Cheap chinese CAN adapter

[Zuikkis]

Hi,

just thought I'd share this with you. I needed a CAN adapter for Think diagnostics and to be able to program RLEC ID with ProgTool.

I thought I'd try first with cheapest possible chinese adapter before buying a real PCAN.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005721849902.html

Well, it wasn't THAT cheap when I bought it, seems to be 50% discount at the moment! Only 11.93€ including shipping!

Anyway it claims to be PCAN compatible and is very small etc.

I had a spare OBD connector casing, I figured it would be very compact device when built inside there. Here's some pictures of the process.

Du kan ikke vise dette vedlegget.

The board fits very nicely to the OBD casing when I used a saw to cut small lines near the wire exit hole. They hold the board nicely. I added small foam padding to make the board sit more tightly.

Du kan ikke vise dette vedlegget.

Wiring is simple, just CANH, CANL and GND.

Du kan ikke vise dette vedlegget.

Anyway. I installed PCAN software and drivers and the drivers recognize this device as PCAN USB Pro... At least PCAN-View works nicely, and also I managed to now change RLEC ID with ProgTool which was the main purpose I bought this. So everything fine!


Oh I also have this kind of adapter to fit RLEC ribbon cable to OBD reader.

Du kan ikke vise dette vedlegget.

[Zuikkis]

Oh I think this is the same kind of OBD connector I used:

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32843983220.html

[Warlock]

Yeah, I have one of these in order as well though this summer, but it has not arrived yet
It is an CANable clone of som sort, original open source hardware here: https://canable.io/

It is probably flashed with an older version of xcan-cantact (or similar), which supported PCAN before Peak asked them to remove the copyrighted parts from the code. (One could just wonder why I cloned something here: https://github.com/Insectodium/pcan_cantact ).

Anyway, cool that it can be bought as a complete product, and I as well is looking forward to test it out when it finally arrive...
Great work, and thank you for sharing

[worry]

WOW! 

[Zuikkis]

Yeah, I have one of these in order as well though this summer, but it has not arrived yet
It is an CANable clone of som sort, original open source hardware here: https://canable.io/

It is probably flashed with an older version of xcan-cantact (or similar), which supported PCAN before Peak asked them to remove the copyrighted parts from the code. (One could just wonder why I cloned something here: https://github.com/Insectodium/pcan_cantact ).

Anyway, cool that it can be bought as a complete product, and I as well is looking forward to test it out when it finally arrive...
Great work, and thank you for sharing

Thanks for your detailed answer!

Yes the Aliexpress page says you can choose between CANable or PCAN firmware, but the default is PCAN.

My device arrived very quickly. I ordered it on 13.8 and it arrived 25.8! With the Aliexpress free shipping!

Aliexpress has been really fast now when they started the "EU approved" shipping system where any possible VAT is already included in the price. So you pay full amount to china and then parcels are delivered directly to you without any customs hazzle. Works really well. I don't how it is in Norway? Might be not so optimized as the bigger EU market?

[BauDemo]

Did it work?
Can you use zebra monitor or commtool or pcan viewer with it?

[Zuikkis]

Did it work?
Can you use zebra monitor or commtool or pcan viewer with it?

Only have tried ProgTool and PCAN Viewer so far, they worked.

[Warlock]

I've now tested this for SavvyCan and CommTool (both versions) and can report this works flawlessly. I have no Zebra car to test this on, but hopefully I could borrow one in near future, and I will confirm for ZebraMonitor then (if I'm able to get the setup right).
If anyone needs help in making these, I would gladly assist.

[Marsto]

Yes!!! This is a great new tool for all us Thinkers.
I would not be surprised if it works with Zebramonitor also. We will find out tomorrow with Trondheim Thinkers in action.

[Warlock]

Ok, so we tested this some more.

It works for with every program which can use the newest drivers for the Peak CAN-USB, so things like CommTool, ProgTool, SavvyCAN, PEAK Viewer, etc.

Unfortunately it didn't work with the old drivers which is needed for ZebraMonitor it seems. Zebra Monitor depends on very old drivers, and there is probably some old deprecated system- or communication calls which is not supported in newer drivers, nor in the CANable firmware.

I dont know if I will look into this much more for the Zebra part, but it is very usable for everything needed for the Enerdel/Li-ion Think troubleshooting.

[Warlock]

Uh, i did som "th!nkering" on a Win10 PC, and the latest ZebraMonitor v2.76 seems to run fine, and is willing to communicate with the CANable-module (!?!)...

Either a false positive, or a actual success!
I need a Zebra-think to test on again, unfortunately I'm also scheduled for some R&R the next few days...

[Marsto]

Great, great news. We will be back after fall break to find out on the Zebra Think we have unfinished business with.