Connectivity Options

[Anonymous]

I ran across this post and use OpenSprinkler for myself. I am now looking to see if I can use OpenSprinkler for our HOA, it would need to use cellular communication. Has anyone figured out how to get OpenSprinkler working with GSM?

[951calguy]

http://wiki.seeed.cc/Xadow_GSMPlusBLE/ Ray I found this little guy a while back and I was hoping you could tell me if it will also require a ton of modifications to get to work with OS, please take a look and let me know as I am still looking at an option for gsm connection instead of wifi or ethernet. Thanks.

[Ray]

I honestly don’t have any insightful knowledge about how to get GSM to work with OpenSprinkler. The only connection options we support right now are either wired Ethernet or WiFi. If your GSM module does not provide either of these two, then it’s gonna involve firmware changes. We really don’t have the resources right now to look into this. This is something that’s going to require weeks or research work.

[Ray]

While helping a customer searching for travel router, I came across some travel routers that have 3G/4G support, like this one:
https://www.amazon.com/TP-Link-Wireless-Portable-Router-TL-MR3020/dp/B00634PLTW
My understanding is that it will allow 3G/4G connection, and share that connection through WiFi or the built-in Ethernet port. I have not tried it yet, but just thought to bring this up because this may be an easy solution to get OpenSprinkler connected to cellular network.

[Anonymous]

That is really slick solution, though if you’re in the middle of no where (i.e. you have a contract to maintain a little league field and there’s no connectivity), the unit is going to be very likely exposed to the elements. Doesn’t look like that enclosure is IP67 graded 😉

I’d be curious to know what sort of DB losses you end up suffering when you end up picking up a proper weather-proof enclosure. Sadly it doesn’t look like there’s a readily available SMA or type-N aux port on that router, so you can’t just do the ol’ “throw it into a properly rated enclosure, drill and tap for your water-sealed fittings[1]. Realistically though GSM is at 850mhz, so you won’t really have any major comms issues I’d imagine.

An even simpler (but cruder because you lose connectivity to OpenSprinkler– though you do gain the granular control of what you are tx’ing is to fire off information via stateless UDP packets to a 10$ VPS. If you have sporadic connectivity, there’s no losing and having to renegotiate a TCP session. Just a simple one-two
1) Use an off the shelf GSM shield[2] that uses standard UART. It’s tuned for quad-band, so it’ll work with basically any provider on the planet.
2) Serial tx/rx to ESP8266 via UART[3] to dispatch any pertinent infomation you need

Bobs your auntie.

[1] http://www.intelliconnectusa.com/connector-products/sma-waterproof 😉 Overkill much? I’ve never seen these used except in portable spectrum analyzers meant for field service, that run like 20k a unit from Rohde & Schwarz
[2] https://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoGSMShield The pertinent information is : “The shield uses digital pins 2 and 3 for software serial communication with the M10. Pin 2 is connected to the M10’s TX pin and pin 3 to its RX pin.
[3] https://www.arduino.cc/en/Reference/SoftwareSerial

[951calguy]

Most enclosures out in the middle of nowhere where cellular connection would be used are made out of stainless steel, this unfortunately completely cancels the cell signal inside of them, the good thing is that commercial irrigation controllers have an external “pancake” antenna. The shield above would be awesome if I new how to integrate the code to make it work with opensprinkler and also how to physically connect it.

[Ray]

Would this Orbit water-proof enclosure fit your need?
https://www.amazon.com/Orbit-57095-Weather-Resistant-Outdoor-Mounted-Controller/dp/B000VYGMF2/
it’s made of plastic so shouldn’t have too much impact on the signal strength.

[Author]

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