NK©26
Minneapolis, MN --:--:--
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(02/06) — Hardware

E28 OBC

A 1986 dashboard, rewired from behind the glass.

Year
2026
Role
Design, boards, firmware
Status
Boards designed
Discipline
Hardware
Fig. 02 — Face, 1:1 in spiritLive
On film
Five-thirty-five, frame 7506 · 01
7506 · 01 — Five-thirty-five
Five-thirty-five, frame 9195 · 07
9195 · 07 — Five-thirty-five
Five-thirty-five, frame 0013 · 08
0013 · 08 — Five-thirty-five
(A) — Brief

The factory on-board computer in my 1986 BMW 535i is a thirteen-key slab glowing orange on black. This replaces it with a single portrait touch screen cut to the exact face. It boots into a faithful copy of the original, then flips to gauges, performance, trip, nav and audio.

(B) — How it works
  1. 01

    Measured, not guessed

    The face comes from a model of the real part: 67.5 × 80.5 mm with a 45.97 × 34.8 mm window. Every assumption that wasn’t measured turned out wrong.

  2. 02

    Two boards

    A Compute Module 5 carrier for the display, and an I/O board built to survive a car’s 12 volts. Both are four-layer and machine-assembled.

  3. 03

    The old keys still work

    HR-DATE, AVG MPG, RANGE, TIMER, CODE: the original modes are rebuilt key for key, in the original colour.

  4. 04

    Wireless gauges

    Sensors in the engine bay report to the dash over ESP-NOW. No new wires through the firewall.

(C) — Built with
Next — 03/06 Barbot The model picks the bottles. Math picks the pour.