well fiat have just produced a nice bit of software for my cars excellent blue&me system.... went on the fiat website today, and downloaded abit of code to a memory stick (and a program to run it on my PC)...

stick the memory stick into one of the USB ports (in the car), and withing seconds the nice lady says "update completed"...

next thin, I stick my usual 8 gig stick with all my music on back in there, start the engine, click the button and say "ecodrive on"... "ecodrive on" the nice lady replies

now my car is recording my driving style for the next five days, throttle openings, how early/late I brake, fuel consuption, items like aircon that are on, ect ect ect.....

then I stick my "usual" memory stick back in my PC, run the program, and it gives me a shed load of stats (max speed best/worst fuel economy ect ect) and analyses my driving from an "ecodrive" point of view, then gives me a load of reccomendation on how to improve fuel economy!

what a cool little toy...... people pay huge money for add-on computers that do this sort of thing, and this little "beta-test" software is available for free from fiat on the net..... next thing I have to do is download the lates update that makes the blue and me "read" my text messages to me when the arrive

when I get my results in five days time, I'll post some stuff up here so you can all have a laugh :P (assuming it works, it is made by microsoft after all...)

updates to follow!

That sounds like a really neat idea.

And will it inform you when you have broken the speed limit?

maybe... dunno you can set a "speed limiter" just on the dash menu... so it really shouts at you if you go past 70mph but you know I'd never do that len

I've 5 days before I can download the info and find out exactly what it can tell me, but apparently it had access to all the cars sensors, so should be interesting

can you do it on a day to day basis instead? i reckon its more for fiat to see how their cars are actually driven.

well its just in beta testing, so the 5 day thing may just be a default setting to test the software, I would assume, when its being included in all the new cars blue&me systems it will be perfected, so you can use the voice control to choose options, and just record and analyse anything you want (like you can with the computer in the skyline)

at the moment my only voice commands are "ecodrive on" and "ecodrive off" so I can tell it when to record, and when not to.........

will be interesting to see how it develops

I've been holding off getting a Scanguage, just because I'm sure someone's got to come with with a "consumer-grade" obd-ii data logger.

The Scanguage's already made massive inroads into the MPG camp in the States, so this can only be a matter of time, I hope... Just think of the other variables you could get it to log...

Anyway, would love to know more about this - would really be interested in how the analysis of the data it captures is done (website, software?)

I've been holding off getting a Scanguage, just because I'm sure someone's got to come with with a "consumer-grade" obd-ii data logger.

The Scanguage's already made massive inroads into the MPG camp in the States, so this can only be a matter of time, I hope... Just think of the other variables you could get it to log...

Anyway, would love to know more about this - would really be interested in how the analysis of the data it captures is done (website, software?)

I'll post the details up when I get them... lots of people signed up to it, and the whole purpose is to analyse your driving, then give hints on how to improve your MPG... there is a "virtual" city of members, and the software has apparently already given 24,000 kg of CO2 savings (not that I care) but fuel economy is good for all no mater what the point of view, and I've seen some of the 500 owners (1.3 m/jet, same as used in vauxhall and ford KA, bought from fiat) giving regular over 73 average MPG, which is bloody good!

all done frome before and after calcs......

anyway, its on fiat.co.uk/ecodrive, all good stuff, but nothing you can use unless you have a blue & me equipeed 500 or grande punto...

but maybe other manufacturers will follow... the new superb has its own version of blue & me..... ect ect

Sounds interesting that - well done to FIAT for some joined up thinking

Using USB is a really good way of doing it too...

Steve