Nunchuck and Bluetooth

Has anyone figured out a way to use a nunchuck and bluetooth module at the same time? I want to have the option to use my phone or nunchuck to control the board while using a single vesc.

I personally would advise against the phone for controlling your board, but a new controller that will send some stuff back to the phone is being developed here (https://www.electric-skateboard.builders/t/oled-remote-s-with-gps-bt-nrf-under-development-please-leave-suggestions/22055) else there is the closed source app that focuses on getting as much data from the VESC back to the phone for comparing stats (https://www.electric-skateboard.builders/t/configuration-and-telemetry-for-vesc-ios-android/13483).

Any reason in particular you wouldn’t use the phone?

If a drop of water lands on your phone, the throttle could be sensed elsewhere/ not sensed at all. Accuracy with touch screens is much lower than with a joystick/ thumbstick/ trigger. If your phone falls, when you are going at speed it will get damaged, the joystick is plastic so should be fine. Holding a phone is less comfortable than holding a joystick (in my opinion).

Bluetooth is okay for things like telemetry (that don’t require such precise timing and reliability), but not actually controlling an electric board. Bluetooth is simply not reliable enough of a connection protocol to use it for controlling our boards.

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When I am not mistaken that is possible with the new VESC 6.0 but not with any older hardware. Or two “old” VESCs connected over CAN. But you asked for a single VESC. :slight_smile:

If I use that app you posted the second link to, wouldn’t that take up my slot for he receiver?

You would have to check but yes I think the bluetooth module gets its data over the vesc’s uart port so you would have to use a transmitter receiver combo that gives ppm signals to the vesc (rather than uart as the newer ones made especially for the vesc are doing).

So how would I do that?

You are correct. All of the bluetooth modules I have seen around here connected to the VESC using UART (a communication protocol) and then transmit those signals to a device (ie phone) via bluetooth.

Assuming you’re asking for how you’d use a bluetooth and a controller, you just need to choose a controller that doesn’t need the UART or any similar connections. Basically, you’re limited to PPM ones. Search here for the GT-2B remote (sometimes written without a dash). That’s pretty much the go to around here.