Hello Solar sensor
I am using the Hobby boards Solar sensor, around mid day to late afternoon I experience 0%
readdings. I have tried many changes to hard ware with out success
anyone else experiencing 0% readding during very sunny times using the hobby board solar sensor
any suggestions please
Much appreciated John
very sunny times:
that might be a clue
I Hope so Brian
One other interesting thing when my network was fully loaded with all my sensors
I refer to the Humidity/Temp devices
I actually got a histogram looking Solar plot
under 1 wire setup no clues that there was any sensors not working, all looked great
the Humidity devices functioned properly.
Might also be useful information
Regards John
when it drops to zero on the graph, is the raw reading in the solar setup still OK?
it might be simply that its over scaling on the graph
humm, just noticed you have plot solar %
so, try not having plot solar % ticked, as a test
it must be that the solar % is going to zero…
when you raw reading is real high…
(let me know what the raw mv reading is)
actualy, try increasing the max volts reading in the solar setup (default is 200)
that just might be the trick!
Hello Brian
Can confirm with certainty Raw readding drops to zero
I have considered it possibly a hardware issue and device interaction.
But strange how its mostly an issue at higher sun levels which made me question this
and see if it is more than just me experiencing this
Cheers John
oh, raw reading dropping to zero./…
when it does that, if you can be there, try seeing what the reading is like with the i button viewer?
but, maybe, do you have the sensor under a shield of some sort?
try shading it slightly?
http://www.geyserlandobservatory.org/weather/weather.html
this nz rotorua station looks OK
( a sensor supplied from me)
the actual sensor is behind a opaque dome
Thats working well
can see the clouds going over
is this a hobby board solar sensor
do I need to do the dome thing
regards John
its actualy a jim jennings original
but yes i would try and get the sensor behind some opaque shield or similar
it might be that too bright a sunlight is too much for it
Thanks Brian Ill give that ago
John
The lens that Jim Jennings used are available from www.mouser.com. I don’t have the exact part number as I’m not at home. I will be later tonight and will try to get you the part number.
Happy Thanksgiving !!
Cheers
MikeyM
anyone else experiencing 0% reading during very sunny times using the hobby board solar sensor
I have exactly the same problem as John, using the same HB kit I think. I opened a bug report about it a couple of weeks back and was waiting for Brian to build his HB solar sensor to look into the problem.
My max volts is set at 215 currently, and the sensor is under a clear glass dome. I use the plot% and use the raw devided by max calculation.
I’ll look and see if I only get that problem on very fine days as well.
Also I’m still getting the evening “spike” on the graph. The spike appears to be a % of whatever the days maximum was so I suspect a progromatic error - I also observed the raw volts to confirm that they are not increasing during the spike.
I just looked at my WDL page now and the solar reading is 0. However I cant tell what the raw value is as I’m at work. Is there a log file of the raw volts anywhere that I can look at later. ?
Wow, that took some work to find, but the lens that Jim Jennings used can be found at the following link :
It’s a "White tranlucent lens #606-25P-307W.
Jim sent me one and it worked GREAT. Good luck
Cheers
MikeyM
Thanks Mikey
Much appreciated, I will try one of those lens caps.
looks like they will do the job, because I have fashioned
a opaque shield from a plastic bottle and todays result
greatly improved, I have been tweaking the maximum
voltage is set at 225mv
Cheers John
thats looks much better…
sometimes its just the little things!
My solar sensor is working very good,
my only problem is my daily sunshine hours, they are many hours lower than the ones reported by the metservice,
what do i have to do to increase my hours of sunshine.
