Welcome to EnviroDIY, a community for do-it-yourself environmental science and monitoring. EnviroDIY is part of 
@neilh20
active 2 days, 14 hours ago-
neilh started the topic Salt water marsh monitoring project in the forum Infrastructure and Equipment 1 month, 3 weeks ago
I came across this project discussion “Measuring internal temp of oysters and mussel” which has a lot of good discussion and thought it would be good cross-reference for anybody interested in a infrastructure and equipment discussion
https://www.thethingsnetwork.org/forum/t/measuring-internal-temp-of-oysters-and-mussel/26492/6
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neilh posted a new activity comment 5 months, 2 weeks ago
Cal – Some thoughts, if you are using the Mayfly’s battery measurement its not actually measuring the LiIon battery voltage. How are you connecting the solar cell and what rating is it?
If the battery is charging, its taking current and the voltage indication is close to that of the battery – depending on how much solar there is. For the voltage…[Read more] -
neilh posted a new activity comment 5 months, 2 weeks ago
Unfortunately I am seeing some issues with the LiIon battery measurement. I think the issue is that the battery measurement uses a 10M/2.7M resistor with a high impedance Analog input, and if its in an RF noisy location (roving cell phones) it can detect some of that energy. Wires can behave in two ways – on the one hand they conduct current,…[Read more]
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Neil – I saw the spike on my Mayfly for the 2nd time last week. I think I have a different problem than you – and I think my problem is battery related. The spike goes from 4v to 5v then tapers back down over several hours. I can’t imagine any stray electromagnetic field causing that kind of jump for that kind of time span in the middle of…[Read more]
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Cal – Some thoughts, if you are using the Mayfly’s battery measurement its not actually measuring the LiIon battery voltage. How are you connecting the solar cell and what rating is it?
If the battery is charging, its taking current and the voltage indication is close to that of the battery – depending on how much solar there is. For the voltage…[Read more]-
Neil – there is no solar panel on this setup. We swap the battery with a new charged one after 3 months use.
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neilh replied to the topic Trouble initializing XBee3 LTE-M in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 5 months, 2 weeks ago
Thanks.
The cct V0.5b shows an option of connecting the Xbee to the LiIon V_bat – which can get to 4.2V – and a very nice low impedance for the Cellular Tx power requirements.
So if the Xbee-V1-UT/XB3-C-A2 Cellular @ 4.2V was pulling up, that would over drive the mega1284 pins above their Vcc (3.3V).
At some point the megas1284 protection…[Read more] -
neilh replied to the topic Trouble initializing XBee3 LTE-M in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 5 months, 2 weeks ago
Oh good to hear it works.
What pin are you using on the Mayfly.? I could see the references in the code on modemConnect() but couldn’t find any designation.One of the problems is that the ATmega1284 doesn’t have any 5V compatible pins, so it may cause some unpredictable behaviour if it pulls the mega1284 pin up too hard – which depends on the…[Read more]
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neilh replied to the topic Trouble initializing XBee3 LTE-M in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 5 months, 4 weeks ago
I’ve also had this problem with the Xbee S6 WiFi. However I’ve lowered the polling rate and a few other tweaks of the TinyGSM and its been better https://github.com/neilh10/TinyGSM.
@cal the Mayfly 0.5b schematic diagram of the U6/XBEE-1XBEE-1_LOCK shows the RESET pin5 – the schematic symbol of circle on the mainbody is typically a way of…[Read more] -
neilh posted a new activity comment 6 months, 1 week ago
Hello Jesse, great you joined.
Can you need to provide a bit more information.
It is **normal** ~ though perhaps undesirable and non-intuitive ~ for a depth measuring instrument to show a slightly negative depth when outof water. Depending on the type of physical sensor they don’t know 0.0 – they have to be calibrated for it, and even that,…[Read more]-
Hi Neil,
Thanks for your reply! This sensor is submerged deep in a pool. After I saw that it had a negative reading, I cleaned the outside of the probe, put it back in the water, and took another reading and same thing, negative numbers. Some I’m not sure what to try.
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neilh commented on the post, Build Your Own EnviroDIY Sensor Station 7 months, 1 week ago
Wow. Thankyou Stroud Water team for detailed how-tos. Fantastic stream side setup for Mayfly, as well as good reference material for how to do water quality collection.
One comment, is that we’ve seen sensor cables being gnawed. So we’ve tended to put the cables communicating to the sensors in a flexible PVC sheath. In the West we also get…[Read more] -
neilh replied to the topic Water Monitoring in remote locations with a solar Particle Electron in the forum Environmental Sensors 7 months, 2 weeks ago
Nice write up on github thankyou. I’ve got the ParticleIO WiFi going for one project. Particularly interesting your TDS references thanks.
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neilh replied to the topic SDI-12 library support in the forum Environmental Sensors 7 months, 3 weeks ago
hi @frbiggs I’ve used the teensy – but it comes in a number of flavors.
Checkout https://github.com/duff2013/SDI12_T3
IHMO the Teensy3.5 also has +5V tolerant pins.
The Teensy3.5 and 3.6 processors have some nice ram. https://blog.adafruit.com/2016/10/06/new-products-teensy-3-5-teensy-3-6/Can you say what your context is – are you looking to…[Read more]
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neilh posted a new activity comment 7 months, 3 weeks ago
that sounds pretty fantastic. Of course doesn’t indicate long term reliability and the issues are mechanically how to connect the water pressure with the mineral oil. I’d be interested in how you are thinking about doing it in a steam with the logger connection is say 20′ above the point of measurement. But its giving me someother ideas. I’m…[Read more]
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neilh posted a new activity comment 8 months ago
BME280 – I don’t know. Its a materials/chemistry issue – how does mineral oil react with the materials in the sensor. Probably easy to test – but how to do longer term reliability testing.
Years ago, a Motorola/Freescale product “Pressure sensor” engineer suggested I use a high molecular silica gel for interfacing to its air sensor diaphgram.…[Read more]-
neilh, Thanks for your thoughts on this.
I’m looking at small rivers and streams. So depth change is generally less than 10 feet, in most cases max change of 1-5 feet. I’d like to get less than 0.1% accuracy and +_ 0.1 inch but I could live with as much as +_ 0.5 inch if I had to.
I’ve been running the BME280 in the mineral oil for about 8 weeks…[Read more]-
that sounds pretty fantastic. Of course doesn’t indicate long term reliability and the issues are mechanically how to connect the water pressure with the mineral oil. I’d be interested in how you are thinking about doing it in a steam with the logger connection is say 20′ above the point of measurement. But its giving me someother ideas. I’m…[Read more]
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neilh posted a new activity comment 8 months ago
Hi John – feel free to email me direct on neilh at biomonitors.com as I get it quicker.
comments: generally pressure sensors are pretty easy to understand and calibrate for a water column – but the devils in the detail. What range (eg 0-10′) and accuracy do you want.
1) for the BME280 it hasn’t got an easy mechanical port to isolate the pressure…[Read more]-
I’ve got the calibration OK and I’m using another BME280 for atmospheric compensation. Both BME280s use I2C.
What I’m unsure of is submersing the BME280 in mineral oil. It seems to work but I haven’t heard of anyone putting the BME280 in mineral oil, or any pressure sensor in mineral oil for that matter, to isolate it from the water. Any…[Read more]-
BME280 – I don’t know. Its a materials/chemistry issue – how does mineral oil react with the materials in the sensor. Probably easy to test – but how to do longer term reliability testing.
Years ago, a Motorola/Freescale product “Pressure sensor” engineer suggested I use a high molecular silica gel for interfacing to its air sensor diaphgram.…[Read more]-
neilh, Thanks for your thoughts on this.
I’m looking at small rivers and streams. So depth change is generally less than 10 feet, in most cases max change of 1-5 feet. I’d like to get less than 0.1% accuracy and +_ 0.1 inch but I could live with as much as +_ 0.5 inch if I had to.
I’ve been running the BME280 in the mineral oil for about 8 weeks…[Read more]-
that sounds pretty fantastic. Of course doesn’t indicate long term reliability and the issues are mechanically how to connect the water pressure with the mineral oil. I’d be interested in how you are thinking about doing it in a steam with the logger connection is say 20′ above the point of measurement. But its giving me someother ideas. I’m…[Read more]
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neilh replied to the topic Newbie Mayfly Setup for RS485 sensor to internet in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 8 months, 1 week ago
Thanks for all the help in diving into the ModularSensors code.
I’ve captured my notes on how to work as a developer with the layers of ModularSensors/TinGSM/KellerLib/Arduino code – https://github.com/neilh10/ModularSensors/wiki/git-cmds-for-preparing-for-a-PR This is really my cheat sheet – but available if anybody else wants it. -
neilh replied to the topic AREF in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 8 months, 1 week ago
I’ve put a discussion of measuring LiIon voltage https://github.com/EnviroDIY/ModularSensors/issues/196
I’m seeing a divergence in between two different sources of measuring LiIon from V_Batt and ExtVolt/ADS1115. -
neilh replied to the topic AREF in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 8 months, 1 week ago
Hello Shannon/@shicks – thanks for the detail.I missed that it was an internal connection on the mega1284 to the 3.3V
The issue with the 3.3V, is that it is connected to the LiIon through the regulator SPX3819.
The regulator has a dropout that is variable depending on the load, temperature etc – so from the datasheet at load of 500mA it could be…[Read more] -
neilh started the topic AREF in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 8 months, 2 weeks ago
Just wondering if AREF connects to a voltage source.? Looking at the rev0.5B and IC1 pin 29 labeled AREF I can’t find how AREF connects to 3.3V – but its probably I’m missing something. If it was an annotated PDF I could search for AREF.
The code suggests AREF is connected to 3.3V.
If it does connect to 3.3V, can it be disconnected, leaving C19…[Read more] -
neilh replied to the topic Newbie Mayfly Setup for RS485 sensor to internet in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 9 months, 1 week ago
Thankyou @fisherba thankyou!!!. I got the Xbee SB6 wifi communicating to data.envirodiy.org
I’ve cloned locally github.com/EnviroDIY/ModularSensors
then set to develop
and copied
enviroDIYModularSensorsexampleslogging_to_EnviroDIY
Arduinoenv02nanolevelStarting up platformIO I opened the folder Arduinoenv02nanolevel
in platformio.ini I set…[Read more] -
neilh replied to the topic Newbie Mayfly Setup for RS485 sensor to internet in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 9 months, 1 week ago
Just wondering if I should be able to build from the develop or whether there are dependencies that make it too complex.
If I need to just wait until it gets to master – then thats OK as well, but if its useful;I’m using GitHub Desktop (latest 1.4.2)
I switch to ModuleSensors which map to https://github.com/EnviroDIY/ModularSensors.git and…[Read more] -
neilh replied to the topic Newbie Mayfly Setup for RS485 sensor to internet in the forum Mayfly Data Logger 9 months, 1 week ago
Thanks for the status 🙂 very much appreciate its a a work in progress – sometimes it just figuring it out. Its great to have it visible on github and to get pointers.
For software stability, testing is everything, and the options for boards and modems are a matrix.
For the record using the Xbee WiFi S6 hybrid, the current master branch as of…[Read more] - Load More
Neil – there is no solar panel on this setup. We swap the battery with a new charged one after 3 months use.