WashTastic - 1W node based on E22-900M30S and promicro NRF52

[true garden]

but with a 5v 6 watt panel not even set in the best orientation has been charging to 100% daily

[jolly wigeon]

Agreed - the popular Soshine panel is plenty to top it off even mounted flat on the roof of my car. Using two high capacity 18650s isn't hurting

[olive basin]

thats good

[true garden]

this was why i decided to order when i did

RIP to having pcba service done in china now for us americans

[olive basin]

Oof

[rustic brook]

Yikes

[lime ledge]

i assume this is gonna make domestic PCB manufacturing more expensive too. Supply and demand shenanigans.

[remote jungle]

I wonder if it will be cheaper in europe then, since the demand will be lower, but supply the same

[heady mulch]

You would think, but no

[olive basin]

Anyone made any sort of commercial before?

Or anything like that?

I think I made this sometime ago with the help of chatgpt

Some sort of intro and calming music.

Clears throat?
Have u wanted a high power solar compatable node?
Don't look further, WashTastic is here for u.

Featuring nrf52 as its core for its low power.
For lora there is e22-900m30s to achieve maximum transmit power of 1W





Soft, calming music fades in
Clears throat

Ever wanted a high-power, solar-compatible LoRa node?

Look no further—WashTastic is here for you!

Powered by the ultra-efficient nRF52 and featuring the E22-900M30S LoRa module, WashTastic delivers a full 1W of transmission power.

And with its built-in CN3791 solar charger, you get intelligent power management, complete with DIP switches for precise MPPT voltage selection—ensuring optimal solar efficiency wherever you go.

Built for reliability. Designed for adventure.

WashTastic—stay connected, anywhere.

Music fades out

id like to make something like it but idk how i would do it 😅

[gilded cedar]

Has anyone ordered Washtastic 0.4.0 ?

[olive basin]

@viral pier

[gilded cedar]

Do they work ?

[olive basin]

not yet 😅 atleast they havent gotten it working yet

[gilded cedar]

What's the issue ?

[olive basin]

check #1346425369246302258

i prob also wanna update to use cn3791

[gilded cedar]

Yea

[viral pier]

I have not managed to reprogram the VDD voltage converter. It's stuck at default 1.8 volts. You are supposed to be able to select other voltages via one of the registers, but there are a bunch of fussy requirements to be met before you can modify a register. And 1.8v is not high enough to operate the USB interface, so I'm forced to do everything via SWD. I tried adding a small 3.3v external converter, but it needs 4.5+ volts input and VDDH is under 4.2.

[olive basin]

So do we say that i should add a external 3v3 regulator on the board 😅

Try atleast 🤣

[viral pier]

Yeah, if you can fit it on. It seems quite tricky to get the nRF to provide the 3.3. I'm still playing with it but can't say I feel confident.

[olive basin]

Will try later today

well i mean i will make it fit since i do wanna change the solar charging to cn3791

This shouldn't be hard to add

Bom count 5 xd

Anyway back to sleep

[gilded cedar]

That sucks.. How many boards did you get, and where are you located ?

[viral pier]

I got 5 boards. I'm in Michigan.

[gilded cedar]

You willing to part w/ one ? I'd be willing to help get them working..

Or at least try.. LOL

[viral pier]

Oh, when using an off-chip 3v3 source, you are supposed to connect the VDDH pin to VDD_NRF (output of 3v3) .

[viral pier]

Sure, I can share what I've learned so far. 🙂

[olive basin]

Mhm

[olive basin]

its fucking longer by 1mm 🤣

v0.3.5 is 75mm xd

[heady mulch]

If you still need sideways connectors, there are through-hole versions that are shorter

might save you enough to keep the footprint?

[olive basin]

Or i could try to optimize the placements 😅

I already see how to fix kt

[meager spruce]

You and your affinity for JST PH connectors.... JST GH might be worth a look. Easier to make a wire to wire adapter, than to have to play Tetris inside a PCB design

[olive basin]

I mean don't need to play Tetris at all :)

Gotta rotate one resistor and done 🤣

[olive basin]

Nvm capacitor

[meager spruce]

Ok made a minor exaggeration lol

[heady mulch]

Why is r33 so big?

[olive basin]

Basic part

[heady mulch]

But that would mean soldering wires to a PCB, and that makes Tom sad 😉

[heady mulch]

Fair enough. Nothing smaller?

[olive basin]

With few resistors maybe but who cares

[heady mulch]

Don't forget to make sure the silkscreen is clearly legible.

Some of us can't see as well as we used to.

🧑‍🦯‍➡️

^ me with a soldering iron

[olive basin]

Hahha

[olive basin]

oki its now 75mm

[meager spruce]

I mentioned the wrong connector, it's the JST SH (1.25mm pitch) that there are connectors for and batteries that already have them attached.

[heady mulch]

Oh, yep. That's a good one.

SH is the smallest size that still has a through-hole version.

I think

[meager spruce]

I hadn't seen through hole yet, but i know they have horizontal and vertical surface mount options.

[heady mulch]

I haven't checked the details, but stuff like this: https://www.lcsc.com/product-detail/Wire-To-Board-Connector_Bossie-BX-ZH1-5-2PWZ_C18077736.html

[meager spruce]

oooo

[heady mulch]

Note the low low price of 1.12¢ per

And compare to the pack of 20 from AliExpress that costs $2 for 20

🤣

I never thought I'd be saying Ali was expensive

[olive basin]

lol

[viral pier]

Hmm, I wonder whether the entire board couldn't run on 5 volts? Then you would not need a second regulator. Just a thought. 🙂

[heady mulch]

You can run 5v into the battery pin if you're adventurous. You could add a silicon diode to cut that down by 1v or so.

[olive basin]

Solar can take 5V :)

But then u would still need a step up converter to get 5V from battery

Like it's doing right now

[viral pier]

My thought was that you already have the 5v step-up, maybe that could also feed VDD.

[heady mulch]

Sounds like it needs some power-path management.

[olive basin]

i mean does it matter if u still need 3.3V for sensors etc

unless u can get that internal ldo working it needs external regulator for 3.3

[olive basin]

give ne an ic that can will ouput 5V and 3.3V 😅

that doesent do charging xd

[olive basin]

already added 3.3v regulator

now it should be easier to flash the botloader too

since they are aligned

[rustic brook]

I'm still interested to see how these 0.4.X series boards come out. It would be super nice to just have the entire board made by a PCBA place and the end user just has to flash the firmware.

[olive basin]

agreed 😅

end user does need to flash the bootloader for the nrf52 sadly

once i get out of da military and back to work i will have to order a set of v0.4s

[heady mulch]

That's the advantage of the modules. You can get those pre-flashed.

Although even with the tariffs temporarily lowered, you might want to get them shipped to a 3rd country for flashing before they make the trip to the US.

Just sayin'

[olive basin]

yeee

might also replace that chip antenna for ipex connector

[heady mulch]

Ipex supremacy

[olive basin]

yes

[heady mulch]

What are you running at the moment? Wehooper's Big Xiao?

[rustic brook]

Nothing 1W except for two MeshAdv hats. I'd love to do some 1W handelds and solar units.

The 22dbm just isn't cutting it here lol

[heady mulch]

Have a word with @foggy tartan , or wait for @olive basin to finish her tour...

[olive basin]

more than happy once im done with this

[rustic brook]

Yep, I'm a reservist, I know how it goes, no worries. I'm saying, I just like where the R&D is going because I couldn't figure it out myself 🙃

[olive basin]

fair enough

[foggy tartan]

I have some….

I just need to figure out how to price them with the fallout with the terrifs. The way they “paused” then left things in a wired state

[rustic brook]

Ha yeah, I haven't ordered anything recently either. Wating on THAT to smooth out.

[olive basin]

@viral pier aparently the internal ldo on the promicro cant supply more than 25mA 😅

[gilded cedar]

I wish there was a way to keep these threads pinned in the "channel" window..

[olive basin]

agreed

[dry summit]

at this point i feel like you could just integrate what’s on the E22 module into the PCB 😭

[olive basin]

hell nah

not ready for that

i mean

would be easier to use 1W front ends

[dry summit]

Idk about compatibility but iirc the actual 1.25mm pitch connectors on batteries and a bunch of boards are molex picoblade

[dry summit]

haha, i wonder if it makes sense to just take an existing module and just bolt on the front end and rf switch

the design of the PA/LNA isn’t too complicated, but then you get into having more and more smd chokes

can’t be much more painful than routing the nrf52 tho?

[olive basin]

nrf had one rf trace 😅

[dry summit]

if i ever find free time, i’d love to give bolting a 1W PA to the stm32wl a try haha

[olive basin]

that i just did without rly calculating anything lol

[dry summit]

a throw into a tree cheapie but at 1W

how hard can it be 😇😇

[olive basin]

haha

i did succefully use a 1W front end i think xd

[dry summit]

i’m actually working on STM32U0 at work for a non-LoRa project, and i have a bunch of spare STM32L4 dev boards, i’d love to just abuse meshtastic+platformio and an E22 module to build something with stm32 non-wl

built something that’s got a projected battery life of around 3 years

again, non LoRa. sadly meshtastic kinda needs to be awake

but stm32wl + PA/LNA would be really useful as a mountaintop node

[olive basin]

mm

[pliant kiln]

Question: is there any known issue with Washtastic (v 0.3.1 here) not allowing the NRF52 getting power after battery empty than slow charge scenario? Only manual ,flipping off than on' of SW1 controlling the Bat/BatOut mosfet gives back power in this scenario. I had to retrieve 3 nodes based on washtastic 0.3.1 and will (hope to is 'node dead' scenario will not come back to haunt me) override the Q2 mosfet with a thin wire. Thoughts? Was this error observed by others?

[olive basin]

if im not completly wrong that version did have issues witht the battery protection module

auts, i fixed that issue one revision later 😅

https://github.com/valzzu/meshtastic-pcbs/issues/9#issuecomment-2653328830

[pliant kiln]

I know - I am not using it (using the inbuilt bat protection). Any thoughts on the transition from emptry battery to full charge while SW1 / Mosfet is switched on? Done the mosfet maybe stay in ‘off’ until ‘manually woken up’ based on slow Bat voltage rise?

[olive basin]

it shouldmt matter, i tried the fixed battery protection and it came back after i "drained" a battery 😅

[pliant kiln]

Ok, I need to search elsewhere for a cause/fix - I was just intrigued that the NRF suddenly came back after SW1 ON->Off->ON …. strange, but thanks for reflecting on this…

[olive basin]

its prob the nrf just going into brown out if the voltage gets too low. with the integrated ic it shuts off at 2.9V so its way above the min voltage for nrf

[dry summit]

we really need updated silicon with some brownout protection

[olive basin]

i mean its not that expensive to add an ic to protect the battery and brownout

[heady mulch]

The brownout problem is a lot better than it was - the filesystem updates have helped a lot.

[heady mulch]

Can you share a close-up picture of the switch in those two positions?

I'm just wondering if there's some corrosion or something on the switch surface

[olive basin]

more washtastics 😅

[olive basin]

washtastic V0.4 now has ipex for ble and i moved the bootloader programming pins to the edge so u can use one of those pogo pin clips :)

[olive basin]

5x v0.4 😅 not planning to order atm.

i can get 10 V0.3.5 for the price of this almost

nvm yes, i can get 10

[olive basin]

We have another dare devil 😅

More v0.4 in the wild if it works 🤣

I need to also get on that boat but hella expensive compared to 0.3.5

Gotta raise my selling price again at that point 🤣🤣🤣

Maybe 100€ or 120€ per device 🤣🤣

[olive basin]

68,5€ per board for 5x so ye 120 prob lol

@finite palm if u need help flashing the bootloader just send a message :)

And i need to create new diagram for 0.3.5 😅

[proud cargo]

Is it possible to export or share out an order? I'm tempted by this project but am afraid I'll botch the PCB order as I haven't done them before

[olive basin]

Sadly no 😅 but i can guide u

[heady mulch]

Find 4 other friends and you're on to something

[proud cargo]

I have a work group of embedded engineers that I think would each like to have one

They're in the midwest and just barely out of range of each other with the normal boards

[gilded cedar]

1 is never enough!

[finite palm]

Hey guys! 👋
I've started an order for 0.4 but there are a few parts it's saying are out of stock... So I'm just working through that 😅 (I'll post here before I hit go)

I wanted to ask (if ok to ask here) what kind of solar panels everyone is using successfully? I've been using 10W ones with the older 0.3 version (with just the 5V solar - no voltage switching) and I can't seem to keep my Washtastic nodes running long term. I've even tried 12V 10W panels using a separate CN3791 charge controller and they're still slowly trending down.. I've been needing to revisit them once a month or so to swap out batteries (using 8 x 18650s in parallel). I'm wondering if I just need bigger panels, but would appreciate anyone's insight who has successfully run long term solar!

[olive basin]

The 68uH inductor is known to be a problem child 😅 i did find a replacement and it's mentioned in GitHub

[olive basin]

i currently have v0.3.5 running and its charging fine

dont think nobody else has reported charging issues

[finite palm]

Hmmm ok I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong

[olive basin]

thats interesting

[finite palm]

This has been my general experience 😅

[olive basin]

how are u charging?

solar port?

[finite palm]

I've tried both the solar port and an external one and im getting the same result

[olive basin]

hmmm.... thats quite interesting

does the leds on the board light up when using solar?

[finite palm]

Test setup 1 was this panel using the onboard ports... https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0DF32RPMJ

Yep, the charge light comes on

[olive basin]

all i can say the usb c wont charge it seems 😅 even tho in theory it should but i guess the lora draws too much current to do anything

[finite palm]

The nodes aren't in direct sun... they're all under trees, but they get a lot of indirect sunlight with ~1-2hrs a day at least of full sun

Ohhh sorry I forgot to say -- I didn't use the USB connectors, I cut the cables and put a JST connector on it to go to the solar port

[olive basin]

good

but ye thats something i havent been notified nor have seen to be an issue

not sure if its something with ur unit or what

[finite palm]

Hmmm OK, thanks for letting me know -- I'll double check everything im doing again

Nah I've got 4 of them all doing the same thing 😕

[olive basin]

V0.3.5 and v0.4 has better charging anyway 😅

[finite palm]

I'm wondering if I possibly did something wrong in ordering from JLC and something is on backwards or missing

[olive basin]

i doubt but possible

where u live?

[finite palm]

Brisbane, Australia

So usually sunny but its winter now... which is still like 16*C medium sun

[olive basin]

ah, if u were closer i could have bought one from u to test 😅

[finite palm]

Haha well if I can't figure it out I'm happy to send you one for science lol

Currently I'm testing using this external charger board...

Same CN3791 as you have on the board I think, but I did this as an isolation test

and with a 12V panel about twice the size of the other one... and It's still happening 😅

The screenshot above is from the external 12V one

(sorry brb, kids need me 👶 )

[olive basin]

understandable xd

what board version u have?

i think 0.3.3b was the last one with CN3163 and everything after that now has cn3791

if v0.4 works might just switch to that tho its way more expensive 😅 0.3.5 will still remain as an cheaper alternative xd

also when u get it and if it works could u tell me what the ina3221 is reporting

ch1 should be negative while discharging (battery)
ch2 should be positive (3.3V to nrf)
ch3 should be positive when solar plugged in (solar)

[pliant kiln]

Hey David from Brisbane, here ElectricFish from Canberra... here similar setup with same external solar charger and 12V 5w (Jaycar) panel. Here surely less sun in Winter but batteries charge full. Sudden brownouts randomly after 1-4 weeks operation it seems with the earlier 0.3.1 board here. Trying to to test supercaps to stabilise internal voltage. Will see...

[olive basin]

that is interesting

well atleast it charges

[meager spruce]

hmmm and here I thought I was alone on my random "sleeps it never wakes up from" issue I've been seeing on my mobile boomer. I'm using a 0.3 with an external charge board, but its routing to the washtastic charger and the battery is coming off the washtastic....

[gilded cedar]

@olive basin How is board version 0.3.5 ? Any issues ?

[olive basin]

Haven't noticed yet

Well maybe reduced ble range on promicro 🤷‍♀️

[gilded cedar]

Trying to talk AlletCat into making an enclosure for it..

[olive basin]

If v0.4 was similar layout would prob work too but is not 🤣

And it's 0.1mm longer too xd

Taller

75mm vs 76mm 😅

https://github.com/valzzu/meshtastic-pcbs/blob/main/WashTastic%2Fpics%2FV0.4%2Ftop_V0.4.png

https://github.com/valzzu/meshtastic-pcbs/blob/main/WashTastic%2Fpics%2FV0.3.5%2Ftop_V0.3.5.png

Why no pic 😢

[heady mulch]

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/valzzu/meshtastic-pcbs/refs/heads/main/WashTastic/pics/V0.3.5/top_V0.3.5.png

[olive basin]

those were with the size :)

and i were on phone xd

oh

nvm

[heady mulch]

If you could harmonise the hole spacings, I think you'd be ok

Is there any way to do that?

[finite palm]

Heya @pliant kiln ! Thanks for sharing this! That's an awesome build! 💪
Yeah I have an earlier version... I think 0.3.3 -- but I think a very short-lived version that had reverse polarity on the through hole connectors on the battery 😅
Hopefully these 0.4's I'm about to order will work perfectly!

[finite palm]

Heya @olive basin sorry for the slow reply -- it's been a tough couple of days 😅

I think version 0.3.3 is the one I have. It was me messaging you a couple of months ago via GitHub with the reverse polarity through hole battery connectors... so that version 😅

I'm just working through my 0.4 order now -- I'll post a couple of screenshots. Would appreciate if you wouldn't mind having a quick look to see if I've got everything right (I'm a software person... not so good with hardware)

[olive basin]

ah

gotcha 🤣

[finite palm]

I guess just tick all of these...?

[olive basin]

yes and no 😅 theres one cap that for some reason is wrong, just open it and see if its a smd component

the wrong one is a through hole

[finite palm]

...this one? It doesn't say SMD

[olive basin]

click the box with alot if info like the part numver (CXXXX)

[olive basin]

click basic parst

and find C0402 capasitor

[olive basin]

ye the bottom one

[finite palm]

OK cool -- looks like it has the same one as the C1, C15, etc. now...

[olive basin]

ye

idk what is wrong with it

ill have to check

[finite palm]

Cool cool - ez fix

I've got a few missing bits 😅

[olive basin]

argh

[finite palm]

Sould I try same method as before?

LIke find the same package size and capacitance?

[olive basin]

ill give u the inductor

68uH

[finite palm]

kk ty

No results for basic parts on that

[olive basin]

XR1265-680M

[finite palm]

32MHz Crystal is the other one...

[olive basin]

ye that one is not basic part

[finite palm]

What should I search to find the right part...? Sorry it's giving me 12K+ results on 32Mhz search 😅

[olive basin]

i think it was on the first page

pic

[olive basin]

ye the first

[finite palm]

Sweeeet, ty

X1 locked in...

For the shortfalls...

[olive basin]

lemme check

[finite palm]

Thank you 🙏

Those are my guesses... but I have no idea what im doing 🤣

[olive basin]

dis good

[olive basin]

good

[olive basin]

should be good if its 511k ohms

[finite palm]

Yep I think it is from that tooltip

Here's the end result! 🚀

Oof... I see what you mean about this version being more expensive 😅

[olive basin]

indeed

[finite palm]

That's ~$250 USD, so about $50 USD / board?

[olive basin]

plus shipping and tax

but ye about

with that u can get 10 V0.3.5 lol

[finite palm]

Haha well I've come this far 😅

[olive basin]

i think i got it to around 60€ or something after shipping and tax or was it closer to 70

when i checked

[finite palm]

know any good JLC coupons? 🤣

[olive basin]

nope

u might have some

[finite palm]

Yay I do!

Alrighty, order submitted

now I wait

Thanks for your help with this @olive basin ❤️ ...and of course for the board design too 😅

[olive basin]

np

feel free to sponsor me too :) if u feel like it. even one time is fine xd

[gilded cedar]

@olive basin Do you have demensions for 0.3.x and 0.4.x boards ? I don't think the 0.4.x board shouldn't have an enclosure made for it just yet, since it's still being worked on..

@olive basin You should set up a patreon.. ;P

[olive basin]

Technically i do :) and Also u can sponsor on GitHub

[olive basin]

Hold on

[olive basin]

Tho id much prefer if ppl used GitHub :)

[gilded cedar]

Ah

[olive basin]

iirc patreon directly deposits the money to me and it doesent go through them and that is not allowed in finland 😅
if a company pays me, like twitch then its allowed

[gilded cedar]

Ah

[finite palm]

Heya @olive basin I just got this back from JLC... what should I tell them?

For H1, we cannot find the corresponding pads on PCB. Could you please point out the pads on picture?
Your early reply will be highly appreciated, thank you so much!

I'm guessing just tell them to exclude it...? Looks like header pins that maybe shouldn't be there?

[olive basin]

ye do that 😅 those should not even be in the bom xd

ill have to see

thats interseting

H1 is the CLK, DIO, 3.3 and gnd balls

it doesent have 3d model lol

or that header

oh

oh

😅

i got it

fixed now xd

but ye its not needed

[olive basin]

v0.4 has the bat and sola plugs in different place than v0.3.5

[finite palm]

Haha cool cool thank you!

[olive basin]

ye np

[olive basin]

@heady mulch https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/MuFpL6.png

embed?

ah

[heady mulch]

Nop

[olive basin]

there now embed xd

thats v0.4 and 0.3.5 layered

[heady mulch]

It works from GitHub too, if you link the raw

[olive basin]

a but u cant layer them ontop of em

[heady mulch]

I was just thinking if you align the holes, a lot of these will be deployed in enclosures anyway

[olive basin]

hmmm

[heady mulch]

If you align to the raspi holes, you get bonus points

(I might make a PoE baseplate on the same holes, but with mounting slots. It's a frequent request.)

Note just the mounting holes, not the overall size/shape.

It's definitely easier than the RAK or the original Arduino uno

[olive basin]

theres noway to do the holes like pi without moving alot of components

on v0.4

actually

thats best i can do on v0.4, the third hole is no go

[heady mulch]

Just having them in a straight line might be enough.

Just thinking about that "M3 grid" stuff

[olive basin]

those holes are 2.5mm so i guess would need to make em bigger

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/SCheCW.png

i reverted back and they should be aligned

maybe

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/abV9kI.png

idk if they are aligned 🤷‍♀️

they look that way

[heady mulch]

You can check the x/y cords of the holes...

[olive basin]

🤣

well well look at that

they are at the same x

now both are,

tho v0.4 they are in different spots than v0.3.5

[heady mulch]

Meh, can't win them all

[olive basin]

yee

[wispy wraith]

nah wtf did I find
https://washtastic.com

[olive basin]

Tf

[wispy wraith]

tbh other than our dms I am not sure where the webstore is

[olive basin]

My dms 🤣🤣🤣

Untill i finish military

[wispy wraith]

aight I've found it again hah

[olive basin]

I wonder if i remembered to change the price

[wispy wraith]

well, if its hand soldered its realistic sure

omg my meme review is still there

[heady mulch]

Don't undersell yourself.

https://tenor.com/view/the-help-viola-davis-aibeleen-clark-you-is-smart-you-is-kind-gif-3518895

[finite palm]

Heya @olive basin 👋
Exciting news! I have the 0.4 boards!! 😄

I'm just setting up to flash the bootloaders on them... the documentation for the ESP32 flasher firmware says to connect to SWCL and SWIO on the NRF... is thatthe headers labelled TX and RX on the board.. or is it the I2c ones?

Here is the one that will probably be sacrificed to science when I make a mistake doing this 😅

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/qsqgbG.png

these

[finite palm]

Legend, thank you! 😄
Just setting up the ESP board for flashing now... will post results! 😄

[olive basin]

also those pads are so u can use something like this https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004869027755.html 1.27mm 4P

single row

[finite palm]

That's awesome! I'll order one for the next batch (assuming this all works) 🤣

@olive basin is there supposed to be a password on the web ui for the ESP32 flasher... did you get that?

I cant see in that discord thread any mention of it

I got the WiFi configured on it... but then when I try to hit the web UI it's prompting for a login

I might just try flashing again... in the YT video hes getting this, which is totally different to mine...

[olive basin]

In the git repo there's .html file u gotta upload

Of the esp flasher

@finite palm https://github.com/atc1441/ESP32_nRF52_SWD/blob/main/data/index.htm

[finite palm]

Ahhh got it, thank you @olive basin !

[olive basin]

np

[wispy wraith]

Is that an embedded pro micro

[olive basin]

indeed

[wispy wraith]

madman

[olive basin]

i havent had a chance to test it myself 🤣

[finite palm]

@olive basin sorry more questions... do you know the login?

[wispy wraith]

It looks so clean

[olive basin]

what login?

[olive basin]

ah

wait

[finite palm]

omg lol

admin / admin

[olive basin]

hahaha

[finite palm]

Woohoo

[olive basin]

if it says nrf locked then u gotta erase nrf

[wispy wraith]

A mobile solar washtastic node is sounding quite intriguing.

[olive basin]

i mean could prob make a non 1W washtastic

[olive basin]

did u get it?

[finite palm]

I've got the ESP up and running... but I can't get it to connect to the NRF

I'll do a quick video!

[jolly wigeon]

This one has been going strong on the roof of my car for a few months with the popular Soshine panel. I ended up swapping in two 18650s instead of the lipo pouch for a little more run time. But I do get a ton of sun here so results may vary.

[olive basin]

#1346425369246302258 :)

[olive basin]

plus the newer 0.3.5 has better charging circuit

[olive basin]

ah i see :)

dis easy

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/EbFte1.png

[finite palm]

🤦‍♂️

It would probably work better if I connected it to the right place 🤣

[olive basin]

indeed

[finite palm]

Alrighty... brb soldering lol

[olive basin]

that was gps connector where u connected it

[finite palm]

Haha derp derp 🥔

I'll get there eventually lol

[olive basin]

haha ye

[finite palm]

OK back with fixed wiring

That's better!

[olive basin]

woohoo

[finite palm]

https://meshtastic.org/docs/getting-started/flashing-firmware/nrf52/update-nrf52-bootloader/

Is it the uf2 files from here i flash?

[olive basin]

bin

hold on

[finite palm]

(im taking photos and documenting as I go btw so I can put together a guide if you want)

[olive basin]

no wait it was hex

https://github.com/meshtastic/firmware/tree/master/bin/generic

[olive basin]

ye sure

[finite palm]

Awesome, ty!

Any idea how to check which version I should use or just guess? 😅

[olive basin]

6.1

[finite palm]

(it's running....)

Taking a suspiciously long time 🤨

[olive basin]

Did u hit flash uploaded file?

[finite palm]

Sure did

just kinda thinking about it lol

[olive basin]

Hmmm

Let it cook, i guess

Don't remember how long it took

[finite palm]

https://tenor.com/view/esperando-el-horno-denise-dumas-masterchef-argentina-temporada3-episodio101-gif-25969607

[olive basin]

Could u maybe take one board and maybe try plugging usb in :)

[finite palm]

Patience is key! lol

[olive basin]

Woohoo

[finite palm]

hokay USB time

Chg LED solid red... but nothing showing up on computer

Double press reset no resposne

[olive basin]

Flip da switch maybe

[finite palm]

Oh - battery?

[olive basin]

The usb alone isn supplying anything :) the switch cuts power to the nrf

[olive basin]

That led is a good sign tho :)

[finite palm]

awwwwyissss

Battery is needed

[olive basin]

Oh ye lol

Maybe

My guinea pigs lol

[finite palm]

Hello serial port

[olive basin]

Ur the first one to get this far 😅

Well u are the second person to order

[finite palm]

Woohoo

Its communicating on serial

[olive basin]

Les go

Its working

My should work, works lol

@heady mulch :)

[finite palm]

Bluetooth is being weird

[olive basin]

Hm?

[finite palm]

INFO | ??:??:?? 224 BLE Connected to iPhone
DEBUG | ??:??:?? 224 BluetoothStatus CONNECTED
INFO | ??:??:?? 226 Ended BLE connection
INFO | ??:??:?? 226 BLE Disconnected, reason = 0x16
DEBUG | ??:??:?? 226 PhoneAPI::close()
DEBUG | ??:??:?? 226 BluetoothStatus DISCONNECTED
INFO | ??:??:?? 227 BLE Connected to iPhone
DEBUG | ??:??:?? 227 BluetoothStatus CONNECTED
DEBUG | ??:??:?? 227 [Power] Battery: usbPower=0, isCharging=0, batMv=4152, batPct=97
INFO | ??:??:?? 228 Ended BLE connection
INFO | ??:??:?? 228 BLE Disconnected, reason = 0x16
DEBUG | ??:??:?? 228 PhoneAPI::close()
DEBUG | ??:??:?? 228 BluetoothStatus DISCONNECTED

Its kidna looping trying to connect

[olive basin]

💀

Ummm....

Uhhhhh

Hmmmm

[finite palm]

Tried on iPhone and Android and both do the same thing

[olive basin]

Fuck

Ummmm

[finite palm]

It starts to try the pairing process then just loops over and ober

[olive basin]

Welll.... I mean usb works 😅

Better than not working at all

[finite palm]

Haha I mean for my use case BT isn't a big deal 🤷

It's nice to have but im using them as repeaters with managemnet over mesh

I'll try doing all the config over serial now

voltage reading works

[olive basin]

On android u can do serial

How about ina?

[finite palm]

Good call -- switching to Android serial

Will enable telemetry module and check

Lora is up

[olive basin]

Nice

[finite palm]

INA readings

[olive basin]

Okay nice

Ch 3 is solar btw

[finite palm]

I guess 1 is battery... 2 is 3.3v..?

[olive basin]

Ye ch2 is the mcu

[finite palm]

Anything else you want me to check?

[olive basin]

Hmmm tho ch 1 should be positive if charging

[finite palm]

It will be discharging now because connected to phone

[olive basin]

Oh ye

Makes sense

Xd

[finite palm]

I'll connect to computer, sec

[olive basin]

I mean i think ch3 also will display usb

Don't remember exactly

Since it has 5v and 2mA xd

[finite palm]

Hmmm its not sending me a new telemetry packet lol

[olive basin]

It's not fast lol

[finite palm]

Nope lol... will report back on this... evenetually 😆

What do you want to name this node? 😛 You get naming rights!

[olive basin]

Oh ye flip 5v on the dip switches :)

[finite palm]

Ooh the light went green

[olive basin]

Guinea pig lol

[finite palm]

Green "Done" light is on now

I guess that's the CN3791 telling us its not charging now...?

[olive basin]

Yeee

Hmmm

[finite palm]

Wait

weird

its blinking periodically red

[olive basin]

Ah hm

Vid?

[olive basin]

What's the voltage of the battery?

How about at that diode?

Before and after

[heady mulch]

Did you flash the bootloader, and then the firmware?

[olive basin]

Yup

They did

I think 🤣

Well im happy that it's working almost

[heady mulch]

Yee

[olive basin]

Now to figure Bluetooth 🤣

[finite palm]

~4.06 is right on battery voltage

Just flashing a second one now to fault isolate on the bluetooth thing

Also I used 2.6.11 firmware -- new alpha so it could just be a FW issue

Will put 2.6.4 on this one which is known good for BT on the 0.3 version

@olive basin bluetooth is working now!!

On both boards.... 🤨

[olive basin]

Wha

[finite palm]

Sorry for the false alarm... It could have either been because I still had the ESP flasher connected (it was soldered on.. but working with it off now)... or maybe just a weird bug in the new firmware

[olive basin]

thats prob why its doing that

[olive basin]

hm

[finite palm]

So the main battery voltage says 4.16, but the INA says 4.08 -- and my multimeter agrees with the INA

[olive basin]

close enough

[finite palm]

So there's a bit of a discrepency there but good enough

Yep, I'm not complaining lol

[olive basin]

well its a voltage divider so ye

[finite palm]

2 boards looking good!

https://tenor.com/view/sacha-baron-cohen-great-success-yay-gif-4185058

I've got a solar enclosure outside with a 0.3 board in it now (one of the ones I was having the issue of slowly discharging over time with) -- I'll swap it out for this board and let it burn in for a week or so! 😄

Thanks again for all of your help with this @olive basin ! ❤️
I'll put together some instructions -- do you want me to push as a merge request to the wiki on your github?
Also - let me know if there's anything else you want me to test on these -- happy to do so!

[olive basin]

ye sure u can do that :)

[finite palm]

But for now... it's 1AM and I'm off to bed 🤣
Good night! 😄 👋

[olive basin]

night

[gilded cedar]

Wait, so does 0.4.x work now ?!

[olive basin]

welll

yes but no

😅

if u dont care about bluetooth yes it does seem to work

tho it prob did work on the first version too but it just didnt have the external 3.3V converter

i just realised i had routed di01 under the antenna 😅

oops

[olive basin]

actually had few

[finite palm]

I think Bluetooth is good!

Overnight report -- seems to be averaging about 20ma draw.. and this is on a relatively busy mesh of 100+ active nodes on medium fast

In client mode

Washy 1 is outside soaking up the sunshine 🌞

[finite palm]

INA219 is getting the solar panel on channel 3! It's a 12V panel, so accounting for MPPT that ~11V sounds about right!

Although the current sense is backwards 😅 might need to change the direction of the current flow to the INA so it picks it up as positive current instead of negative

[olive basin]

Yeee thx :)

And its ina3221 btw :)

I wonder if i could fit bme280 on that board

Since it already requires standard assembly 🤣

Well atleast ch1 and ch2 are positive current 😅 and now i realised i might want switch ch2 to also display the lora consumption 😅 since it's only showing nrf52 but idk, ch1 still show's it anyway so 🤷‍♀️

[gilded cedar]

Yes.. ;P LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!! Go w/ a 680 if possible.. LOL

This is what I have for my INA3221 on my rak19007 in lowes solar node..

[finite palm]

I guess the 3 channels should have told me that... 🤦‍♂️ 🤣

[finite palm]

This would be awesome! I'm going to be hooking one up to I2C on each of these

@olive basin maybe a false alarm on those negative amp readings.... it has now jumped over to positive 🤣

[olive basin]

Whaaat

Hm

[olive basin]

Yes but its hella expensive

[gilded cedar]

True..

[olive basin]

Its like $10 on diginey 😅

[olive basin]

interesting how it didnt work yesteday

[olive basin]

I just realised something

i have set the max charging current to 2A 😅

wont matter much if the panel cant supply it

if math

correct

[finite palm]

@olive basin i2c headers working

[olive basin]

Would be surprised if they didn't

Literally connected to the same trace with ina 🤣

So, ble is okay?

[finite palm]

Yep been working perfectly since

It was just that one time.. happened with both iOS and Android, but after a reset it’s been perfect

[olive basin]

Weird

If it works then it works

[finite palm]

Honestly I would suspect firmware.. only happened on the one I put 2.6.11 on and only at first

[olive basin]

🤷‍♀️

Possibly i guess

[finite palm]

The 2.6.4 one works perfectly from the first try

Different board and different firmware so.. results inconclusive it it works so meh 😂

[olive basin]

Lol

[waxen sparrow]

Ok I'll bite, where can I git more info on ordering one of these E22-90030S w pm NRF52 ?

[olive basin]

https://github.com/valzzu/meshtastic-pcbs/blob/main/WashTastic%2FReadme.md

0.3.5 is pretty well tested

0.4 is experimental atm

Also make sure to post dome pics or videos in #1346425369246302258 once u got something to show.

[olive basin]

10 more

[meager spruce]

Not gonna lie, these are beautiful.

[olive basin]

😅

Thx

[gilded cedar]

I really wanna order more.. LOL

I just don't h ave the money right now..

[olive basin]

Hahahaha

[finite palm]

Kinda makes me wish I'd ordered the V0.4 in Purple 🤣

[olive basin]

It does look good

[finite palm]

My OCD wants me to ask you to move the one thats upside down in the bottom row up to the top with its friends 🤣

[gilded cedar]

I like black PCBs..

But out here in the desert, where it can get 120f/48.8c in the shade, black isn't the best color.. LOL

[heady mulch]

-# white PCBs

[olive basin]

@mint trail read from here :)
TLDR; its been tested

[mint trail]

Awesome!!! Time to update https://github.com/valzzu/meshtastic-pcbs/tree/main/WashTastic#v04x

[olive basin]

i was supposed to remove that 😅

oops

done

now its a warning xd

@finite palm hows the bootloader flashing wiki going?

[mint trail]

I'm new to this, so I grabbed the 0.4 gerber file, uploaded to https://www.seeedstudio.com/fusion_pcb.html and it gives an error about "no NC drill file" http://support.seeedstudio.com/knowledgebase/articles/1977138

[heady mulch]

Check the folder, but they should be there. 2/3 of the solutions are to ignore it.

[mint trail]

Roger that.

[mint trail]

For everything that you want them to solder on, you just look up the manufacturers part number and add it to the BOM_1W-meshtastic-node_0.4_connectors.csv

[heady mulch]

Is there's not a bom included?

[mint trail]

I used the .csv, but then like part 16 12pF C11,C12,C18,C20 but no manufacturer or supplier part numbers.

I'm probably over my head, it's a capacitor, but I don't know the type size etc, nor how to figure that out.

SM04B+AC0-SRSS+AC0-TB(LF)(SN) I look that up and I see nothing with the AC0, but can find SM04B-SRSS-TB

I'm finding that +AC0 in multiples, so that must be something with my formatting, disregard that.

That had to do with UTF-7 vs UTF-8 encoding

[heady mulch]

are we looking at the same bom?

footprint is C0402, aka tiny

[mint trail]

Nope, that looks like the one without connectors

In your image, 14 through 19 don't have part numbers for them.

For the ones that have the LCSC number, I can get the MFG part number, and see if they have it here: https://www.seeedstudio.com/opl.html

[heady mulch]

ok, but if they don't have a part number, normally JLC just match it to their basic range

I dunno what seeeeeeed do

oh, that looks tedious, if they don't have even basic matching

[mint trail]

JLC then says The below parts won't be assembled due to data missing.
U8,U11,J1,U12,J3,J4,J5,J6 designators don't exist in the BOM file. Is that normal?

It seems like one doesn't have to manually look up the parts on https://www.seeedstudio.com/opl.html but they need at least a part number they can cross reference, I see how JLC does it, they look at the footprint and find the closest match.

Off topic, but is there a way to have posted links not get expanded?

[heady mulch]

not by default

I just click the thing and delete embed ASAP

[mint trail]

Thanks, that gets annoying quickly

[olive basin]

Yup, there are some that are not included cuz they don't need assembly, like the through hole headers

Also jlc is probably cheaper than seeed anyway

[mint trail]

I had done it through there, but the were missing some parts so I wanted to see if it would be the same with seeed

[olive basin]

As for the 68uH inductor u can find the part in GitHub under v0.3.5 atleast

[mint trail]

That is one that JLC had me search for but they had different sizes on all of them

[olive basin]

Ye, idk why it's not finding the correct one

[mint trail]

PCB cost was like half price on seeed, but never got through the components and placement part of it.

Maybe not half, I closed the window but it was 4 something vs 7

[olive basin]

what

[mint trail]

And about $8 shipping, slow boat.

Disclaimer, I just uploaded the gerber zip, so if anything needed to be changed I probably didn't do it correctly.

[olive basin]

ah thats just pcb cost

not assembly

[mint trail]

No components and no assembly as they wanted part numbers for everything when I tried to submit it.

But I feel like I'm not familiar with this kind of process that I would probably mess something up trying to figure out all of the part numbers to put in. Could probably get most of them by copying from what JLC decides.

[olive basin]

yee

[mint trail]

Should probably start with something simpler/cheaper or just buy as part of a group purchase or something.

[olive basin]

theres one component that jlc might think is a through hole so make sure u catch that

fair

#1377910167240441866 🙃

🤣

[mint trail]

I like the size of the seeed nodes, Would have been awesome if they could have made these fit the XIAO dimensions: https://www.seeedstudio.com/Wio-WM1110-Module-LR1110-and-nRF52840-p-5676.html

Flushable, lol, ever see the show Adam Ruins Everything, with the flushable golfballs, 🤣

[olive basin]

nope

[heady mulch]

build it

[mint trail]

It's just too big to fit at 20x20mm. If somehow they could have made it thicker instead.

[finite palm]

Hey! Work in progress, sorry -- will try to finish it over the weekend. I need to go back and grab some screenshots I missed along the way!

[olive basin]

alr no worries

[heady mulch]

yeah, I didn't pursue it because it was wider than 18mm, which is my idea of what is able to fit in a sensible setup

but we're being picky. Build it!

BTW, my view is that the xiao format is cute for project work, but the lack of IO is annoying, and the 2-row breadboard-friendly format is only useful on a breadboard. Beyond a certain point you want JST.

[olive basin]

i know have an etsy store https://valzzu.etsy.com/

tho will only be shipping in EU countries for now

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/ADV0tG.png

dem

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/WxwwbC.png

hehe

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/2o3l5v.png

dem, my first order 😅

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/BGY13i.png

also gave 5€ towards meshtastic :)

[forest niche]

Not that I can order from Canada but what does the support option get you?

[olive basin]

its just i give certain amount to meshtastic

donate

5€ or 10€

[forest niche]

a worthy cause!

[olive basin]

indeed

[gilded cedar]

Washtastic running 2.7.0..

[olive basin]

It doesn't know what to do when no battery and node powered off 🤣

[gilded cedar]

Uh....

Is that solar pwr only

[olive basin]

yes and switch turned off :) works fine when switch is on and node is drawing current

[olive basin]

tf, just got another washtastic order 😅

[remote jungle]

@olive basin My (recycled) solar panels should arrive very soon, so I'm starting to get ready to order a batch of washtastics to provide backup communications in my city. I'm a bit worried about there not being load sharing, and thus the charge cycle not terminating (this normally terminated if current drops below 16% of charge current, which would be 2A in this case, so 320mA), which would impact the safety of the battery. What capacity battery did you connect to the 0.3.5 version? Do you see the CHG LED turning off sometimes?

Secondly, I just saw the CN3795 charge IC, which also does the same solar panel input range, but also supports cells of a different chemistry, and is literally just 2 resistors extra compared to the existing CN3791. I don't want to ask for a redesign (again, sorry :/ ), but wanted to bring this to your attention that it exists, and is maybe useful to get a longer life out of lipo cells (they apparently live a lot longer if you don't charge them to 100%) or to be able to use fancy LTO batteries

[remote jungle]

or even LiFePO4 batteries, which are safer

[heady mulch]

I think she might be asleep, but she's aware of teh CN3795. I don't want to second guess her design decisions, but the CN3795 has a higher minimum input voltage (6.5V iirc) which might mess with battery charging, and also the addition of a second voltage divider requires another bank of switches, which would require a redesign.

[remote jungle]

righto, that makes sense 🙂

[olive basin]

10A, the node is outside so idk

Idk how one would even add power path

[olive basin]

I know its i thing and i did a variant of it but never released it. Don't remember how it looks tho 😅 not sure if i did it on 0.4 or some earlier version

[olive basin]

Plus it would still need to 4.2V s I wouldn't damage anything

And not 5V or 15V

[olive basin]

I can do some testing in the weekend

[olive basin]

But ye, there's no real good way to do load sharing

[remote jungle]

if you have a 12V solar panel, and place a linear regulator on it (in parallel with the MPPT), can you do load sharing off of that? sure, you'll lose some efficiency in the solar panel, but that should be fine, I think?

[heady mulch]

Might be worth watching this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2yMs-JAyQM

[remote jungle]

I did, but I think this assumes that the battery capacity is matched to the configuration resistor of the charge chip: if you hang a 10 Ah battery on it, there will be a much higher terminal charge current then with a 2 Ah battery. If you then also add the load of the microcontroller, it could well be that it does not terminate the charge on a 10 Ah battery, and does on a 2 Ah battery? Or am I misunderstanding something? In addition, the slowly charging, then discharging probably is also worse then just leaving the battery unused when there is sun?

[olive basin]

on 0.4 the usb power takes priority over solar so maybe something like that could be done for load sharing, just cut the battery off and feed like 4V to the line 🤷‍♀️ but that then adds more complexity and components

and brings the cost up possibly

[olive basin]

the node is drawing like 20mA constatnly while idling so 🤷‍♀️

ill report back when i get home

since i have deployed 0.3.5 and the battery is full so i can check what its showing

but ye it might be worse to keep discharging slowly and charging again

i doubt the battery capacity makes a difference

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/EEdDyN.png

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/VQk4gV.png

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/AGkbGY.png

but 🤷‍♀️

[remote jungle]

You're supposed to stop charging in the constant voltage phase when the current goes below a certain percentage of the capacity, most commonly 0.1C (so for a 2 Ah battery, once the current goes below 200 mA, it should stop applying voltage). Washtastic is using the CN... chip, which stops charging in the constant voltage phase when the current goes below 17.5% of what the current sense resistor is configured to. So if it's configured to charge at 2A (which is the case, with the current configuration), it will stop charging when the current goes below 350 mA. This is more then fine for a 2 Ah battery (it even stops a bit earlier than it's supposed to), but if you attach a much bigger battery (for example, a 10 Ah battery), you also stop charging only if the current goes below 350 mA, which might not happen since this is a lot less than 0.1C (which would be 1A). Note that this 350 mA here is not at all related to the capacity of the battery attached, only to the current sense resistor, but to have a correct charge termination condition, it should be related to the battery capacity instead.

And I mean, in practice, it might just be fine, I'm just a bit worried about the battery degrading fast.

[heady mulch]

I think you've answered the question there. Node draw is 20mA, terminal charge current is 350mA

It's pushing that a bit later in the cycle, but not much.

If you genuinely want to charge to a lower voltage, use a multi-chem charge system and set the terminal voltage to 4.1

I tuned my micro-mppt to that.

Remember there is also an overcharge protection chip as well.

[olive basin]

Kicks in at 4.25V iirc

I can lower the max charging sense resistor so it's at 1A

Iirc it should be like 0.012ohms for 1A atleast thats what i remember when i checked what it would be

[remote jungle]

yeah, I guess I communicated it a bit confusingly of what my actual questions are, I'm afraid

• with a 2 Ah battery, is the system safe? (does it stop charging in constant current mode) -> yes, since node draw is 20 mA, 0.1C is 200 mA, but it already stops at 350 mA, so this is fine
• with a 10 Ah battery, is the system safe? (does it stop charging in constant current mode) -> unsure: node draw is 20 mA, 0.1C draw is 1A, but it will only stop charging if the total current drops below 350 mA, so this might not happen, is very depending on what current the batteries themselves draw in constant voltage mode. Lowering the charging resistor to 1 A would be worse, since it would then only stop charging if it reaches an even lower current.
• with a 2 Ah battery, how bad is it for the batteries to constantly charge/discharge them slowly in cycles (like in the bigclive video), compared to having load sharing, where it would charge then disconnect during the day, and discharge during the night

[olive basin]

I'll check my node on Saturday what the node says its doing

[heady mulch]

I think that question is better left to #solar-power

It's a generic problem we all face with larger battery packs

[remote jungle]

options I see for my own system if I want to make it more safe/better for the batteries (I'll soon have a pallet of 12V solar panels, recycled from parking meters, and want to cover my city in meshtastic nodes)

• do load sharing, with a linear regular, to avoid more cycles on the batteries
• use the multi chemistry CN chip to be able to use a lower battery voltage or to use LiFePO4 or LTO batteries

[remote jungle]

good point 🙂 English is not really my first language, when I find some time, I'll reword it to give people outside of washtastic some context, then post it there

It's just that washtastic seemed to be the most polished meshtastic project for solar repeaters, and does almost everything perfectly imo

[olive basin]

demm.... 😅

thx

but ye ill report back soon what my node does

[olive basin]

i think i have a defective lora module

it gets hot semi fast

expecially on spot where the ebyte logo is

also its not being detected

only if i know had a thermal cam

something is indeed wrong

i tested it with my psu and when i start power the node on it draws 30mA for few seconds and the jumps to the max of 500mA that i had set

i tested with my multimeter and nothing was shorted externally

[olive basin]

what on earth is going on

soldered another washtastic and it cant find the lora but this time its not heating up

all solder joints look okay

[heady mulch]

@meager spruce had bad luck with a promicro today, too.

I think we're just not having a good hardware day all round

[olive basin]

ive had these promicros for a while now

but bad promicro wont explain the lora module heating up like crazy and pulling like 490mA

[heady mulch]

meh

can't win them all

[olive basin]

tru

i gotta get one working one tho

phew

third times the charm lol

i need more promicros 😅

[heady mulch]

get one of these while iyou're on Ali:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005499263696.html

note: 1.8v operation.

[olive basin]

wuts dis?

what is it used for?

[heady mulch]

Gyro & compass for BUI

[olive basin]

Ah, not like i have any node with a screen 🙃

Expect my v3

And t3s3

@remote jungle

Stopped at 4.05V

Nvm

Now its 4.17

[olive basin]

maybe for flushable when it has a screen lol

and it has a case u can have on ur wrist

[olive basin]

seems like it started to charge again 🤷‍♀️

but yes, it will terminate charging

[remote jungle]

alrighty 🙂 any idea of the cycle time of charging / discharging? okay if not

although, sun has gone down here, so there also probably

[olive basin]

didnt check

i guess it also depends on the size of the battery

that one was 1200mAh

[remote jungle]

ah, yeah, that one we calculated should cycle, it's the 10 Ah one I'm worried about

[olive basin]

I'll check the my base since it was so late/raining last night lol

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/ip6szi.png

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/c1ycqj.png

@remote jungle It does end

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/p7gppO.png

now gps as 3d model xd

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/ciOBPX.png

just realised the filter is pain to solder 😅

need fuck ton of heat

[remote jungle]

what filter is that?

[north wing]

https://tenor.com/view/welding-breaking-bobby-bones-welder-soldering-building-something-gif-21963638

[olive basin]

https://www.digikey.fi/fi/products/detail/taoglas-limited/DBP-868-U-A-30/9972851?s=N4IgTCBcDaICICEAKA6AHANjSgqiggigMwAMIAugL5A

need us version too now that i think of it

https://www.digikey.fi/fi/products/detail/taoglas-limited/DBP-915-V-A-30/9972852?s=N4IgTCBcDaICYCMAOA6AnARgKwoG4oEMUBmABhAF0BfIA

[north wing]

https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Taoglas/DBP.915.V.A.30?qs=MLItCLRbWsyKal3qF5ESLA%3D%3D

Is this the same ?

Nvm I see that you found a US link first

[remote jungle]

is the filter always worth it? it has 3dB insertion loss, but I guess when close to a cell tower or something, it might be useful?

[olive basin]

u dont need to use it tho

[remote jungle]

and do you need a coax to the filter and then another coax away to the antenna, or does the radiomodule have a pad for the RF signal, so you only need to put one ipex connector on the PCB?

nvm

[remote jungle]

I looked at this foto, now it's clear

I'm interested in the comparison, if you ever make one 🙂

[olive basin]

prob will make 😅

maybe just 5

that filter isnt that cheap either

[remote jungle]

I guess I can always add the filter afterwards if I really need it

[olive basin]

Tru

[pliant kiln]

Hi Iris - quick question: what job do q3 (I assume just power on/off the nrf and ebyte?) and q4 have?

[olive basin]

Q4 is reverse polarity protection on the battery and q3 is for powering the whole board

[olive basin]

have now updated the diagram

oof

lol

gotta update it again xd

[dry summit]

MHP50!

[olive basin]

I do have a hotplate

[dry summit]

if you add -D EBYTE_E22_900M30S to your variant, the configured Tx power becomes post-PA tx power 🙂

so you can just set any number you want, it will then get correctly limited by firmware

e.g. if the regional limit is 26dBm, it will get limited to 26 and also save to user prefs as 26

[olive basin]

Welll im using promicro variant soooo

And users ain't gonna be compiling their own firmware 😅

[dry summit]

haha, if you are selling them with firmware, or if this variant is getting built elsewhere only with this module, i'd suggest adding that define

-D EBYTE_E22_900M33S also does the same gain calc + sx1262 limiting

and setting licensed mode still overrides that as before, but still clamps the sx1262

[olive basin]

Files are available on GitHub but I'm using promicro diy variant

[dry summit]

icic

the main issue with building -D EBYTE_E22_900M33S is that you can't set >30 from the iOS app

[olive basin]

For initial flashing i can do that but what happens if ppl update their nodes?

Since they just download the file from flasher

That will ofc remove the thing and then shit happens

I mean could build my own firmware and redirect ppl to download it but thats a hassle

[dry summit]

hm, so i would say that the promicro variant should have EBYTE_E22_900M30S defined

i'm still trying to think of a better way than having a different variant for every different EBYTE module

an easy way is for the gain and sx126x limit be a user pref, but it really shouldn't too...

but i don't think having many many different variants that are extra level would cause any burden to meshtastic devs

[olive basin]

Probably not but they would not be in the flasher

[heady mulch]

Might need a second flasher to dispense DIY firmware.

It's something we've discussed a few times.

[olive basin]

Maybe

I support this xd

[heady mulch]

I've made a start, using GitHub actions

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/HYBzg7.png

haha

[olive basin]

i could add a smd gps antenna on the board 🤔

[gilded cedar]

This groove connector is killing me.. ;P

[olive basin]

wdym?

[gilded cedar]

I don't have groove cables for my I2C devices..

[olive basin]

theres also a header

[gilded cedar]

Yup, that's what I'm using now..

But had to solder header..

was to lazy when I built it..

[olive basin]

i can add it to the assembly

[gilded cedar]

Nah, it takes me all of 15-30 seconds to solder the 4 pin header..

I'm looking into solder fountains now... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAAH

[olive basin]

dem

[dry summit]

only when you’re sure you no longer need new neural pathways

[gilded cedar]

Neural pathways are so 1900s.. LOL

[olive basin]

holy shit, somebody ordered 2 washtastic from spain 😅 they have yet to pay

atlest etsy hasnt registered

[olive basin]

just sent the files with the filter to pcbway and elecrow so well see what the price is for 5 compared to jlcpcb

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/8TmatL.png

this one

initial estimate without componets is
pcbway $73.14
elecrow $83.52

jlc 216.24€ for the whole thing.
minus filter, bme280 and qwiic cuz out of stock

[heady mulch]

For 5 PCBs?

[olive basin]

no components yet

they havent emailed me yet on them

but yes

hella expensive

[heady mulch]

So JLC will be $15 or so for the PCBs...

[olive basin]

whered u get that?

i get 43.248€

[heady mulch]

Just for the PCBs? Delivered?

[olive basin]

that price it the full one with tax etc from jlc

[heady mulch]

Oh, um...

[olive basin]

5 boards is 216.24€ so 43€

per one

ofc plus the filter

2,34€ for one

and cant forget promicro

so 50€

or so

[heady mulch]

PCB only

[olive basin]

ye board is cheap

[heady mulch]

That's 2x 5 boards, with coupon on one order

[olive basin]

assembly is the most expensive

[heady mulch]

Oh, the pcbway and Elecrow include assembly? Sorry, I missed that.

[olive basin]

nope

well yes

but no component fees

yet

[heady mulch]

PCB + assembly but no components.

[olive basin]

yes

[heady mulch]

Ok, I think you can get the BOM cost from JLC?

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/tVvouj.png

pcbway

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/NvIF7j.png

elecrow

idk why the total price is different

cuz if i count evenrything its more

[heady mulch]

Remind me why pcbway is cool?

[olive basin]

🤷‍♀️

just wanted to see what the price is lol

so well wait

[heady mulch]

Cool to people who have too much money...

[olive basin]

yeee

mainly seeing what elecrow can offer if i'm gonna sell the boards

and use their production

since if i ship to china its like 44€ so ye

even tho jlc is cheaper shippin costs fuck ton

[olive basin]

okay got elecrows quote, its $275.03

mind u it has bme280, the filter and the qwiic connectors

tho it does not include tax

295€ with tax

so 59€ per node 😅

still waiting for pcbway

[proud cargo]

@olive basin , you're in the EU somewhere, right?

[olive basin]

Yes

[proud cargo]

Okay. I need to find somebody stateside to coerce into doing a batch then.

[olive basin]

Might have some WashTastics on sale globally at somepoint

[olive basin]

Pcbway

So elecrow is the second cheapest

@heady mulch

Lead time on both about a month

I wonder what seeeds price are 🤔

[gilded cedar]

Have you always had Duty & Tax ?

[olive basin]

EU

And i selected the shipping method that has ir

Cuz i don't wanna deal with customs if i can choose

[olive basin]

i hate seeds bom requirements

they need the manufacturer part nuber rather than jlc, digikey etc numbers

argh

also they need the link for the item

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

https://support.seeedstudio.com/knowledgebase/articles/1162186-why-can-not-recognize-my-bom-file

welp

time to add the mnp to all parts

[olive basin]

💀

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/EdVdV5.png

yea seed is no go

never

[heady mulch]

But if you order 50, they're the same price per piece as JLC when ordering 5 😄

And they're waiving 500$ in engineering fees!

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/HzbH46.png

yeeee......

and no purple pcbs

[heady mulch]

https://tenor.com/view/shame-bell-game-of-thrones-walk-of-atonement-cersei-lannister-gif-16635977892557113898

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/jexhFn.png

jlc is still cheaper with standard assembly 😅

still missing the filter and qwiic connectors

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/PcdrpG.png

[heady mulch]

Qwiic connectors? JST!

The cheaper, more universal cousin

[olive basin]

https://zipline.valzzu.xyz/u/8XMWCN.png

https://lcsc.com/product-detail/Wire-To-Board-Connector_JST-B4B-PH-SM4-TB-LF-SN_C160354.html?s_z=n_4pin%2520jst

dis good?