CarPlay solution for Tesla by Michal Gapinski using Raspberry Pi with Android

[MikeMass]

Putting my shopping list together here. Quick question about the power supply.

@ElectricAnt54 suggested a usb-a male to usb-c male cable along with THIS & THIS

@timeshifter suggested THIS , THIS & THIS

and then @Yipsan suggested: "power to rpi4, it can be usbc -usbc cable, or 12v charger with appropriate usb -usbc cable"

My question is: Can I do away with the cigarette jack and plug something like THIS from the RPi4 directly to a port in the car?

 

[EMEV]

On this latest Tesla Android version and with Tesla 2022.36.20 I have to keep turning on the WiFi in the Tesla car after I leave the garage even when I have set it in the car to keep it alive with the Tesla Android WiFi. Once I turn on the WiFi on the Tesla it connects to the Tesla Android with no problem. Anyone else seeing this same behavior with the Tesla car WiFi turning off even when you say that it should keep it alive with Tesla Android?

Just for those having the same problem I had above - I figured out the problem and I had another network that was also set to be on while in drive that was creating a conflict with Tesla-Android. Now everything is working fine including my Alcatel modem that was not working before.

For those having problems with the IK41UC modem the solution is on the GitHub issues thread created by EletricAnt54. The user MCFFHAB found out that there are two models of the IK41UC - a normal commercial version and a "IoT" version labeled "M2M". To find out which version you have look at the inside of the cover of the modem that you take out to insert the SIM card. It will say the Model: IK41UC M2M instead of just IK41UC. If you have the IK41UC M2M it will not work out of the box unless you change it to rndis mode (this version of the modem comes as mbim out of the box). MCFFHAB found out how to change the modem to rndis mode and michal created a patch (already in 2022.45.1) that makes this modem work in this mode.

The catch is that it is somewhat technical the way to change the modem from mbim to rndis. Also, once you change this modem to rndis there is very limited ways to change it back to mbim that is very technical. Michal is working on a solution to make this modem work out of the box in mbim mode with the information provided by MCFFHAB. If you want to change to rndis mode at your own risk to make work now, you can read that GitHub issues thread to know how to do it.

 

[EMEV]

Just for those having the same problem I had above - I figured out the problem and I had another network that was also set to be on while in drive that was creating a conflict with Tesla-Android. Now everything is working fine including my Alcatel modem that was not working before.

For those having problems with the IK41UC modem the solution is on the GitHub issues thread created by EletricAnt54. The user MCFFHAB found out that there are two models of the IK41UC - a normal commercial version and a "IoT" version labeled "M2M". To find out which version you have look at the inside of the cover of the modem that you take out to insert the SIM card. It will say the Model: IK41UC M2M instead of just IK41UC. If you have the IK41UC M2M it will not work out of the box unless you change it to rndis mode (this version of the modem comes as mbim out of the box). MCFFHAB found out how to change the modem to rndis mode and michal created a patch (already in 2022.45.1) that makes this modem work in this mode.

The catch is that it is somewhat technical the way to change the modem from mbim to rndis. Also, once you change this modem to rndis there is very limited ways to change it back to mbim that is very technical. Michal is working on a solution to make this modem work out of the box in mbim mode with the information provided by MCFFHAB. If you want to change to rndis mode at your own risk to make work now, you can read that GitHub issues thread to know how to do it.

A few additional points - if your modem is working now - even if it has problems dropping connections - the above instruction is not for you. Only follow those instructions if you are certain you have the "M2M" version of this modem.

 

[ElectricAnt54]

North Americans who have an Alcatel usb lte modem & use Reddit , can you please vote on this poll asking your experience. Poll is open for 7 days, maximum I was allowed. Basically did it work without issue, did you need to execute an AT modem command to change the modem’s mode, did you end up plugging it in to a travel router or did you give up and return the modem?

https://www.reddit.com/r/teslaandroid/comments/zcjwmb

 

[ElectricAnt54]

Downloading tesla firmware 2022.44.2 now. I’ll try tesla-android tomorrow since the download is hung at 50% ..probably waiting to continue when car is inactive. Always does this. Known tesla behavior. Alll goood.

 

[evNewbee]

Downloading tesla firmware 2022.44.2 now. I’ll try tesla-android tomorrow since the download is hung at 50% ..probably waiting to continue when car is inactive. Always does this. Known tesla behavior. Alll goood.

I updated to 2022.44.2 just about an hour and a half ago. Will test it tomorrow as well on the performance of Tesla Android but I doubt there is any improved performance.

 

[BMW740iL]

I updated to 2022.44.2 just about an hour and a half ago. Will test it tomorrow as well on the performance of Tesla Android but I doubt there is any improved performance.

Is performance an issue when using Tesla Android in the current setup?

 

[ElectricAnt54]

Is performance an issue when using Tesla Android in the current setup?

@BMW740iL , performance is good when using it for CarPlay. I use wireless & wired CarPlay & both seem good. That is what I use it for. I do not have experience with android auto or using android os apps like waze. I have been using it for months and it replaced my hansshow consol as my source of Apple CarPlay.

performance tips:
the pi needs to be as close to car’s wifI antenna. Seems to be more of an issue on 2018 vehicles. Upcoming update will support small wifi antenna hardware I have read.

if android os seems fast but CarPlay & android auto is slow, this suggests issue with carlinkit dongle. If using wireless CarPlay, try wired to see if dongle wifi might have interference or has hardware issue. This was someone’s issue recently. If using lte modem, try unplugging modem as test to see if it causes interference When in wireless CarPlay/android auto. If this is case, use usb-a male to usb-a female extension cable to make more room between the devices (just an idea, never heard of anyone needing to do this). I have a short extension cable because my Alcatel modem is big and was rubbing against CarPlay dongle usb connection.

Note: MCU 1 (cars previous to March 2018 without an infotainment upgrade) are not supported, as the built-in browser is out of date and too slow.

Tesla Android Project

Android 13 for all Tesla vehicles!

teslaandroid.com

 

[ElectricAnt54]

I updated to 2022.44.2 just about an hour and a half ago. Will test it tomorrow as well on the performance of Tesla Android but I doubt there is any improved performance.

@evNewbee if you have performance issues, might be easier to solve your specific issue by making a thread in the Reddit community as it is hard to keep track of issues in this forum, not best tool for the job. it is named r/teslaandroid

 

[evNewbee]

Is performance an issue when using Tesla Android in the current setup?

No issue for Carplay generally. It’s just choppy when I stream YouTube on either Carplay or directly on the TeslaAndroid, but this is the limitation, not an isssue, as currently TeslaAndroid does not have hardware encoder/decoder yet.

 

[evNewbee]

@evNewbee if you have performance issues, might be easier to solve your specific issue by making a thread in the Reddit community as it is hard to keep track of issues in this forum, not best tool for the job. it is named r/teslaandroid

Thanks for mentioning Reddit. I already joined. I don’t have any performance issue at all, just the current limitation of TeslaAndroid that does not support hardware decoding/encoding so streaming is choppy

 

[ElectricAnt54]

Thanks for mentioning Reddit. I already joined. I don’t have any performance issue at all, just the current limitation of TeslaAndroid that does not support hardware decoding/encoding so streaming is choppy

Ah yes I remember you have a jail broken iPhone and can watch YouTube video within CarPlay , yup that will have issues until perhaps hardware decoding is exposed in android os that tesla-android is using.

 

[ElectricAnt54]

I believe I found a source of North America Only Alcatel LTE modems which should be plug & play with Tesla-android.

Unknown to the developer of tesla-android, there is a variant model number of the Alcatel LTE USB modem sold in North America called "IK41UC M2M" (there are spaces). Only the model named "IK41UC" works plug & play with tesla-android. Resellers often do not know the difference and will omit M2M from the description. If you end up with a "IK41UC M2M" the modem can still be made to work "plug & play" (no travel router) & tutorials are being written to help people who end up with this variant. I'd really try to avoid ending up with the M2M variant unless you are a technical person. So if in doubt, ask the reseller if they can confirm that M2M doesn't appear on box / inside modem. Yesterday I messaged a seller of Alcatel IK41UC LTE USB modems asking if the words M2M appeared on the box or under the plastic cover of the SIM card where model numbers are mentioned. **NOTE
ONLY the sticker under the SIM card cover & product box will say M2M. The sticker on the main body of the modem won't**. That's how my modem is at least. The person said no and sent me photos of the product they are selling. This means the seller's modems should work plug & play with tesla-anderoid, no need to switch the modem to rndis mode. Here is the sales listing I was looking at when I used e-bay's contact seller button. Here are the photos they sent me. My modem & a few other people's which didn't work plug & play had "M2M" to the right of the model number.

 

[ElectricAnt54]

I believe I found a source of North America Only Alcatel LTE modems which should be plug & play with Tesla-android.

Unknown to the developer of tesla-android, there is a variant model number of the Alcatel LTE USB modem sold in North America called "IK41UC M2M" (there are spaces). SNIP
View attachment 882581

Here is an image of how the Alcatel "IK41UC M2M" LTE USB Modem variant appears. This is the variant which doesn't work plug n play and requires the mode to be set to RNDIS via old fashioned AT modem commands mentioned a few posts earlier or via plugging in to a travel router such as TP-Link AC750 (TL-WR902AC) .

 

[Daekwan]

I believe I found a source of North America Only Alcatel LTE modems which should be plug & play with Tesla-android.

Unknown to the developer of tesla-android, there is a variant model number of the Alcatel LTE USB modem sold in North America called "IK41UC M2M" (there are spaces). Only the model named "IK41UC" works plug & play with tesla-android. Resellers often do not know the difference and will omit M2M from the description. If you end up with a "IK41UC M2M" the modem can still be made to work "plug & play" (no travel router) & tutorials are being written to help people who end up with this variant. I'd really try to avoid ending up with the M2M variant unless you are a technical person. So if in doubt, ask the reseller if they can confirm that M2M doesn't appear on box / inside modem. Yesterday I messaged a seller of Alcatel IK41UC LTE USB modems asking if the words M2M appeared on the box or under the plastic cover of the SIM card where model numbers are mentioned. **NOTE
ONLY the sticker under the SIM card cover & product box will say M2M. The sticker on the main body of the modem won't**. That's how my modem is at least. The person said no and sent me photos of the product they are selling. This means the seller's modems should work plug & play with tesla-anderoid, no need to switch the modem to rndis mode. Here is the sales listing I was looking at when I used e-bay's contact seller button. Here are the photos they sent me. My modem & a few other people's which didn't work plug & play had "M2M" to the right of the model number.
View attachment 882581

Im ready to buy the one you linked to on eBay right now.

Just want another confirmation its exactly what you are recommending to get! As soon as you reply yes.. I'm clicking the buy button!

 

[ElectricAnt54]

Im ready to buy the one you linked to on eBay right now.

Just want another confirmation its exactly what you are recommending to get! As soon as you reply yes.. I'm clicking the buy button!

That is who I would buy from if I were buying an Alcatel for use in North America knowing what I do now. Other people posted who they bought from so those could be good sources too, you can send the seller the pictures to see if they will verify they are not selling M2M.

Also I noticed the seller I linked to says the modem works with companies that use AT&T & T-Mobile networks. it was buried so just saw that now.

“Guaranteed to work on AT&T and T-Mobile and others as long as they T-MOBILE TOWER USERS and international / overseas anywhere with GSM Network Worldwide. Phones (lte modem) will not work with Carriers like Cricket, Sprint, Verizon, Straight Talk, Boost Mobile or Virgin.”

If they send you a M2M modem, it’s not the end of the world. Myself & others are going to write some tutorials about how to convert M2M variants in to plug n play. I did it on my M2M Alcatel & so have a few others. I ordered a M2M modem which should arrive next week to help ensure I write the correct steps. I’m testing slightly easier ways of converting than what I did. I’ll also write up the methodology I used. This is how I stumbled upon this seller since I was specifically looking for the non plug n play M2M version so I could test to see how OS detects the modem as I’m writing tutorials.

 

[ElectricAnt54]

That is who I would buy from if I were buying an Alcatel for use in North America knowing what I do now. Other people posted who they bought from so those could be good sources too, you can send the seller the pictures to see if they will verify they are not selling M2M.

Also I noticed the seller I linked to says the modem works with companies that use AT&T & T-Mobile networks. it was buried so just saw that now.

“Guaranteed to work on AT&T and T-Mobile and others as long as they T-MOBILE TOWER USERS and international / overseas anywhere with GSM Network Worldwide. Phones (lte modem) will not work with Carriers like Cricket, Sprint, Verizon, Straight Talk, Boost Mobile or Virgin.”

If they send you a M2M modem, it’s not the end of the world. Myself & others are going to write some tutorials about how to convert M2M variants in to plug n play. I did it on my M2M Alcatel & so have a few others. I ordered a M2M modem which should arrive next week to help ensure I write the correct steps. I’m testing slightly easier ways of converting than what I did. I’ll also write up the methodology I used. This is how I stumbled upon this seller since I was specifically looking for the non plug n play M2M version so I could test to see how OS detects the modem as I’m writing tutorials.

Tech world moves fast. The commands we wanted to test in the easy method were tried by two people this morning who had non plug n play (with tesla-android) variants. One had USA Alcatel M2M variant and other had European Alcatel “IoT” variant. The commands made both modems plug n play. A global solution! In GitHub thread, current Plan seems to be to add ability for tesla-android to detect these modems since we know the ID numbers and switch them to RNDIS mode (plug n play with tesla-android ). So in the perhaps not so distant future, it won’t matter which variant you end up being sold. No need for me to write tutorials .
As a side note, I sat on the sidelines waiting for my M2M hardware to arrive. Much Credit goes to the others in the GitHub thread. My M2M Delivery was pushed up a week and it will arrive tomorrow , one day after global solution identified . Was hoping to help test the commands. Oh well that’s how life is sometimes.

 

[dusty]

Question: instead of using a RPi, could it be possible to run everything from an Android phone? Seems like it should be doable, especially it the phone is rooted for. Am I off basis here?

 

[ElectricAnt54]

Question: instead of using a RPi, could it be possible to run everything from an Android phone? Seems like it should be doable, especially it the phone is rooted for. Am I off basis here?

One reason I can think of why phone is not a good computing choice, too many variations of phone hardware with different abilities which means difficult to support. I think the developer is interested in supporting an additional type of micro computer which might be easier to obtain and cheaper than PI. The developer posts on the Tesla android twitter account often. You can follow that account to get hints at possible upcoming functionality & plans. Sometimes the developer reads this thread, not sure how often.

 

[Daekwan]

I believe I found a source of North America Only Alcatel LTE modems which should be plug & play with Tesla-android.

Unknown to the developer of tesla-android, there is a variant model number of the Alcatel LTE USB modem sold in North America called "IK41UC M2M" (there are spaces). Only the model named "IK41UC" works plug & play with tesla-android. Resellers often do not know the difference and will omit M2M from the description. If you end up with a "IK41UC M2M" the modem can still be made to work "plug & play" (no travel router) & tutorials are being written to help people who end up with this variant. I'd really try to avoid ending up with the M2M variant unless you are a technical person. So if in doubt, ask the reseller if they can confirm that M2M doesn't appear on box / inside modem. Yesterday I messaged a seller of Alcatel IK41UC LTE USB modems asking if the words M2M appeared on the box or under the plastic cover of the SIM card where model numbers are mentioned. **NOTE
ONLY the sticker under the SIM card cover & product box will say M2M. The sticker on the main body of the modem won't**. That's how my modem is at least. The person said no and sent me photos of the product they are selling. This means the seller's modems should work plug & play with tesla-anderoid, no need to switch the modem to rndis mode. Here is the sales listing I was looking at when I used e-bay's contact seller button. Here are the photos they sent me. My modem & a few other people's which didn't work plug & play had "M2M" to the right of the model number.
View attachment 882581

This is what I have received from using the purchase link above. Looks like I’m good to go!

Now which cellular carrier and plan should I sign up for.. if you don’t mind sharing.

Many thanks in advance!