Project Curacao2 – Part 10: In the Caribbean
– Repair and Testing
We have now unpacked all the Project Curacao2 boxes, repaired the shipping damage and have them outside charging batteries and experiencing the Ocean Breeze! There will be another 4 or 5 days of watching before we mount the boxes on their permanent positions.
Shipping Repairs
Our shipment down wasn’t too bad for the boxes. The TSA clearly opened the boxes and fiddle with the wiring inside (breaking a connector in one case), but it was easily repaired with the ever present PJ2T 
soldering iron. The top solar panels had been compressed, breaking their stands, but the solar panels themselves were fine.
Project Curacao2 is a redesign and rebuild of the Project Curacao environmental monitoring system that was running down on the island nation of Curacao in 2014 and 2015. It finally died after a loose wire in the solar panel assembly (not in the panels, but in the internal wiring) finally came completely loose. We are taking the original project curaçao apart to diagnose it. More on that in a future posting. We are now using a LoRa WXLink wireless transmitters for data collection.
The project consists of two LoRa transmitters based on a Mini Pro LP and a Raspberry Pi Zero powered base unit. Lots and lots of sensors! All solar powered.
- Part 1 - Introduction to Project Curacao2 and the LoRa WXLink Feeder Stations
- Part 2 - First LoRa WXLink Feeder Stations Report
- Part 3 - Testing the LoRa Range
- Part 4 – Initial LoRa Range Results
- Part 5 – Final LoRa Range Results
- Part 6 - Raspberry Pi Zero Base Unit Build
- Part 7 - Flame On! Initial Base Unit Tests
- Part 8 - Solar Power Management System
- Part 9 - Ready for Deployment and Status
- Part 10 - PC2 in the Caribbean! Repairs and Testing
- Part 11 - It Lives! Deployment and Initial Results
- Part 12 - One Month of Results from Paradise
Project Status
All three of the boxes have been repaired and are out in the sun for testing. On power up, the Raspberry Pi Python based unit does a self test of all sensors and devices. Here are the results:
ProjectCuracao2 Solar Powered Environmental Station Version 3.0 - SwitchDoc Labs Program Started at:2017-06-03 07:41:47 ---------------------- I2C Mux - TCA9545: Present BMP280: Present DS3231: Present HDC1080: Present HTU21DF: Not Present AM2315: Not Present ADS1015: Not Present ADS1115: Present AS3935: Present OLED: Present SunAirPlus: Present Sunlight Sensor: Present WXLink: Present UseMySQL: Present Check WLAN: Present WeatherUnderground: Present ---------------------- Initial Power State Set ---------------------- Power Status ---------------------- OLED Display: On Fan Drive: Off LoRa Power: On AirQuaility Power: Off WiFi Power : On ----------------------
All of the sensor that were supposed to be there are there! The HTU21DF was replaced by an HDC1080 indoor Temperature and Humidity sensor, the ADS1015 was replaced by a 16 bit ADS1115 ADC and then AM2315 Outdoor Temperature sensors are on the remote LoRa units.
Everything working!
And the solar system is working perfectly too:
----------------- SunAirPlus Currents / Voltage ----------------- LIPO_Battery Bus Voltage: 4.18 V LIPO_Battery Shunt Voltage: -24.40 mV LIPO_Battery Load Voltage: 4.16 V LIPO_Battery Current 1: -244.00 mA Battery Power 1: -1.01 W Solar Cell Bus Voltage 2: 5.73 V Solar Cell Shunt Voltage 2: -72.76 mV Solar Cell Load Voltage 2: 5.66 V Solar Cell Current 2: 727.60 mA Solar Cell Power 2: 4.11 W Output Bus Voltage 3: 4.89 V Output Shunt Voltage 3: 38.04 mV Output Load Voltage 3: 4.89 V Output Current 3: 380.40 mA Output Power 3: 1.86 W ------------------------------ finished taking picture -----------------
And as you can see from the very bottom of the above output, the camera is working. And here is the first picture from Project Curacao2. Yes, the exposure needs some work, but we can do that remotely.
