March 6th, 2022 
Marty Figgs 
Android Auto-compatible head units aren’t too difficult to find these days, but they cost a pretty penny and usually won’t fit properly in older cars. A developer created a solution called Crankshaft to address both of those issues, and all you need to make it a reality is a Raspberry Pi 3 and a touchscreen.
Crankshaft is a free “turnkey” GNU/Linux distribution with a simple proposition:
- Buy a Raspberry Pi 3 and a 7-inch touchscreen (and a case, if you’d like)
- Connect the Pi to the touchscreen
- Download and unzip the Crankshaft image, and write it to an SD card
- Assemble the makeshift Android Auto head unit in your car
- Drive
The developer, Huan Truong, said the project began when he couldn’t find an affordable Android Auto Head unit that fit in his 1998 car, which has a single DIN slot.
Crankshaft turns a Raspberry Pi 3 and a touchscreen into an Android Auto head unit was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
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