Attended: Kevin, Gordon, Tyler

• Debugging boards : charging chip of board 4 and 5 were compared with adafruit
  • Behavior was exactly the same
  • Battery voltage ≈ 3.245 V
  • Max voltage output (at max irradiance) = 4.6V
  • Voltage load initially at 6.5V before lowering to 4.6V when max irradiance is applied at once
  • Voltage load dips to 2.7V for a split second before settling back at 3.245V (battery Voltage)
  • why is max voltage 4.6V?
• Worked on eagle redesign of board

• Messed up on charging chip soldering
  • NEVER solder the pad on the board itself, only the pad on the part
• Gateway was down so we weren't able to test the board
• Conditions indoors cannot replicate outdoor irradiance
  • need to conduct irradiance testing outside with real sun

• Perform more tests of board under solar irradiance
  • in direct sunlight, see if board stops transmitting
• Debug populated board 5
  • Some parts need to be swapped out
  • Continuity test of board 5
• Create another spot on csv file for measuring voltage at XBee pin
  • Will be used to look for ghost voltage
  • Nathan said we might not be able to do it : Correction we might be able to use it
  • Debug LED flag : turn on led and keep it on after Ghost voltage is perceived
  • ADC6 might be able be a input chart
• Transmission Tests
  • test adafruit charging chip indoors and outdoors
    • make sure output is good
    • LED behavior
    • behavior with irradiance
  • test our charging chip
    • behavior with irradiance
    • LED behavior
    • Hopefully simply changing the charging chip will fix the problem
• Look into power switching of charging chip
  • Tryston said that between 4.3 - 4.5V the board would be powered by the battery instead of the solar panel
• Populate a new board as soon as new parts come in
• Populate a board with charging chip
• Charging chip debug LED tests
  • 1 - 5bit number to voltage tests
    • this is used to make sure that the charging chip follows tryston's charging chip behaviors
    • to be completed for adafruit charging chip and dragon fruit charging chip
    • 5bits = 31 in decimal
    • 0 = 3V
    • 9 = 3.9V
    • 13 = 4.3V
    • 20 = 5V
  • 2 - Use 3 debug LEDs to visually indicate when switching between solar panel and battery
    • LED 1 : Vload = Solar Panel
    • LED 2 : 4.3 < Vload < 4.5 (around the voltage that Vload switches from Panel to Battery power)
    • LED 3 : Vload = battery mV
    • If all are off, then the load voltage is between 4.3V and battery voltage
    • Need to connect Vload to MCU
  • 3 - Use LEDs to flag Ghost voltage, low XBee voltage, and dropped transmission
    • LED 1 : Ghost voltage is 4V (this is much too high for XBee power)
    • LED 2 : XBee voltage at less than 2.7V (full range is 2.7 - 3.6V)
    • LED 3 : flag for transmission (we do not know how to do it yet)
    • Need to connect XBee power to MCU

Contributing authors:

Created by tyamauchi on 2017/03/25 02:15.