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Are you sure you are measuring DC voltage? Somehow the two numbers you are getting are both twice as much as what they should be, which made me feel perhaps you should check if your multimeter is set on DC voltage measurement.
Note that the current opensprinkler firmware allows valve on time down to 1 second. It’s also possible to reduce it to below 1 second by modifying the firmware.
Cool. Thanks for the pointer. If they can open up their API, the sensor module will definitely be a great add-on to opensprinkler. p.s. I am also developing a wireless soil humidity sensor on the side, to work with opensprinkler. Lots of people at maker faire this year asked about soil moisture sensor, so a clear direction to go.
Cool. Thanks for the pointer. If they can open up their API, the sensor module will definitely be a great add-on to opensprinkler. p.s. I am also developing a wireless soil humidity sensor on the side, to work with opensprinkler. Lots of people at maker faire this year asked about soil moisture sensor, so a clear direction to go.
It’s now in, under the Expansion Board sub-folder:
https://github.com/rayshobby/opensprinklerI apologize that the details are not provided in the user manual yet. I should add them soon. OSPi 1.4 uses the first 8 pins on the 3.3V column (same as the 8 pins you see in the picture you attached), and the first 5 pins on the 5V column. On the circuit board you can see that the occupied pins are surrounded by a white box in the silkscreen. They are pretty subtle but should be visible. The other pins are free to use. Also, the SDA/SCL pins (which OSPi 1.4 uses for RTC and ADC) can be shared with other devices.
The freezing problem is usually because the controller cannot ping the server or is having trouble performing NTP sync. So here are my suggestions:
go to options, and turn NTP sync off, Auto reconnect off, also set DHCP off, instead, use a static ip (make sure the ip is compatible with your network, and make sure you set the correct gateway ip as well, i.e. your router’s ip).
See if these help eliminate the freezing problem.Did you try a few different SD card or just the 64GB card? You may want to try another one. Like scottsh said, I have also unplugged power from RPi many times and have not encountered any SD corruption issue. I do think some cards may be more prone to corruption.
All RPi GPIO pins are mapped out in the ‘RPi Pin Out’ area. It’s at the upper-left corner of the board. The user manual has annotated diagrams to show where they are:
http://rayshobby.net/docs/ospi14_manual.pdf
(page 3)
the pin names are not labeled (because there is no space to label them), but you should see the leftmost two pins are marked +5V and 3.3V, so you can use those two pins to figure out the name of the remaining pins.I’ve seen issues with the PTC fuse false triggering, especially if the ambient temperature is high. I suggest that you solder a wire across the PTC fuse to bypass it.
It has come to my attention that, in ubestbsteppin’s case, the surface-mount DS1307 RTC was placed in the wrong orientation. This causes the microcontroller to stop working, and is our fault since the surface mount components are assembled by us. So if you encountered similar problem (LCD characters are rectangles), check the DS1307 chip — the white dot should e on the lower-left corner (i.e. close to the 32.768kHz crystal). If you see the white dot on the upper right corner (i.e. close to the microcontroller), please contact [email protected]. Thanks.
Currently there is no automatic detection of DST. You need to manually change the time zone to reflect DST.
The DIY kits are in stock (the stock information wasn’t up-to-date when you checked. it’s now fixed). Thanks for asking.
You are right that uSD card is optional and not required. Without the uSD card, the LCD should still go past the ‘Detecting uSD card’ screen in less than 10 seconds. I am wondering if the uSD card slot has an issue or perhaps has a reflow problem. If you can, could you use a magnifying glass and check the solder joints on the uSD card slot, and see if there is any potential solder bridge or unsolder pin?
Do you have sprinkler valves connected and you can see that S8 is always on from the valve action, or are you just measure the voltage? When there is no-load, there are often stray voltages which are not reliably indicators of whether the station is on or off. When a valve is connected the stray voltage should go away.
@bill_s: you are right that the modified port number is only effective after a reboot. If you click on the ‘show tooltip’ button on the ‘set options’ page, there is a brief explanation of each option, and for the HTTP port option it says ‘effective after reboot’.
The OSBo and expansion board have all been tested before we ship them out. It’s not so easy to test them without a tester. Basically you will need a microcontroller, such as an Arduino, to send control signals to the board to test various components on board.
When using expansion board, one thing you should be careful about is inserting the extension cable correctly. Now that the extension cable uses polarized connectors, it’s unlikely you will insert them in the wrong way. Still, if you are inserting the connector with the case top removed, it’s possible to misalign the connector with the pin headers. When this happens, you may end up connecting a GPIO pin to ground, and that can potentially damage the BeagleBone.
If you want, you can send back your boards to us so we can use our testers to check if the boards are still working. Email to [email protected]. Thanks.
Sorry, I am confused, I thought you mean ‘station delay time’. Rain delay time on OpenSprinkler is in units of hours.
Sorry about the confusion. The hardware design files are still released in my Github repository:
https://github.com/rayshobby/opensprinkler
but the software, such as Dan’s interval_program and Rich’s sprinklers_pi program are maintained in their own Github repository respectively.Just realized I haven’t checked in OSPi 1.4 schematic and board files. Thanks for reminding, will check them in tomorrow. Thanks.
Ah, I see, I think only image files are allows. Can you convert your file to .jpg or .png or any image format?
I suggest that you use a multimeter to measure the AC voltage from the transformer. If it’s below 30V AC it should be fine.
The minimum current requirement is to make sure the transformer can power the circuit and activate at least 1 to 2 valves at the same time. There is no maximum current limit because the actual current depends on how much the circuit draws from the transformer. A transformer rated at 24V, 40VA means it’s capable of delivering 40 / 24 = 1.67A current, but it’s not like it’s ‘pumping’ in 1.67A into the circuit — the actual current it supplies depends on how much the circuit needs. 1.67A just means that in the case the circuit needs to draw 1.67A it’s able to deliver that much while still maintaining 24V voltage. Beyond that the voltage can drop significantly below 24V. Hope this makes sense.
Because AC transformers are un-regulated, in practice higher capacity transformers do tend to have higher no-load voltage. For example, the no-load voltage of a 24V AC transformer may be 28V AC or sometimes low-quality transformer can have a no-load voltage exceeding 30V AC. So when in doubt, it’s always a good idea to use a multimeter to measure it. In any case, when there is a load (i.e some current draw), the voltage should drop down to about 24V.
Earlier versions of OpenSprinkler firmware did have a ‘maximum concurrent station’ limit, but it turns out to be not that useful. So I removed it later.
I don’t think running multiple valves will damage the PSU — first, there is a 2A inline fuse on board which will blow if the current exceeds 2A; also, many common sprinkler transformers are not capable of delivering 2A, so what happens is that when too many valves are open at the same time, the voltage from the transformer will drop significantly and trigger a reset of the circuit, thus releasing all valves.
