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I have a lotus esprit but I am also parting out and scrapping a 2004 audi A6. They were going to give me 250$ for the whole car... Yeah right. It just has some bent valves it even has the parts to repair ir but I decided to do a part out.

I got ahold of the climate head. I thought about intergrating it into the lotus or my wifes MK4 golf. The problem is I am not an electronics wizzard. The same night I got ahold of an old printer. IT had a gearbox with a dc motor and an encoder wheel which is perfect for the issue I am having with the lotus. The mechanical system is just too stiff to use anything other than the factory knob. I have a bunch of rotary encoders and the LED displays from the audi.

I was thinking about using an arduino. HAving the rotary encoders feed data to the arduino the arduino sending signal to the motors to control fan speed. flap angle and hot/ cold valve operation. Then the opticoder on this gearbox can tell motor posistion. I know enough to hook the encoders to the arduino but I do not know how to make the arduino take the data from the opticoders and use it for posistion finding. Aka I want to make the motor behave like it did in the printer. Stepping.


I also do not feel confident enought to write the code. someone stick me in the right direction I have spent 10 hours reschearching.

Lol I was pretty sure no one was going to touch this even with the tippy tip of their unicorn horn. So I have made a bit of progress. I have absoloutley demolished the interior of the A6. I am nearing the point where I can harvest the whole loom along with the HVAC unit. The only problem now is there is a subframe in my way. So that said I am switching gears with the project and I am going to see how hard it would be to wire in the head unit and the motors using the original loom. I should just need an arduino to act as the brain.... OR I might get lucky and Ill be able to just plug in the control unit but I aint that big of a dreamer.

I’ve done some small stuff with Arduino before, like controlling lights and fans, but getting stepper motors to work with position tracking is definitely a step up.
I’ve also learned the hard way that having a good wiring diagram is a lifesaver. If you can’t track down a pinout for the Audi system, maybe hit up a local Repair Near Me shop. Sometimes they’ve got the tools or know-how to help you figure out those tricky connections.

I see it’s been a while since you’ve posted, but I just wanted to ask—how did the project go? I'm curious if you ended up finding any tools that really helped speed up the piping process. I’ve been tinkering with HVAC layouts in CAD and always looking for smart ways to make things easier and more precise. Anyone else found good tricks since this thread started?

I ran into similar issues trying to size and plan a duct layout for an older building retrofit. What really helped was checking out emersonproservices.com — they’ve got some solid resources that explain airflow stuff in plain terms and helped me figure out equipment that matched the goals I had. Made it a lot easier to talk to local contractors too without feeling lost in jargon.