"modern" display for cycle analyst

it's been discussed a number of times, and implemented in a few ways.

but a more "direct" approach hasn't been done, of "simply" replacing the screen with something graphical.

i don't have the skills to do this, but here's what might be able to be done:

either one uses an mcu of some type, arduino, etc. to translate teh ca's output to a graphical lcd (or other display), in a fairly direct way (unlike other projects that do something like take the serial output to bluetooth and send to something else remotely that then has an app on it to display the data).

the first way would take the lcd output bus from the ca, and translate the characters it sends on that bus into data sets that can then be displayed on the graphical lcd instead. this means that the ca buttons and menus still work exactly like they would normally, except the display itself would be "modern". but the limitation is that only the same things that the ca lcd would normally have on it can be displayed at all.

the second way uses the serial output of the ca, and translates taht into data sets that can be displayed any way the user desires on the graphical lcd. if this is all it does, then it requires leaving the original lcd on the ca to be able to directly use it's buttons to access menus and so on--the lcd can be removed if you don't need to do that, and can do it all via serial from a computer instead.

the third way combines the above, doing both things, so that the ca menus can be accessed *and* all the data can be displayed any way you like, graphically.


just some thoughts, for those that don't like the "efficient" text-only display the ca presently has.

Sacrilege! 80s display forever!

Really though have you seen BMW's new LCDs? Those are probably the most trick on the market. Would be cool to recreate the designs and pipe the CA into that.

Just use the color graphic popular and cheap Chinese display that are used with the Bafang motors, and running our OpenSource firmware, meaning it should be fast to make this displays working with any motor /system:





More info here: https://github.com/OpenSource-EBike-firmware/TSDZ2_wiki/wiki

casainho said:

Just use the color graphic popular and cheap Chinese display that are used with the Bafang motors, and running our OpenSource firmware, meaning it should be fast to make this displays working with any motor /system:

Click to expand...

That thing looks like garbage what a joke.

casainho said:

Just use the color graphic popular and cheap Chinese display that are used with the Bafang motors, and running our OpenSource firmware, meaning it should be fast to make this displays working with any motor /system:

Click to expand...

unless your osf can read the output of the cycle analyst and then put that on your display, (which afaik it can't) then it doesnt' do what this thread intends.

if you have a new project that does this, then it belongs in this thread, but otherwise, it does not.

Also, what you posted isn't anything like a graphical version of the cycle analyst display. it's jsut a bunch of text on a color display, except for whatever that rainbow graph is supposed to be.

it isn't a useful graphical representation of cycle analyst data.

casainho said:

Just use the color graphic popular and cheap Chinese display that are used with the Bafang motors, and running our OpenSource firmware, meaning it should be fast to make this displays working with any motor /system

Click to expand...

Are you saying there is code in there for the display that does not require using that controller, could be used to power the display with a different controller?

john61ct said:

casainho said:

Just use the color graphic popular and cheap Chinese display that are used with the Bafang motors, and running our OpenSource firmware, meaning it should be fast to make this displays working with any motor /system

Click to expand...

Are you saying there is code in there for the display that does not require using that controller, could be used to power the display with a different controller?

Click to expand...

Yes, because almost all motors and displays communicate using the 2 wires UART and the data that is transmitted is similar. So, think this firmware and this displays as the Arduino of ebikes displays, where you can develop your custom adaptations to support your motor.

Our OpenSource firmware runs in 2 very different displays that are usually used with Bafang motors:

- 850C: big color display with RTC that keeps accurate clock time and has USB charger (nice to power a mobile phone)

- SW102: small, black and white and with Bluetooth

The 850C has numeric fields and plot graphs and SW102 just show numeric fields.

They also have configuration menus:

This sounds like a job for Justin. He needs to come out with a CA v4 with a nicer graphical display.

I like the ones PowerVelocity does on their phone app.

so far no graphical display of the data (like a "dashboard") has been shown, just variations of text displays.

what are the graphical displays of the data like for those? or do they not do that?

Here are a couple of screen shots of the PV dash.






My personal preference would be to have the speed number very large since that's what I want to see most often. Power consumption and battery SOC are next most important and work well with a bar graph or graphical dial. Trip stats like total distance, max speed, etc, can be smaller or even on another screen as I don't need to see those as much while riding.

now, that's the kind of thing people have asked for (and what this thread is really about).


the difference being that the pv dash is on a separate device, and this thread being about having something the ca's mcu board would actually mount inside of to make a "new" ca unit that just has a graphical display instead of text, and just directly running the ca's lcd data or it's serial output data (or both) to an mcu that translates that for the display. (rather than having a remote / wireless display that's separate from the ca itself).


personally, i tend to prefer the visually-uncluttered, non-distracting, text-only "80s" display the ca already has, though i would prefer a "home" screen that lets me customize everything that goes on it, actually leaving most of it blank except if warnings are being displayed.


but many people do want something like that PV dash, hence this thread (and the other similar projects already in progress or completed).

A year later...is there any interest in such an open-source project, to create a more modern (graphical) display "interpreter" for the Cycle Analyst?

It would presumably take the serial output from the CA (like the analogger uses) and then display this on it's own screen, using one of the numerous inexpensive Arduino/etc units available with a decent color display on it, and just writing "sketches" to do this.

For the more ambitious, they could create an android display app for phones or devices, and have the interpreter send all the CA data via bluetooth or something....but that seems a lot harder than the above. And operating systems and device hardware vary so much and change so often it seems a nightmare to get it to work and stay working over time on android devices.

Or for even more ambitious, modifying Casainho's LCD project code mentioned earlier in this thread to do this internally to one of the compatible bike-mountable LCDs.

amberwolf said:

A year later...is there any interest in such an open-source project, to create a more modern (graphical) display "interpreter" for the Cycle Analyst?

It would presumably take the serial output from the CA (like the analogger uses) and then display this on it's own screen, using one of the numerous inexpensive Arduino/etc units available with a decent color display on it, and just writing "sketches" to do this.

For the more ambitious, they could create an android display app for phones or devices, and have the interpreter send all the CA data via bluetooth or something....but that seems a lot harder than the above. And operating systems and device hardware vary so much and change so often it seems a nightmare to get it to work and stay working over time on android devices.

Or for even more ambitious, modifying Casainho's LCD project code mentioned earlier in this thread to do this internally to one of the compatible bike-mountable LCDs.

Click to expand...

We now have our OpenSource Wireless EBike standard technology, that includes cheap and DIY wireless board (Bluetooth and ANT), a mobile app, a wireless remote and the communication and control from the wireless cycling GPS displays that everyone knows so well, the Garmin Edge and others, that have top GPS navigation and cycling fitness, like showing rider heart rate graph!!

Here I am riding at night and on Garmin Edge I see my heart rate graph (measured on my smart watch on my pulse) as also the EBike battery state as also the motor assist level - all this without installing nothing on the Garmin Edge since we are following the EBike wireless standard -- here our project page: https://opensourceebike.github.io/



And this is our wireless box that we connect by serial port to the motor and then we have all this wireless features - this box costs 25€ in materials and was DIY: