Troubleshooting Suggestions?

Posted by Pilkerton on Oct 19, 2016; 2:28am
URL: http://bluesaab-forum.90.s1.nabble.com/Troubleshooting-Suggestions-tp710.html

So after requiring an unplug/replug cycle to operate for a few days at a time, my BlueSaab unit finally stopped functioning a few months back. The symptom: it paired just fine, but never showed up as 'CD1' in the head unit.

Since it got progressively worse before dying altogether, I suspected a hard component fault on the PCB. But swapping out the CAN controller and I/F chips (and updating to firmware 3.7) did not help.

Something very weird did happen one time I plugged it in: the engine fan came on (!) full blast. The car had been sitting for hours and the engine was definitely cold. Unplugging/replugging the BlueSaab unit caused the engine fan to shut off.

So what are a few things I can try?
Is there anything like a loopback test that's possible?
Or is another BlueSaab (or a 2nd Arduino CAN adapter) required for me to test it out-of-circuit?
Where does the CDC cable in the trunk go to? Could the cable be damaged somewhere?

Also I noticed that both the mauselec and Spark Fun CAN adapter designs include zeners and either an L or RC network on the CAN connections. Shouldn't BlueSaab have those also?