this, believe it or not.

The trick with the BT OBD2 adapter is that you do NOT pair it with your device like a regular BT device. Instead after you plug it in, go into OBD Fusion and go to Settings->Communications and make the Communication Type at the top "Bluetooth LE".

I don't see the "vgate icar pro bluetooth 4.0" adapter on Amazon anymore but I see it on ebay. This is the exact one I bought:

New Vgate iCar Pro Bluetooth 4.0 BIMMERCODE BMW Coding iPhone iPad Android OBD2 | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for New Vgate iCar Pro Bluetooth 4.0 BIMMERCODE BMW Coding iPhone iPad Android OBD2 at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

I leave mine connected 24x7 as it'll power down a few minutes after the vehicle is shut off. In theory any Bluetooth LE 4.0 or 5.0 OBD2 adapter should work. Checking my Amazon history, I tried the Veepack but it wouldn't always power on. After returning it I read a few people who said the plastic housing was like 1/16" too long and if you trimmed it then it would fit correctly, otherwise it would sometimes disconnect or fail to make contact and power on. Eh whatever, mine works, the only "mod" I did was to put some electrical tape over the LEDs.

I own one of those Veepack units and will be giving it a try in a little bit when I go out to run a few errands. Just need to install the OBD Fusion app.

 

[kcjaz]

Yep, that was why I originally bought a Wifi-only dongle, and then I had the same annoying experience as you where my phone wouldn't connect to the internet while I was using it. It turns out BT solves this, believe it or not.

The trick with the BT OBD2 adapter is that you do NOT pair it with your device like a regular BT device. Instead after you plug it in, go into OBD Fusion and go to Settings->Communications and make the Communication Type at the top "Bluetooth LE".

I don't see the "vgate icar pro bluetooth 4.0" adapter on Amazon anymore but I see it on ebay. This is the exact one I bought:

New Vgate iCar Pro Bluetooth 4.0 BIMMERCODE BMW Coding iPhone iPad Android OBD2 | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for New Vgate iCar Pro Bluetooth 4.0 BIMMERCODE BMW Coding iPhone iPad Android OBD2 at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

I leave mine connected 24x7 as it'll power down a few minutes after the vehicle is shut off. In theory any Bluetooth LE 4.0 or 5.0 OBD2 adapter should work. Checking my Amazon history, I tried the Veepack but it wouldn't always power on. After returning it I read a few people who said the plastic housing was like 1/16" too long and if you trimmed it then it would fit correctly, otherwise it would sometimes disconnect or fail to make contact and power on. Eh whatever, mine works, the only "mod" I did was to put some electrical tape over the LEDs.

I have a Vgate but it is wifi version. I just tried my BlueDriver BT one but it won't connect at all to the Tesla head unit. I also tried my USB Mini VCI for Techstream but it didn't work with OBDFusion (didn't think it would but tried since I had it).

 

[greynolds]

I just tried this Veepeak model:

Amazon product ASIN B076XVQMVS
The power light came on which suggests it was plugged in to the OBD port just fine, but OBD Fusion doesn't see it. I need to find a free OBD app for my iPhone so I can confirm the OBD unit itself is working correctly, but it looks like the BT module in my head unit doesn't see the BT OBD modules.

 

[kcjaz]

I own one of those Veepack units and will be giving it a try in a little bit when I go out to run a few errands. Just need to install the OBD Fusion app.

Super curious about this. If it connects via BT through the OBDFusion app and you can still connect iphone to head unit with BT (for music) and have iphone as wifi hot spot for head unit, that would be ideal!

 

[linuxgod]

@greynolds Just make sure you're NOT pairing it with your phone. If you pair it, then it won't work in OBD Fusion *and* I believe it will commandeer your BT connection. I know that seems counter-intuitive but it's apparently how Bluetooth LE works

 

[greynolds]

@greynolds Just make sure you're NOT pairing it with your phone. If you pair it, then it won't work in OBD Fusion *and* I believe it will commandeer your BT connection. I know that seems counter-intuitive but it's apparently how Bluetooth LE works

Right. I have the Carista app on my iPhone, which is probably compatible with the Veepeak, so I’ll try connecting through that app later. The Bluetooth capabilities of these head units are notoriously very limited.

I’m not using the head unit’s BT connection for CarPlay because I‘m using an Ottocast adapter that plugs into the wired CarPlay port and provides more modern BT and WiFi connections for the iPhone to use, which made a huge improvement in wireless CarPlay reliability while still using the Zlink app.

 

[greynolds]

I was able to connect to the Veepeak BT module with the Carista app on my iPhone. Still no luck connecting to the OBD Fusion app on the head unit, unfortunately. So it looks like the BT module on my particular head unit doesn't support this sort of thing. I sort of wonder if a BT to USB adapter might work, but I'm not sure I want to play the game of trying a bunch of different ones hoping I find one that the head unit has drivers for, especially since this is mostly a curiosity for me. If/when I update to a newer T-Style head unit in a few years, once the kinks have been mostly worked out of the newer units, I'll probably revisit this.

 

[kcjaz]

I was able to connect to the Veepeak BT module with the Carista app on my iPhone. Still no luck connecting to the OBD Fusion app on the head unit, unfortunately. So it looks like the BT module on my particular head unit doesn't support this sort of thing. I sort of wonder if a BT to USB adapter might work, but I'm not sure I want to play the game of trying a bunch of different ones hoping I find one that the head unit has drivers for, especially since this is mostly a curiosity for me. If/when I update to a newer T-Style head unit in a few years, once the kinks have been mostly worked out of the newer units, I'll probably revisit this.

Yeah, the fact that my BlueDriver BT won't connect to the head unit makes me wonder if anything will via BT. Also not sure direct USD will work either. All of this needs drivers that may or may not be on the head unit. The Vgate wifi OBD2 works fine with OBDFusion, I just can't have it running and wifi for the head unit at the same time.

I'm tempted to just buy a VLinker and try it. I think I'll post on the Tesla Style HU FB group and ask if anyone have got this to work.

 

[kcjaz]

I posted a question on the FB Tesla HU group. Looks like Android 9 doesn’t support OBD2 with BT. Here’s a reply I got:

The Android 9 units won’t connect to a Bluetooth OBDII adapter, purchase a USB OBDII adapter if you don’t want to use a WiFi version

Also found this:

Need help pairing bluetooth ELM327 OBD2 scanner with Acodo 9" Android Head-Unit

I have a China 9" android head-unit which is branded as Acodo. Everytime I try to pair a bluetooth ELM327 v1.5 or v2.1 OBD2 Scanner, it fails to pair with the following error message: Couldn't pair with OBDII because of an incorrect PIN or...

forum.xda-developers.com

 

[BVE]

Yep, that was why I originally bought a Wifi-only dongle, and then I had the same annoying experience as you where my phone wouldn't connect to the internet while I was using it. It turns out BT solves this, believe it or not.

To get WiFi dongles working with the internet, just clear the gateway address. With no gateway your phone with use LTE/5G as it’s path to the internet. Works for me and my phone connects to It every time I get in the truck.

 

[kcjaz]

To get WiFi dongles working with the internet, just clear the gateway address. With no gateway your phone with use LTE/5G as it’s path to the internet. Works for me and my phone connects to It every time I get in the truck.

I'm not sure we are all talking about the same thing here. The PX6 HU doesn't have its own LTE/5G comms like a phone. It needs to connect to a wifi network to get access to the internet. I use my iphone as a hot spot for this. The PX6 can only connect to one wifi network at a time. Are you saying that I could connect a wifi dongle to a PX6 USB port and connect it to my phone (hot spot) to provide internet access to the PX6 and then connect the PX6 wifi to the OBD2 wifi?

 

[BVE]

I'm not sure we are all talking about the same thing here. The PX6 HU doesn't have its own LTE/5G comms like a phone. It needs to connect to a wifi network to get access to the internet. I use my iphone as a hot spot for this. The PX6 can only connect to one wifi network at a time. Are you saying that I could connect a wifi dongle to a PX6 USB port and connect it to my phone (hot spot) to provide internet access to the PX6 and then connect the PX6 wifi to the OBD2 wifi?

Yeah I think you’re right, I was thinking about only the OBD2 wifi dongle and fusion, no head unit. Sorry for the confusion

 

[kcjaz]

This may be a stupid question but on my PX6 (android 9), in apps that have deep menus (like OBD Fusion) I can’t figure out how to go back to the previous menu. So I get “stuck” in a menu screen and have to kill the app and drill down again. In the same apps on my phone, there are “back” buttons that don’t show in the PX6 version of the app. Is there some gesture swipe or something to go back?

 

[greynolds]

This may be a stupid question but on my PX6 (android 9), in apps that have deep menus (like OBD Fusion) I can’t figure out how to go back to the previous menu. So I get “stuck” in a menu screen and have to kill the app and drill down again. In the same apps on my phone, there are “back” buttons that don’t show in the PX6 version of the app. Is there some gesture swipe or something to go back?

Does this button, which should show at the bottom left of the display beside the HVAC controls, not work?

If that doesn't work, the other approach you can take, if you have Sergey's custom firmware, is to configure those apps to run full screen which should expose those missing back buttons in the apps themselves.

And I'm not sure there are any stupid questions with these things as they can definitely be a bit clunky and work in mysterious ways .

 

[kcjaz]

Does this button, which should show at the bottom left of the display beside the HVAC controls not work?
View attachment 3207158

Yep, I have that button but it never occurred to me to try it because I thought it was just a “system” button like the home button.

Works great! Thanks

 

[kcjaz]

Success on the OBD2 front. I bought an OBDLinkSX USB dongle. It connected easily with the PX6 unit and now I have always available OBDFusion dashboards. Here’s a video of how it connects.



In the video I didn’t hit connect in OBDFusion before I opened the dashboard. That’s why the gauges are reading zero. Pretty happy with how this works.

 

[Mago]

Success on the OBD2 front. I bought an OBDLinkSX USB dongle. It connected easily with the PX6 unit and now I have always available OBDFusion dashboards. Here’s a video of how it connects.



In the video I didn’t hit connect in OBDFusion before I opened the dashboard. That’s why the gauges are reading zero. Pretty happy with how this works.

What did you hit on screen top twice to split the screen?

 

[kcjaz]

The blue “app” button at the top.

The double tap was meant to bring up the app list in full screen mode but I didn’t tap fast enough so I go the split screen.

 

[kcjaz]

Tucked away the OBD2 dongle. Used a splitter cable as the dongle sticks out too far to be comfortable when driving.

 

[kcjaz]

After getting my OBDFusion all set up on the head unit, I decided to see if I could fix my Apple Car Play. CarPlay would work via ZLink app but it wasn't stable. After a few hours of use (as in road trip) the controls would get laggy and it would eventually lock up completely. I posted about this above and on the PX6 FB Group and Sergey suggested that I just reinstall ZLink as it is usually very stable. So I deleted the Zlink app from the HU and downloaded/installed Zlink from Play Store but the current version of ZLink is different from what had been installed on my EC Offroad HU. It doesn't work at all. Also the Car Audio icon at the top of the HU used to just open ZLink but now doesn't do anything.

I sent an email to EC Offroad telling them what I had done and asking them how to fix it. The response is not as helpful as I had hoped. They said "Will need to come back to us and we will have to build a app for it for you." Ugh. Previously they had to "build a new MCU file" for me and it took weeks but they at least sent it. There is no way I'm sending the unit back to them in Australia. I'll try to get something better out of them but I'll likely just forget about CarPlay. I haven't tried to use it since last July anyway (because it would lock up) plus I don't like most of the CarPlay driver friendly app versions.

I would like to upgrade to Sergey's firmware but I'm just afraid there will be some glitch with something EC Offroad has done to the unit or other operating files that will break things or brick the unit. This is just more of the same "love/hate" relationship I have with this HU.