At some point, the trip distance on my ’06 Accord started to get short changed. Compared to the trip meter and Google Maps, the Torque trip distance is up to 20% off on the low side. Sometimes it’ll be 5% low, sometimes 10% low, but almost always inconsistently low, averaging about 10% too low.

I’ve tried using internal GPS, OBD, and external GPS. All methods give poor trip distance. I’ve swapped between a OBDLink and OBDLink MX, same issue. With the same phone, trip distance works on another vehicle (’14 4Runner). Same phone and OBDLink works on another ’06 Accord.

I’ve factory reset the phone, no difference.

I tried using OBDLink’s app and get a consistent 3.5% error (too low).

Any ideas?

PS No adapter errors.

Messed with it some more today. Entirely repeatable.

On a screen (screen 1) with inst/trip/long term mpg + trip distance. 3.5% error.

On a screen (screen 2)with MAF/MAP/OBD speed/O2 lambda/throttle pos/coolant temp/trip distance, error is 20% or so.

I can drive one mile with screen 1. 3.5% error.
Drive a second mile using screen 2, lose 0.2 miles of trip distance.
Drive a third mile with screen 1. 3.5% error again
Drive a fourth mile with screen 2, lose another 0.2 miles.
Repeat, repeat.

Bump now that piemmm is back from holiday or whatnot.

crwys, I’ve already tried all the steps you’re suggesting. Thanks for the suggestions though!

edit: Added a bunch of sensors to be logged and let it sit on the trip screen on the way home today. Trip distance now inaccurate there too. Seems like excessive PIDs being displayed/logged is causing the error.

Below is a plot of the trip distance vs time for my trip home today. TD – manual calc uses the logged OBD mph and and time to calculate distance manually. You can see how the Trip Distance PID forgets to add distance from time to time and the error adds up. ~10% for this trip.

Is your vehicle profile setup for proper vehicle at time of use?

Have you tried using GPS sats connected to display? One vehicle i have sees 20+ all time, other 12-15….

Also try using less displays as more using the slower for results for some( this is car ECU dependant ).

One month bump…

I’m using the OBD2 MX USB adapter with a dash-mounted android 4 tablet. I”ve found the Trip mileage to be useless unless you link it to the mileage in the vehicle profile. When linked to the profile, you can use the mileage to track oil changes, long-term fuel economy, etc.

The short-term trip mileage re-sets during my short trips around town. Once in a while I’ll notice Torque Pro “crashes” / disconnects from the ECU then automatically reconnects. When it reconnects, short-term trip mileage starts at zero again. This also resets trip gas mileage making it pretty much useless too.

Maybe your numbers are off because of these dropped connections to the ECU (?)

I wish an update would link the gas mileage to the mileage in Vehicle Profile and give us a way to add more mileage links to profile mileage (multiple odometers).

You didnt mention if the two phones used
the same external gps… but just in case you
havent tried it yet there is a special setting
for Torque Pro for gps error. (Under special
settings).

There is also a toggle for resetting trip
distances during brief stops which may
help with the previous post’s connection
reset.

Hi

Some adapters can disconnect from the app, and when torque senses this and reconnects, it will automatically set the trip distance to 0. You can stop this reset behaviour by turning on the “Ignore short gaps between trips” option in the apps trip settings

The cause for the trip distance under-reading is very likely one of the following:

* (most likely) the GPS not updating or staying ‘stationary’ for long periods of time. This can be caused by poor reception (usually if the phone/tablet isn’t in good view of the sky or is in a built-up area)

* The adapter frequently disconnecting, or pausing, or having a high error count (when gps isn’t being used for distance calculations) If you have any error counts displayed for the adapter then you should get it replaced. The error count for any ELM327 adapter should always be 0 on a properly functioning unit. Malfunctioning adapters can cause a fair few issues getting accurate data

That’s about all it could be. I am due to add an ‘ignore GPS for distance calculations’ option to the advanced settings in the next app update for people with poor GPS visibility **EDIT-already done see below** (GPS is traditionally preferred due to the greater accuracy over longer trip distances that it provides)

(apologies for the late replies! – unfortunately I’ve not been on holiday – just a lot of emails to get through and cool new features to discuss! hopefully the above should provide some help/insight)

EDIT: Forgot I’ve already added the ‘do not use GPS for distance calcs’ option into the apps special settings – try enabling it and see if it cures the issue you have

Hi

No worries – sorry this is taking a bit of two-and-fro-ing to find out what’s going on

Can you tell me if the following settings in the ‘OBD2 adapter settings’ is enabled:

‘Update Trip distance only when connected to ECU’

It should only stop logging if that option is enabled if the adapter loses connection, but you’ve said you have a OBDLink (and they are generally extremely well built and don’t have dropout issues (unless the android device has issues)), so it shouldn’t be this, though I cant rule out this option having an uninteded effect (it will help me pinpoint in code what to look at)

The screens thing you mention is also interesting – that could well be an issue and I’ll be having a closer look at that

EDIT: one more thing I need to check – can you tell me the PID update speed that your adapter is doing (in the adapter status screen) as this also can have a bearing on what’s going on in the app

Thanks!

Guys, did you find a solution?

I am having exactly the same problem with my Acura CL and latest version of Torque Pro. I have OBDLink adapter, no error counts, PID counts/sec: average 7.3, maximum 8.0 . I also tried disabling ‘Update Trip distance only when connected to ECU’ , but that did not change anything.

I always get Trip distance 5-15% lower than car odometer (or Garmin GPS unit, which is pretty close to car odometer).