Thick pomm here, wants to get into canbus sniffing

[Gazz292]

Appologies for being in the wrong forum... i'm from england, and drive a rather lame car by your standards,
a 2011 Vauxhall Meriva B.. a sort of mini mpv, known as odd for having rear suicide doors (doors open backwards to normal... handy for getting brats into the car apparently)

And if you really want to take the piss.. it's got a poxy 1.3 litre diesel engine in it.. but sod it, it returns over 50mpg no matter how it's driven, and with diesel costing ~ £1.25 a litre (2.20 aussie dollars.. or something like 7 US dollars a gallon) i want to use as little of it as i can.

As i didn't buy it new, it's pretty much poverty spec, so i'm setting about upgrading things, first thing i did was replace the IPC from the crappy 2 line driver info display model that just showed mileage to the full screen dot matrix display (the orange mono display, no colour displays on the IPC's here till the very latest astra models)

This showed me a little on how these things talk over the GMlan, the IPC from another vehicle has the VIN of that vehicle stored in it, and until i get that changed to my VIN, it wont show mileage and throws up a few DTC's around the system for mismatched hardware.
I also had to add a few wires between the new indicator stalk with the buttons to control the DIC to the IPC... wiring i am good at, it's software i struggle with,

I have an opcom http://www.op-com.hu/OP-COM.aspx clone unit (cost me £50 not £1400, that can read and reset DTC's, and on some vehicles program things, but my vehicle isnt one of those that op-com software allows to access many programming features, and messing about telling the op-com it was connected to a different vehicle (insignia.. that the IPC came from) got me more features like being able to control engine actuators.
but trying to program the IPC buggered it up a little... lost a few idiot lights basically and still didn't changed the vin.

There is a bloke who can reprogram the eeprom in the IPC directly, so it will work in my vehicle, and i will use him for this time, but i'd like to learn to do these things myself, preferably doing the programming via the OBDii port.


I plan to fit as many parts from the higher spec model of this car that i can (thankfully most items are shared across the vauxhall range)
But i plan on fitting a sat nav infotainment system, AFL headlights, rain sensor wipers and high beam control (uses same sensor apparently) front fog lights, front and rear parking sensor system with the display in the DIC, reversing cam, tyre pressure monitoring, tow bar with factory wiring giving light bulb monitoring on the trailer etc.
Got an auto dim mirror in the post, that will work straight away, just needs power and the reverse light signal (so as not to dim when going backwards)

But everything else will need programming to match my car, and in some cases the BCM updating.. vauxhalls stance is that customers are not to change their car from the spec it was when they bought it, so get arsey when VCI codes and that for upgrades are requested for tech2/mdi programming etc... not that i have access to those tools anyway,


I also want to make the tailgate open remotely, it has an electric release, but it's only operated by the switch on the outside of the vehicle on the tailgate, and aparantly it;s not controled by the canbus... this is something i want to double check by doing some canbus sniffing,


If theres deffo no canbus tailgate release signal, my plan is to use something like an arduino listen to the remote unlock signal.. and when the signal is recieved twice within say 1.5 seconds, (i.e. i press the remote's unlock button twice.. can't hold it down as that winds the windows up) it will trigger a relay for a second or so.. which will send power to the tailgate release mechanism,

BUT, some models of vauxhall have remote tailgate release, and hence have a 3 button remote, i've ordered a cheap one off ebay, in the hope that once programmed to my car, some canbus sniffing will reveal the 3rd button press signal, then i will just need something to listen to that signal and operate a relay.


Crikey, i type a lot of shit, sorry bout that,
basically i want to learn about canbus sniffing.. on the low speed GMlan i believe i will find the remote unlock signals? i know this car has a high, medium and low speed lans, plus the dedicated GMlan on pin 1... that might be the low speed lan tho,
i'm thinking of an arduino and a canbus shield, i have a tiny bit of arduino programing knowledge, but looking for recommendations on what to buy, and what software to use (windows 7)

And then learn about changing certain things in the various modules to make them work together hopefully without totally bricking my car.