What settings do you use when connecting these type of sensors directly to the pi's GPIO Pins ?
I can't seem to get it to read the sensor directly from the GPIO Pins directly.. I guess it would be easier with the hat but I'm wanting to have a Pi 3 as the main hub and this will monitor solar and pull data from various pi zeros which will read the soil moisture, water via a relay and take pictures using a pi zero camera - these will be on each raised bed and the pi 3 will be connect to the internet to send email notifications and hopefully if I can source a wifi router which takes a SIM card to forward the port for complete remote access as this is all going in on the allotment.
I also liked the one wire implementation at the beginning, but there are two roadblocks that made me change my mind about it.
1) The OneWire is not an open protocol, still not clear if still belong to the one corporation that invented it (for the master side). This has a consequence especially for open source SW.
2) The addressing system requires unique address among all the devices being produced.
My experience was not so good either, for short cable length the sensor was quite ok, not so much for longer cables. Also had reliability issues after some time the reading start to be inconsistent.
So now I switched all my sensor to digital capacitive sensors, In theory it is possible use quite longer cables with them.
I'll release a digital hygrometer designed by me, in my shop soon (hopefully before Christmas), I worked a lot to improve the dynamic range and sensitivity.
Being digital, this sensor can be directly connected to the raspberry.
I'm also working to a solution with a mini solar panel, batteries and wifi to make the Soil moisture sensor readable using WiFi so completely removing cables.
My long term experience with the moisture sensor v1.2 is not good. The output of the sensor is so sensitive that a longer cable will interfere with the performance. Fertilizer will also interfere with the output performance. I believe it is because of the very little current capacity of the output. i would like to know about the experiences other user had with the sensor.
I did experiment with the Version 1.2 for a while in combination with the MPC3008. My experience's so far are that the A/D converter chip is very sensitive to noise. To extend the wire between the sensor and the MCP I used cat 6 cable, connected one twisted pair to ground, one twisted pair to 5V and the third twisted pair to signal and the shield to earth and a cap between earth and ground. Got the noise down a lot. Between the MCP3008 and the pi I put a 4 bit 5V/3.3V level-shifter. The one on the photo. this also reduced fluctuation in the readings. I guess it is because of the threshold at which voltage the PI interprets a voltage as zero and from which voltage it is interpreted as a one. At the end I still have a swing around 10%.
Good to know it works now. Well it needs reboot only in one specific case where you move from one setting which is using the SPI pins for input/output, to a config in which the pins are used for SPI. SPI is used to get the data from the ADC. This case happen when you select the Irrigation Hat setting first and after the automationHat setting. So in this case you need reboot. Whatever too technical :)
Hi There, Can you show my a photo with the connection to the sensor and the board, also a screenshot of the real time reading, what is the value you are getting?
No luck here, either @c.l.teker101
I hooked up my A&I Hat v10.4, plugged a sensor v1.2 into AN0 and a sensor v2.0 into AN4. Neither reads any voltage in the Real Time Data page.
I feel like I've missed something, but I'm not sure what it could be.
Any ideas, @hydrosys4 ?
I have gotten the hat. I hooked my v1.2 up and the does not show up. Have you had any luck?
So while I wait for my Automation hat to be delivered, I'm trying to test my various sensors. I have Capacitive Soil Moisture Sensor v2.0, but I can't seem to figure out how to get the Pi to recognize it and Hydrosys4 to see it.
I have an MCP3008-I/P to convert analog to digital. But I must be getting the wiring wrong for it, because nothing ever shows up in Hydrosys4 for it.
Would anyone mind pointing me to a wiring diagram for this? Also, what HardwareSettings are necessary for it?
If the cable on the Captive Soil Moisture Sensor V1.2 isn't long enough to reach the hat, what kind of connectors do I need to use to make it longer?
Did you check out this solution already?
I sorted it and got it reading just under auto watering I've got "sensor not available"
I guess I'd also need the other chip? Or can I just link it to the MCP3008 as I want a single sensor per pi ?
You can't connect the output to the GPIO pins directly. The output is analog and must be run through the MCP3008 Analog to Digital converter. The wiring instructions are shown on the hardware page. The developer has a board available (should be available again soon) that has the chip in it with dedicated inputs for these sensors or you can wire up your sensors to go through this chip using a breadboard or get a Raspberry Pi breakout board and wire up your own hat and connectors. I got started doing a breakout board with my kid (fun kid soldering project!) but then decided to just design my own board for my fiancee's greenhouse that integrates this chip and various connections needed.