Leaf Gen 1 Inverter Board

[alexey]

Hello dear friends. I read a bunch of threads on this forum but didn’t find an answer. I want to use a Nissan igbt module and its motor for a tractor. The problem is that I can’t find what signals need to be sent to the optical inputs of the drivers. I’ll write a program for controlling PWM signals myself. Use a standard inverter and I don’t want a kan interface. I would be grateful for your help.

[johu]

Look here viewtopic.php?t=138

[Alibro]

This is a copy and paste from my post in the Olimex 8266 'How To' thread but much of it is relevant here.

For anybody else out there struggling to setup an Olimex ESP8266 I finally managed to get somewhere today.
It turns out this is a two stage process. First upload the sketch to your ESP8266, then upload the sketch data.

After an embarrassing number of hours I have the default gauges displaying in my car with a new Olimex ESP8266 and have documented it here partly as a reminder to me as well as a help for anyone struggling like I was.
As you might suspect everything you need is in the Wiki but it's a little hard to follow and my requirements were very specific, so while the default instructions worked they didn't give me what I needed. Anyway hopefully this might help.
Some of this is copied and pasted from Johannes page linked below.

I am using a FTDI board to connect to the Olimex RevB, you can see how it is connected here.

I have a couple of versions of FTDI board and they both worked but double check you have set them to 3.3V. While trying to figure this out I had them set to 5V a couple of times and didn't appear to kill the Olimex boards but they did get a little hot. Also the PDF I used to check the Olimex pin positions showed a picture of the socket not the plug so at one stage I had the connections mirrored and everything got a little hot!!!

Steps to follow
1. Go to the Wiki here https://openinverter.org/wiki/Olimex_MOD-WIFI-ESP8266
2. Inside Arduino IDE open the Preferences window - enter 'https://arduino.esp8266.com/stable/pack ... index.json' into the Additional Board Manager URLs. Note I was using Arduino IDE 1.8.19
3. Reboot the Arduino IDE and open Boards Manager from Tools > Board menu and install esp8266 platform.
4. Select your version of ESP8266 from 'Tools - Boards - ESP8266 - Olimex-MOD-WIFI-ESP8266' and the correct port.
5. Download https://github.com/esp8266/arduino-esp8 ... n/releases python support files - extract file to Arduino IDE tools folder like you see here https://randomnerdtutorials.com/install ... duino-ide/ - restart Arduino for changes to come into effect
You will probably need to create the tools folder as I didn't have one. For me the path was <home_dir>/Arduino/tools/ESP8266FS/tool/esp8266fs.jar
6. Download Johannes default Arduino code from https://github.com/jsphuebner/esp8266-web-interface and extract to the Arduino folder. You might need to rename the folder by removing "-master". (In my case I skipped this as I was using Damiens code for a Nissen Leaf VCU)
7. Open the code in the Ardunio IDE by double clicking the 'esp8266-web-interface.ino' file.
The following edit may be needed:- at about line 14 of the code (not the comments) there’s a line that should read "bool fastuartavailable = false;" if the value is set to true change it to false
8. Add the following libraries, ESPAsyncWEBServer and ESPAsyncTCP (a quick Google search should find them or use Johannes link https://github.com/damienmaguire/Lexus- ... /Libraries
9. Ensure you have set the FTDI board to 3.3V
10. Connect it as shown above then select Olimex MOD-WIFI-ESP8266(DEV) from the Tools/Boards menu and select the correct port.
11. Ensure the settings are as shown below - the Flash memory seems to be most important.

12. Use the Upload option to install the firmware in the Olimex and wait for the board to reset.
Note with the RevB board you need to hold the button down as you power it up to put it into programming mode.
if you used a new board you have to select "erase flash: sketch + wifi settings" from the Tools menu so the board will erase its password
13. Repower it with the button held down and select Tools - "ESP8266 sketch data upload" and wait for the board to reset.
14. Reboot the Olimex and connect to the wifi as usual. Open a browser and enter 192.168.4.1. This will give you Johannes ESP8266 WiFi page when you connect to the Olimex WIFI.
Note for this step I used the Nissan Leaf WiFi.ino from Damiens Github to give me the gauges when I used the IP above. A file seems to be missing from the leaf_wifi\data folder in Damiens Github which I found in his Lexus-GS450H guthub. It is solid-gauge.js. Please correct me if I'm wrong about this.


I Used a laptop with a fresh install of Linux Mint and installed Arduino from the Mint App installer which seems to default to Arduino 1.8.19. I can't comment on any other version.

Reasons it might fail.
It looks like you need an older IDE like Arduino 1.8.19. I tried using the current version and didn't get the option to "ESP8266 Sketch Data Upload" under 'Tools'. Linux Mint installs version 1.8.19 if you use the Software Manager and this works fine.
You need to set the Flash memory correctly for your ESP8266 under Tools.
You need to reboot the ESP8266 with the button held down each time you want to upload or do a Sketch data upload as it will reset itself to normal mode after every update.
In my case I was downloading files from Damiens Github and some of the folders needed renamed, like the data folder that holds the html stuff needs to be named in lower case, the Leaf wifi data folder was called Data so the Arduino IDE didn't see any files. This may not be an issue in Windows. Also a file was missing which I found in the Lexus GS450 github. The VCU I have was only sold for a short time before Damien designed the Zombieverter so is not widely used.

EDIT 1:
This process will give a web page but I'm struggling to get it to connect to the VCU.
I wanted to test it before plugging into my car VCU so have connected it to a Due (with Leaf_Gen1_5.ino installed) via the Serial2 connections. I see the activity light flashing but no changes to the display. I'll continue with this but if anyone has any suggestions please help.

Edit2:
OK so I'm a numpty.
I was uploading the ESP8266 sketch, then 'sketch data uploading' the Leaf WiFi web page. What I should have done for my Gen1 Nissan Leaf VCU was upload the Nissan Leaf WiFi sketch from Damiens Github (with the "solid-gauge.js" file copied from his Lexus GS450 repository to the data folder), then do the 'Sketch Data Upload' to send the web page to the board. This was relevant to me but may not be for you. I still don't have the correct SSID but it works so I don't care.
When the Olimex is powered up the web page is available on 192.168.4.1 and the gauges all show full scale. When plugged into the Gen1 Nissan Leaf VCU in my car it displayed the correct voltage etc.
As a test I connected it to an Arduino Due with the Nissan Leaf VCU sketch uploaded and the gauges immediately dropped to 0 where they normally they show full scale. I'm hoping they dropped to 0 as the Due is not receiving CAN from the Inverter, tomorrow I'll try sending a CAN log from a short drive to see what happens but I'm pretty certain it should work. As mentioned above I tried it plugged into my Freelander VCU and it showed the correct voltage and current just the same as the original Olimex supplied by Damien.
The main purpose of all this is to be able to have a test bed in my office where I can play with the settings of my VCU and test them without having to repeatedly send new sketches to the VCU in my car. I still have not worked out why the display will show data from the ISA shunt OR the Inverter but not both so if I have voltage, current and power from the ISA shunt I lose Inverter & motor temps and RPM. As a halfway house I use the DUE that controls charging to send RPM to the dash over CAN and the VCU sends info from the VCU to the display over WiFi. This way Iall I'm losing is temps which at this time of year are slightly less important.

Edit3:
I went back to this with a clean laptop and had some issues. I was able to install the software but every time I went into the admin page to change the display it corrupted with garbage showing where the title should be. After a while trying different things I eventually downloaded the libraries Johannes linked to and suddenly all was OK so the issue must have been an incompatible library.

[r1ckyb0nd]

I have read this post and would like to order a gen 1 leaf board. Is Damien's design for jlcpcb.com? The BOM is not in the right file format(easy fix) but then most items are not available.
Thank you,

[Alibro]

I have read this post and would like to order a gen 1 leaf board. Is Damien's design for jlcpcb.com? The BOM is not in the right file format(easy fix) but then most items are not available.
Thank you,

I don't think the board is available anymore but even if it was you would be much better off buying the Zombieverter. It is still being constantly improved and has many advantages over the Leaf Gen 1 board like regen and charging control built in.
If you wanted to you could build this controller using an Arduino Due.

[r1ckyb0nd]

I was hoping to match both the replacement board and zombie. I am under the impression that replacing the board will allow you to go past the 80kw of the stock limit, and zombie will.allow you to control it via can bus.

[Bratitude]

I was hoping to match both the replacement board and zombie. I am under the impression that replacing the board will allow you to go past the 80kw of the stock limit, and zombie will.allow you to control it via can bus.

your a bit confused, and thats fair because this is a long thread....with 2(ish) different projects in it.

damiens board (which is a now legacy board), just had a throttle and direction inputs and provided the canbus data to the inverter.

there was also a replacement board that went inside the gen 1 leaf inverter that ran the OI motor control firmware.

[r1ckyb0nd]

Is the board that runs the OI firmware still available?

[johu]

It never was, but the design files were made public. Not sure where though

[Alibro]

I was hoping to match both the replacement board and zombie. I am under the impression that replacing the board will allow you to go past the 80kw of the stock limit, and zombie will.allow you to control it via can bus.

I've found that using Damiens legacy board I see up to 90kW so a bit more than the 80kW advertised.

[Alibro]

This is a copy and paste from my post in the Olimex 8266 'How To' thread but much of it is relevant here.

For anybody else out there struggling to setup an Olimex ESP8266 I finally managed to get somewhere today.
It turns out this is a two stage process. First upload the sketch to your ESP8266, then upload the sketch data.

After an embarrassing number of hours I have the default gauges displaying in my car with a new Olimex ESP8266 and have documented it here partly as a reminder to me as well as a help for anyone struggling like I was.
As you might suspect everything you need is in the Wiki but it's a little hard to follow and my requirements were very specific, so while the default instructions worked they didn't give me what I needed. Anyway hopefully this might help.
Some of this is copied and pasted from Johannes page linked below.

I am using a FTDI board to connect to the Olimex RevB, you can see how it is connected here.

IMG_20241204_202516787.jpg
IMG_20241204_202312120.jpg

I have a couple of versions of FTDI board and they both worked but double check you have set them to 3.3V. While trying to figure this out I had them set to 5V a couple of times and didn't appear to kill the Olimex boards but they did get a little hot. Also the PDF I used to check the Olimex pin positions showed a picture of the socket not the plug so at one stage I had the connections mirrored and everything got a little hot!!!

Steps to follow
1. Go to the Wiki here https://openinverter.org/wiki/Olimex_MOD-WIFI-ESP8266
2. Inside Arduino IDE open the Preferences window - enter 'https://arduino.esp8266.com/stable/pack ... index.json' into the Additional Board Manager URLs. Note I was using Arduino IDE 1.8.19
3. Reboot the Arduino IDE and open Boards Manager from Tools > Board menu and install esp8266 platform.
4. Select your version of ESP8266 from 'Tools - Boards - ESP8266 - Olimex-MOD-WIFI-ESP8266' and the correct port.
5. Download https://github.com/esp8266/arduino-esp8 ... n/releases python support files - extract file to Arduino IDE tools folder like you see here https://randomnerdtutorials.com/install ... duino-ide/ - restart Arduino for changes to come into effect
You will probably need to create the tools folder as I didn't have one. For me the path was <home_dir>/Arduino/tools/ESP8266FS/tool/esp8266fs.jar
6. Download Johannes default Arduino code from https://github.com/jsphuebner/esp8266-web-interface and extract to the Arduino folder. You might need to rename the folder by removing "-master". (In my case I skipped this as I was using Damiens code for a Nissen Leaf VCU)
7. Open the code in the Ardunio IDE by double clicking the 'esp8266-web-interface.ino' file.
The following edit may be needed:- at about line 14 of the code (not the comments) there’s a line that should read "bool fastuartavailable = false;" if the value is set to true change it to false
8. Add the following libraries, ESPAsyncWEBServer and ESPAsyncTCP (a quick Google search should find them or use Johannes link https://github.com/damienmaguire/Lexus- ... /Libraries
9. Ensure you have set the FTDI board to 3.3V
10. Connect it as shown above then select Olimex MOD-WIFI-ESP8266(DEV) from the Tools/Boards menu and select the correct port.
11. Ensure the settings are as shown below - the Flash memory seems to be most important.

IMG_20241204_195411571_HDR.jpg

12. Use the Upload option to install the firmware in the Olimex and wait for the board to reset.
Note with the RevB board you need to hold the button down as you power it up to put it into programming mode.
if you used a new board you have to select "erase flash: sketch + wifi settings" from the Tools menu so the board will erase its password
13. Repower it with the button held down and select Tools - "ESP8266 sketch data upload" and wait for the board to reset.
14. Reboot the Olimex and connect to the wifi as usual. Open a browser and enter 192.168.4.1. This will give you Johannes ESP8266 WiFi page when you connect to the Olimex WIFI.
Note for this step I used the Nissan Leaf WiFi.ino from Damiens Github to give me the gauges when I used the IP above. A file seems to be missing from the leaf_wifi\data folder in Damiens Github which I found in his Lexus-GS450H guthub. It is solid-gauge.js. Please correct me if I'm wrong about this.


I Used a laptop with a fresh install of Linux Mint and installed Arduino from the Mint App installer which seems to default to Arduino 1.8.19. I can't comment on any other version.

Reasons it might fail.
It looks like you need an older IDE like Arduino 1.8.19. I tried using the current version and didn't get the option to "ESP8266 Sketch Data Upload" under 'Tools'. Linux Mint installs version 1.8.19 if you use the Software Manager and this works fine.
You need to set the Flash memory correctly for your ESP8266 under Tools.
You need to reboot the ESP8266 with the button held down each time you want to upload or do a Sketch data upload as it will reset itself to normal mode after every update.
In my case I was downloading files from Damiens Github and some of the folders needed renamed, like the data folder that holds the html stuff needs to be named in lower case, the Leaf wifi data folder was called Data so the Arduino IDE didn't see any files. This may not be an issue in Windows. Also a file was missing which I found in the Lexus GS450 github. The VCU I have was only sold for a short time before Damien designed the Zombieverter so is not widely used.

EDIT 1:
This process will give a web page but I'm struggling to get it to connect to the VCU.
I wanted to test it before plugging into my car VCU so have connected it to a Due (with Leaf_Gen1_5.ino installed) via the Serial2 connections. I see the activity light flashing but no changes to the display. I'll continue with this but if anyone has any suggestions please help.

Edit2:
OK so I'm a numpty.
I was uploading the ESP8266 sketch, then 'sketch data uploading' the Leaf WiFi web page. What I should have done for my Gen1 Nissan Leaf VCU was upload the Nissan Leaf WiFi sketch from Damiens Github (with the "solid-gauge.js" file copied from his Lexus GS450 repository to the data folder), then do the 'Sketch Data Upload' to send the web page to the board. This was relevant to me but may not be for you. I still don't have the correct SSID but it works so I don't care.
When the Olimex is powered up the web page is available on 192.168.4.1 and the gauges all show full scale. When plugged into the Gen1 Nissan Leaf VCU in my car it displayed the correct voltage etc.
As a test I connected it to an Arduino Due with the Nissan Leaf VCU sketch uploaded and the gauges immediately dropped to 0 where they normally they show full scale. I'm hoping they dropped to 0 as the Due is not receiving CAN from the Inverter, tomorrow I'll try sending a CAN log from a short drive to see what happens but I'm pretty certain it should work. As mentioned above I tried it plugged into my Freelander VCU and it showed the correct voltage and current just the same as the original Olimex supplied by Damien.
The main purpose of all this is to be able to have a test bed in my office where I can play with the settings of my VCU and test them without having to repeatedly send new sketches to the VCU in my car. I still have not worked out why the display will show data from the ISA shunt OR the Inverter but not both so if I have voltage, current and power from the ISA shunt I lose Inverter & motor temps and RPM. As a halfway house I use the DUE that controls charging to send RPM to the dash over CAN and the VCU sends info from the VCU to the display over WiFi. This way Iall I'm losing is temps which at this time of year are slightly less important.

Edit3:
I went back to this with a clean laptop and had some issues. I was able to install the software but every time I went into the admin page to change the display it corrupted with garbage showing where the title should be. After a while trying different things I eventually downloaded the libraries Johannes linked to and suddenly all was OK so the issue must have been an incompatible library.

So a couple of things about this post.
Since making it I've found one of the boards I programmed works some of the time but often I cannot connect to the WiFi. I have no way of checking whether it was one of the ones I accidentally connected to 5V but it might be so I guess it's something to be careful of.

The original reasons I wanted to program these ESP8266 boards.
1. I have one of Damiens Leaf Gen 1 VCU's which uses this board and I wanted to be able to tweak it and make a copy of it just in case my own fails.

2. I never managed to make the display work with the ISA shunt and show the Inverter and motor temps plus rpm at the same time, so an alternative was to use a spare Arduino Due to transmit temps and RPM while the VCU transmits the ISA shunt Volts and Amps. I know it sounds daft but my programming skills are practically non existent so I'm scared to mess with the VCU in case I mess something up and cause a crash or kill it completely so I have to work with what I've got.
It turns out using a slightly tweaked version of Damiens VCU sketch on a Due worked a treat and I now have two WiFi Hubs in my car and it's easy to either swap between them or use my phone on one while the Android head unit displays the other.

[tom91]

I've found that using Damiens legacy board I see up to 90kW

Wait are you on about a "logic replacement board" or a VCU that controls the OEM inverter over CAN? Please be specific as you next post just mentions VCUs

[Alibro]

Wait are you on about a "logic replacement board" or a VCU that controls the OEM inverter over CAN? Please be specific as you next post just mentions VCUs

It's the board that is the subject of this thread. Damiens original VCU (predecessor to the Zombieverter) that controls the inverter over CAN.
I should have mentioned that.

[r1ckyb0nd]

This is also a replacement board that I think works with gen 1 leaf inverters that connects open Inverter brain to it.
https://github.com/jsphuebner/inverter-hardware
Anyone familiar with this and if it still works?

[johu]

That's discussed here: viewtopic.php?t=138