Experienting with lead acid batteries in Tola

 I have 8x 100W solar panels on my pergola and brought down my eSmart3 charge controller and 2x 12v 70Ah lead acid batteries.

I intend to set up a little mains supply system in the kitchen with a 300W inverter I have knocking around :)

Experimenting with two 24v 100Ah LiFePO4 batteries in Kilnageer

For the last few days I've been testing my two 24v 100Ah LiFePO4 batteries.

I received them a few weeks ago but only tested BLE communications to their BMS with an Android App. I didn't try charging or discharging them.

I bought them on Jan 11, 2022 from  CERRNSS Battery Factory Store (https://www.aliexpress.com/store/912104017) on AliExpress and they cost 1,311 euros including all taxes and a mains charger. I specifically asked for them to have Wi-Fi access to their BMS. They arrived on the 1st April, 2022 so took 10 or so weeks to arrive.

But after taking them up to Mayo on Mon 18th April 2022 the testing finally began.

In Mayo I have 5x 230W solar PV panels connected to a eSmart3 charge controller which was connected to 6x lead acid leisure batteries (configured as three 24v pairs in parallel).

Wood delivered for pergola and PV panel stand

 The idea is the pergola will hold two vines and eventually have solar PV panels on top.

Built pergola which has three 4 foot (48" / 1220 mm) by 3 foot (36" / 920 mm) sections for solar panels. Can I get 300+ W ones to fit in there?

Finally got my LiFePO4 Batteries from China

 Happy days my batteries have arrived

Exciting unboxing them!

These are 24v 100Ah LiFePO4 batteries so combined provide 4.8 KWh (or 5 units) of electricity.

I expect only 80% can be drawn. I also have a mains charger for them.

So either I charge them at a night rate in Tola and discharge during the day to reduce my electricity bill. But Community Power haven't implemented my night rate yet.

Or take them to Mayo and see if they can supply enough current @24V to my 4KW inverter so that I can run the oven for an hour (2KWh). Something I'm yet to achieve.

I also downloaded the Android BMS app to talk over  low-power Bluetooth (BLE) to each battery's Battery Management System (BMS) and all looks good.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1CXmg5qO9P9VHWR4YZBSQSR12QE1Lp9Xw

They appear to by 8 strings of 3.x v LiPo batteries.

But I want to do this monitoring using a NodeMCU and Arduino later.

Photo resistor (2x) and transistors (10x TIL78) have arrived

 Got back from Mayo to two packages containing my photo resistors and transistors.

Aim to use theses to detect the LED pulses from OMNIpower smart electricity meter

Looks like a 47KR will do the trick according to this website:

https://forum.arduino.cc/t/phototransistor-usage/190418/10

https://learn.parallax.com/tutorials/robot/shield-bot/robotics-board-education-shield-arduino/chapter-6-light-sensitive-15

Long lead is collector C and shorted lead is emitter E

A 5v to C and a 2KR from E to GND with A/D sampling at E pin should do this trick :)

Once I've determined the voltages I can refine the Arduino sketch 

Setting up two ESPNow boards

I used the  two TTGO ESP32 LoRa boards to experiment with ESPNow communications. Which I haven't tried yet.

Master code serial output:

STA MAC: 4C:75:25:C2:7F:3C
ESPNow Init Success
 
Found 18 devices 
Slave Not Found, trying again.
 
Found 23 devices 
Slave Not Found, trying again.
 
Found 13 devices 
Slave Not Found, trying again.  

Slave code serial output:

rst:0x1 (POWERON_RESET),boot:0x13 (SPI_FAST_FLASH_BOOT)
configsip: 188777542, SPIWP:0xee
clk_drv:0x00,q_drv:0x00,d_drv:0x00,cs0_drv:0x00,hd_drv:0x00,wp_drv:0x00
mode:DIO, clock div:1
load:0x3fff0018,len:4
load:0x3fff001c,len:1044
load:0x40078000,len:10124
load:0x40080400,len:5856
entry 0x400806a8
ESPNow/Basic/Slave Example
AP Config Success. Broadcasting with AP: Slave_1
AP MAC: 4C:75:25:C2:EF:CD
ESPNow Init Success  

Would like OLED display support in Arduino so I can do a field range test :) Llooking for a suitable library :)

https://github.com/LilyGO/TTGO-LORA32

 

I went for the library from:

https://github.com/ThingPulse/esp8266-oled-ssd1306

And the OLED sketch:

/home/kilnageer/Arduino/sketches/LILYGO TTGO ESP32 LoRa OLED/TTGO-LORA32/BaT_test_ssd1306/BaT_test_ssd1306.ino 

 

which worked great! So combining the two sketches I now get..

 

 

 

 

Programming a TTGO ESP32 as a 868MHz RF sniffer

Out of the box the MCU runs a person counter programmer called PAXCOUNTER. Which uses bluetooth and WiFi transmissions to detect how many people are nearby.

http://www.lilygo.cn/prod_view.aspx?TypeId=50060&Id=1271&FId=t3:50060:3

And produces this serial output at 115200 baud on its micro-USB connector.

kilnageer@mint-AMILO-Pro-Series-V8210:~/Downloads/arduino-1.8.19$ cat putty.log
=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~= PuTTY log 2022.02.27 22:22:46 =~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=
.cpp:110] sendData(): Counter cleared
ery: 4230mV
[I[I][cyclic.cpp:73] doHousekeeping(): Battery: 4200mV
[I][senddata.cpp:110] sendData(): Counter cleared
[I][cyclic.cpp:73] doHousekeeping(): Battery: 4198mV
[I][cyclic.cpp:73] doHousekeeping(): Battery: 4266mV
[I][senddata.cpp:110] sendData(): Counter c.cpp:110] sendData(): Counter cleared
ets Jun  8 2016 00:22:57

rst:0x1 (POWERON_RESET),boot:0x13 (SPI_FAST_FLASH_BOOT)
configsip: 188777542, SPIWP:0xee
clk_drv:0x00,q_drv:0x00,d_drv:0x00,cs0_drv:0x00,hd_drv:0x00,wp_drv:0x00
mode:DIO, clock div:2
load:0x3fff0018,len:4
load:0x3fff001c,len:928
ho 0 tail 12 room 4
load:0x40078000,len:8740
load:0x40080400,len:5788
entry 0x4008069c
[I][reset.cpp:64] do_after_reset(): Starting Software v1.9.982, runmode 0
[I][configmanager.cpp:190] loadConfig(): Reading settings from NVS
[I][configmanager.cpp:55] open_storage(): Opening NVS
[I][configmanager.cpp:60] open_storage(): Done
[I][configmanager.cpp:204] loadConfig(): NVRAM settings version = 1.9.982
[I][configmanager.cpp:222] loadConfig(): bsecstate = 0
[I][configmanager.cpp:227] loadConfig(): loradr = 5
[I][configmanager.cpp:235] loadConfig(): txpower = 14
[I][configmanager.cpp:243] loadConfig(): adrmode = 1
[I][configmanager.cpp:251] loadConfig(): screensaver = 0
[I][configmanager.cpp:259] loadConfig(): screenon = 1
[I][configmanager.cpp:267] loadConfig(): countermode = 0
[I][configmanager.cpp:275] loadConfig(): sendcycle = 30
[I][configmanager.cpp:283] loadConfig(): wifichancycle = 50
[I][configmanager.cpp:291] loadConfig(): wifiantenna = 0
[I][configmanager.cpp:299] loadConfig(): vendorfilter = 1
[I][configmanager.cpp:307] loadConfig(): rgbluminosity = 30
[I][configmanager.cpp:315] loadConfig(): blescantime = 8
[I][configmanager.cpp:323] loadConfig(): BLEscanmode = 0
[I][configmanager.cpp:331] loadConfig(): WIFIscanmode = 1
[I][configmanager.cpp:339] loadConfig(): rssilimit = 0
[I][configmanager.cpp:347] loadConfig(): payloadmask = 127
[I][configmanager.cpp:355] loadConfig(): Monitor mode = 0
[I][configmanager.cpp:362] loadConfig(): Done
[I][i2c.cpp:23] i2c_scan(): Starting I2C bus scan...
[I][i2c.cpp:44] i2c_scan(): 0x3C: SSD1306 Display controller
[I][i2c.cpp:71] i2c_scan(): I2C scan done, 1 devices found.
[I][main.cpp:242] setup(): Starting LED Controller...
[I][power.cpp:171] calibrate_voltage(): ADC characterization based on reference voltage stored in eFuse
[I][lorawan.cpp:297] lora_stack_init(): LORA send queue created, size 600 Bytes
[I][lorawan.cpp:300] lora_stack_init(): Starting LMIC...
[I][main.cpp:375] setup(): Starting Wifi...
[I][main.cpp:388] setup(): Starting Interrupt Handler...
[I][main.cpp:412] setup(): Starting Timers...
[I][main.cpp:470] setup(): Starting Timekeeper...
[I][timekeeper.cpp:151] timepulse_init(): Timepulse: internal (ESP32 hardware timer)
[I][timesync.cpp:52] timesync_request(): [10.506] Timeserver sync request seqNo#144 started
[I][main.cpp:477] setup(): Features: OLED LED BATT OTA LORA FILTER PACKED WIFI
[I][cyclic.cpp:73] doHousekeeping(): Battery: 4116mV
kilnageer@mint-AMILO-Pro-Series-V8210:~/Downloads/arduino-1.8.19$ date
Sun 27 Feb 22:23:58 GMT 2022
kilnageer@mint-AMILO-Pro-Series-V8210:~/Downloads/arduino-1.8.19$

Which while interesting is of no use to this RF sniffer project.

To use the Arduino IDE for this MCU you need to add  https://dl.espressif.com/dl/package_esp32_index.json into the “Additional Board Manager URLs” field in the File -> Preferences screen.

Then install/download the 32MByte esp32 board support package by Espressif in the Board Manager (see https://github.com/espressif/arduino-esp32)

(See https://randomnerdtutorials.com/installing-the-esp32-board-in-arduino-ide-windows-instructions/)

After this you can select the "TTGO  LoRa32-OLED v2.1.6" board via Tools -> Board

In passing, I had to follow http://playground.arduino.cc/Linux/All#Permission to get serial monitor access

No good couldn't compile without getting below error. I also tried using board "Heltec WiFi LoRa 32" as stated in:

https://github.com/LilyGO/ESP32-Paxcounter/blob/master/platformio.ini

 

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/kilnageer/.arduino15/packages/esp32/tools/esptool_py/3.0.0/esptool.py", line 38, in <module>
    import serial
ImportError: No module named serial
exit status 1
Error compiling for board Heltec WiFi LoRa 32.

kilnageer@mint-AMILO-Pro-Series-V8210:~/platformio/ESP32-Paxcounter$ pip install pyserial
Collecting pyserial
  Using cached https://files.pythonhosted.org/packages/07/bc/587a445451b253b285629263eb51c2d8e9bcea4fc97826266d186f96f558/pyserial-3.5-py2.py3-none-any.whl
Installing collected packages: pyserial
Successfully installed pyserial-3.5
kilnageer@mint-AMILO-Pro-Series-V8210:~/platformio/ESP32-Paxcounter$ 

That fized above arduino serial issue and can now program MCU with blink, WiFiscan, etc. sketches :)

So tried using PlatformIO Core (CLI) (I'm on a 32-bit Mint Linux laptop so VSC, etc won't install!)

Wouldn't compile.. missing bt_xxx.h file.

 pio run

..

Compiling .pio/build/ttgov2/src/blecsan.cpp.o
Compiling .pio/build/ttgov2/src/lorawan.cpp.o
src/blecsan.cpp:15:22: fatal error: bt_types.h: No such file or directory

******************************************************************
* Looking for bt_types.h dependency? Check our library registry!
*
* CLI  > platformio lib search "header:bt_types.h"
* Web  > https://registry.platformio.org/search?q=header:bt_types.h
*
******************************************************************

compilation terminated.

 

 

 

 LILYGO TTGO ESP32-Paxcounter LoRa32 V2.1 1.6.1 Version 868MHZ LoRa ESP-32 OLED 0.96 Inch SD Card Bluetooth WIFI Module(868MHz CH9102)
Sold by TIAN YI