Am very new to Arduino, its just been like 2 weeks since I got the mega and started to play with leds and potentiometers, so far I managed to make led bars as fuel level gauge for 2 fuel tanks, and third for the water injection tank to monitor how much water in the tank, so its going fine and very smooth so far, but am not sure about controlling the fuel pumps at different speeds, well I have very good knowledge with automotive wiring and electricity, but not much into such electronics as Arduino, and I need your help guys here if you could
Well am working on the same car that I did the fuel level led bars to, but now I want to control the fuel pumps with PWM to be able set different speeds to the pumps regarding to RPM, so I want to have the pumps run on low speed when the engine on idle (500RPM-1200RPM) and medium speed on cruising RPM (1500RPM-3500RPM) and full pumps speed on 3500RPM and above, well I want this cuz am running 3x bosch 044 fuel pumps and extra walbro pump, so they are noisy as hell specially on idle and cruising, plus circulating the fuel with all these pumps are making the fuel goes hotter and the pumps produce even more noise when they are hot, so I want to lower the speed to lower the sound and heat, first mechanical thing I did was that I placed bigger fuel tank to accept more fuel (trying to lower the fuel heat) and placed all the pumps inside the tank, I placed the Walbro pump to collect the fuel from the tank and push it to in-tank surge tank were the 044s pumps are located and the 044 pumps will push the fuel to the engine, the sound got much more better for having the pumps inside the tank, but still need to lower it, and the extra fuel volume helped in lowering the fuel temp but still need to go lower since am running 100% alcohol fuel, anyway am controlling all the pumps with after market ECU, as am using this with automotive relays, each pump got its own relay, the good thing that the ECU primes the pumps for user defined time when the ignition is on, and then shut the fuel pumps off till I start the engine, as the fuel pumps require 25A-30A for each pump, so am not sure how I can do this with Arduino and make it to control the pumps that takes such power, anyone can guide me here where to start looking?
If this is a car to be used for actual racing I presume the pumps will all be at full speed during a race?
When you are not racing, perhaps it would be simpler just to switch off some of the pumps when less fuel flow is required. That would only require the Arduino to control relays. Solid State Relays would be easiest if your budget can stretch to them.
If you do need to control the motor speed you will need to find a suitable high-amperage motor control board that can interface between the motors and the Arduino.
And thanks for the fast response, well I thought about switching pumps ON and OFF, but I will have problems with the tune, my aftermarket ECU can set two tuning maps, I already used the two maps, one map for the gasoline fuel, and the other map for the 100% alcohol fuel, so it will be bad idea to switch OFF 1 or 2 pumps while I have a tune with 3 pumps, as the car is used in illegal street drag races, so it will see cruising from home to racing and then race.
What is the best brand and price for the motor control board that you recommend? I have seen now some boards from 15$ to 80$! so am not sure!
Other thing can't I make the Aurdino to control the stock automotive relays? I have checked the Bosch and Siemens style relays it seems the 5V from the Aurdino can't activate the relay coil and deliver power to the other pin relays, how I can do this? it seems there is no much information about doing this!!
ARDnew:
What is the best brand and price for the motor control board that you recommend? I have seen now some boards from 15$ to 80$! so am not sure!
Other thing can't I make the Aurdino to control the stock automotive relays? I have checked the Bosch and Siemens style relays it seems the 5V from the Aurdino can't activate the relay coil and deliver power to the other pin relays, how I can do this? it seems there is no much information about doing this!!
Sorry, I have no information about high amperage motor drivers - I just know you will need them. It may be worth researching Electronic Speed Controllers (ESCs) for brushed DC motors as used for model aircraft and model cars. If they can handle the current they are very easy to control with an Arduino because they appear to it as servos.
Yes you can use an Arduino to control a regular 12v relay but the problem is that the Arduino can only produce about 20 milliamps at 5v on an I/O pin which isn't even enough to drive a very small 5v relay. That means you will need to rig up a transistor circuit to allow the Arduino to control the relay coil current through the transistor. It's not difficult - Google should be able to advise you.
