openinverter forum

Hi everyone,

I purchased a complete Wuling Hongguang Mini EV electric motor and inverter from Alibaba some time ago, and I’m now testing it on my bench.
The seller only gave me basic pinouts for each module, but no CAN protocol or documentation.

### Current Status
- I can spin the motor **forward** by sending a specific CAN message (ID + payload).
- However, I haven’t yet found how to make it spin **reverse**.
- Using SocketCAN (can-utils) at 500 kbps for testing.

### Help I Need
1. Does anyone have a candump (CAN bus log) from the Wuling Hongguang Mini EV, especially while shifting between Drive (D) and Reverse (R)?
2. Any clues which CAN ID or byte might represent the gear/direction command?
3. If anyone with access to a Mini EV could record a short `candump` log when engaging reverse, that would be extremely helpful.

### Notes
- I can share my current candump logs (forward only).
- I’m also able to run more tests and upload inverter PCB photos, labels, or wiring details.

Thanks a lot for your help! I think this info could be useful for others who want to repurpose Mini EV hardware.

How did you get the info for spinning it forward?

Best get as much info from the seller as possible. I would not have purchased it before getting any of that info.

tom91 wrote: ↑Fri Sep 26, 2025 8:58 am How did you get the info for spinning it forward?

Best get as much info from the seller as possible. I would not have purchased it before getting any of that info.

Thanks for the feedback!

Actually I do have a candump log from a Wuling Air EV (different market version, slightly different power rating).
From that log I was able to identify the forward command, and when I replayed that message the inverter runs the motor forward correctly.

However, for reverse it doesn’t behave the same:
- When I send the exact reverse command from the candump, the inverter only gives a very small torque (up to about –52 from the base value).
- If I go beyond that, instead of running backward it switches back to forward torque.

So it looks like either this inverter has different logic for reverse, or there are additional conditions (handshake, gear state, safety bit, etc.) that I haven’t figured out yet.

Has anyone seen this kind of behavior before?
Could it be that another CAN frame (e.g. “gear selector” or “VCU status”) must be present for reverse to work?

Post what you have worked out so far so its easier to review.

Hi, thanks for the feedback.

I’ve now created a repo to organize everything I’ve worked out so far:
https://github.com/xajist/wuling-can-reverse

What’s inside:

• CAN logs from both Wuling Hongguang Mini EV kit (no VCU, bench test) and Wuling Air EV (Indonesia variant, original VCU active)

• Table of identified CAN IDs (VCU → MCU torque, gear selector candidate, MCU feedback, etc.)

• The Python script I used to inject CAN frames directly into the Mini EV inverter (since the VCU is not used)

• Observations:
  • Forward torque works fine when injecting directly.
  • Reverse torque does not work — I only get a small negative torque (~–52), beyond that the inverter spins forward again.
  • In the Air EV candump, I can clearly see separate frames when shifting Drive ↔ Reverse, but replicating those on the Mini EV inverter does not give proper reverse.

My suspicion: the Mini EV inverter expects an extra frame (gear selector / brake status / handshake) from the VCU before allowing reverse.

If anyone has:

• A candump from a Mini EV showing Drive → Reverse → Drive, or

• Knowledge of what extra frames are required for reverse enable,

…that would be extremely helpful.

Hi, I was searching for information on how to read the Wuling GSEV MACARON's speed or velocity through CAN bus reading, which led me here. If my Wuling GSEV MACARON were identical to your Mini EV, here is the logs:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing

whatever the case, can you help me to get Wuling speed or velocity information from the CAN logs?

Thank You