Reprogramming the AAG RS485 Weather Station

He he, do I get a prize :slight_smile:


Rob

Graynomad:
He he, do I get a prize :slight_smile:


Rob

Sorry, no. :slight_smile: Good job, though!

The remaining mystery to me is why they went to such trouble to hide what they are doing. The dummy looks EXACTLY like the real magnet. It's like they had a big batch of defective ceramic magnets to use up. The rotor that operates the HE for wind speed does have two functional magnets and looks identical to the Wind direction rotor. Curiouser and curiouser.

I'm still left with the problem of reprograming the stock chip. Anyone with any suggestions about that please step in.

reprograming the stock chip

I'd buy a $20 programmer like this

from Pololu or someone (there are a few around) and make up a 6-way to 5-way cable.


Rob

Graynomad:

reprograming the stock chip

I'd buy a $20 programmer like this

http://www.pololu.com/catalog/product/1300

from Pololu or someone (there are a few around) and make up a 6-way to 5-way cable.


Rob

I might end up doing that but there's no reason why I can't use an Arduino for this project unless the manufacturer has burned the fuses to disable reprogramming.

EmilyJane:
The remaining mystery to me is why they went to such trouble to hide what they are doing. The dummy looks EXACTLY like the real magnet. It's like they had a big batch of defective ceramic magnets to use up. The rotor that operates the HE for wind speed does have two functional magnets and looks identical to the Wind direction rotor. Curiouser and curiouser.

Unlikely that they're hiding anything. Perhaps a counterweight? Provided for balance?

EmilyJane:
I'm still left with the problem of reprograming the stock chip. Anyone with any suggestions about that please step in.

Adafruit sells a little ISP programmer (usbtiny) that should do the job nicely. It's supported directly by avrdude.

BTW, the Bus Pirate that I mentioned yesterday also fulfills this purpose. Also supported by avrdude. Just sayin'...

Oh, and my earlier suggestion regarding position is based upon experience with my own AAG weather station. You really don't get a useful position until it moves.

buzzdavidson:

EmilyJane:
The remaining mystery to me is why they went to such trouble to hide what they are doing. The dummy looks EXACTLY like the real magnet. It's like they had a big batch of defective ceramic magnets to use up. The rotor that operates the HE for wind speed does have two functional magnets and looks identical to the Wind direction rotor. Curiouser and curiouser.

Unlikely that they're hiding anything. Perhaps a counterweight? Provided for balance?

EmilyJane:
I'm still left with the problem of reprograming the stock chip. Anyone with any suggestions about that please step in.

Adafruit sells a little ISP programmer (usbtiny) that should do the job nicely. It's supported directly by avrdude.

BTW, the Bus Pirate that I mentioned yesterday also fulfills this purpose. Also supported by avrdude. Just sayin'...

Oh, and my earlier suggestion regarding position is based upon experience with my own AAG weather station. You really don't get a useful position until it moves.

Those are all good suggestions. Thank you!

Well, I'm going to call it a night.

buzzdavidson:

EmilyJane:
The remaining mystery to me is why they went to such trouble to hide what they are doing. The dummy looks EXACTLY like the real magnet. It's like they had a big batch of defective ceramic magnets to use up. The rotor that operates the HE for wind speed does have two functional magnets and looks identical to the Wind direction rotor. Curiouser and curiouser.

Unlikely that they're hiding anything. Perhaps a counterweight? Provided for balance?

EmilyJane:
I'm still left with the problem of reprograming the stock chip. Anyone with any suggestions about that please step in.

Adafruit sells a little ISP programmer (usbtiny) that should do the job nicely. It's supported directly by avrdude.

BTW, the Bus Pirate that I mentioned yesterday also fulfills this purpose. Also supported by avrdude. Just sayin'...

Oh, and my earlier suggestion regarding position is based upon experience with my own AAG weather station. You really don't get a useful position until it moves.

I'm sure it's a counterweight as you suggest but it is made out of the same material that the magnet is made from. Maybe they are readily available from another process/product.

I finally got avrdude/ArduinoISP to talk to the WS but I'll probably order one of the Adafruit programmers to use in the future. The problem was I needed to over-ride the baud rate in avrdude. Coding Badly figured that one out.

The new AAG will be even easier to determine wind direction now that I realize that there is only one magnet. It will work when the vane is stopped as well.

I decided to go ahead and bump the clock frequency up to 16 MHz so as soon as a crystal arrives, I'll get back on this project. I'll be using a USBtinyisp and a USB/TTL serial interface instead of an Arduino for programming and communication also, so everything should go smoothly.

so everything should go smoothly

He he.


Rob

Graynomad:

so everything should go smoothly

He he.


Rob

Yeah, that's the thought that went through my head, too. :slight_smile:

Bah. You two are pessimists. What could possibly go wrong?

An old boss helped design and build the control system for a very large tank farm. While driving to the plant for the startup, he stopped at 7-Eleven and picked up a stack of job applications ... just in case things went poorly.

:slight_smile: Funny story.

If I didn't break anything and the schematic diagram is correct it really should go smoothly. With the FTDI bridge and a 16 MHz clock, it should look exactly like an Arduino NG with LEDs on every pin. :smiley:

Well, I've got an Arduino bootloader programmed into the AAG Atmega8 now and am just playing around with the on-board hardware. I'm programming it from the IDE through an FTDI USB/serial bridge with a 100nF capacitor from DTR to reset. The first thing I have noticed is that the schematic is wrong for P1, the photocell. On the schematic it should show R20 (3K0) and P1 reversed. The 3K0 resistor goes to Gnd and the photocell goes to +5 volts. If you're is playing along at home, you'll want to change your schematic. :slight_smile:

I had a chance to play with the weather station and wrote this code to set up the ports and get wind direction. I created an array of bytes to hold the 16 possible states of the Hall effects. Either one Hall effect is triggered or two are when the magnet is between two of them. The 16 states map into a string array that corresponds to the 16 directions.

Next I will get the 1-wire temperature working and wind speed and then it will be at the same point where I took it apart.

AAG wired the DS1850 directly into PD5 with no pull-up resistor so I'm going to re-wire it with one so I can have a proper 1-wire bus to extend outside the enclosure. I don't have too much flash so I'm going to have to work on the 1-wire code to make it as slim as possible.

/*
PC0-PC5 PD6-PD7 = Q1-Q8  Wind Direction
 PD5 = 1-Wire DS18B20
 PD4 = Q9 Wind Speed
 PD2 = DD RS485 Data Direction
 PD1 = TXD
 PD0 - RXD
 ADC7 = P1 Photocell Schematic wrong actually pulls up to 5V
 ADC6 = Voltmeter
 */

#define ADC6  6
#define ADC7  7

const char* windDirection[16] = { // strings for the 16 wind directions
  "N", "NNE", "NE", "ENE", "E", "ESE", "SE", "SSE", "S", "SSW",\
  "SW", "WSW", "W", "WNW", "NW", "NNW"};

uint8_t WD[16] =  { // Hall effect outputs for 16 wind vane positions
  B01111111, B00111111, B10111111, B10011111, B11011111, B11001111,\
  B11101111, B11100111, B11110111, B11110011, B11111011, B11111001,\
  B11111101, B11111100, B11111110, B01111110};


uint8_t match_wind(uint8_t* mask_array, uint8_t mask){ // match wind direction mask with array of possibles
  for (uint8_t i=0; i<16; i++)
    if (*mask_array++ == mask)
      return i; // return match which corresponds to string array index too
  return 16; // signal no match. 
}

uint8_t make_wind(void){ // build mask for wind direction
  uint8_t temp = PINC; // read Q1-Q6(PC0-PC5)
  temp &= B00111111; // clear bits 6 and 7
  temp |= (PIND & B11000000); // OR on Q7-Q8(PD6-PD7) bits
  return temp;
}

void setup() {
  Serial.begin(9600);
  DDRC &= B11000000; // PC0-PC5 = inputs (Wind Direction)
  PORTC |= B00111111; // switch on pull-up resistors
  DDRD &= B00001011; // PD4, PD5, PD6, PD7 = inputs (Wind Direction and Speed + 1-Wire) PD2 temporarily for RS485 disable
  PORTD |= B11110000; // switch on pull-up resistors
}

void loop(){ 
  int photocell = analogRead(ADC7);
  Serial.print(photocell, DEC);
  delay(1000);
  int voltmeter = analogRead(ADC6);
  Serial.print('\t');
  Serial.println(voltmeter, DEC);
  delay(1000);

  uint8_t d = make_wind(); // ;-)
  d = match_wind(WD, d);
  if (d < 16)
    Serial.println(windDirection[d]);
  else Serial.println("Invalid Direction");
  delay(1000);
}

Is it possible to read the strength of the hall sensors? (now I see only 0/1)

If so these could be used to interpolate between the values. The 16 wind directions are steps of 360/16 = 22.5, if interpolation is possible you may could get to 5 degrees accuracy

robtillaart:
Is it possible to read the strength of the hall sensors? (now I see only 0/1)

If so these could be used to interpolate between the values. The 16 wind directions are steps of 360/16 = 22.5, if interpolation is possible you may could get to 5 degrees accuracy

Not likely. Hall effect sensors come in two varieties, those with a digital output and those with a analog output. Sounds like this weather station is using simple digital output hall sensors.

Lefty

Is it possible to read the strength of the hall sensors? (now I see only 0/1)

They are Allegro 3144 which is now obsolete and replaced by the A1104. Unfortunately, like Lefty points out, they are digital devices, so no interpolation will be possible. Just from watching the wind vane while I had it up on a pole, the direction oscillated quite a bit. I don't know that wind direction is stable enough to warrant 5 degree resolution. Not Texas wind anyway. :slight_smile: We have a saying here, if you don't like the weather just wait 5 minutes.

That's an interesting idea though. If I ever decide to replace the circuit board, I could try linear Hall sensors.

EmilyJane:
I had a chance to play with the weather station and wrote this code to set up the ports and get wind direction.

Nice!

A suggestion and an idea. Suggestion...

const char* windDirection[17] = { // strings for the 16 wind directions
"N", "NNE", "NE", "ENE", "E", "ESE", "SE", "SSE", "S", "SSW",
"SW", "WSW", "W", "WNW", "NW", "NNW", "---"};

...very slightly simplifies displaying the wind...

uint8_t d = make_wind(); // Sophomore humor. Got to love it. Hmm, I think I'll watch Shaun the Sheep tonight...
d = match_wind(WD, d);
Serial.println(windDirection[d]);

Idea... interpolating (guessing) the wind direction... By tracking the wind direction versus time, it is possible for the application to provide a guess at the exact wind direction.

I just finished modifying the board to include a 4K7 pull-up on the 1-wire pin. The DS1850 that I removed is obsolete too. The Chinese must have a stockpile of old parts. Or maybe they buy them up as they go obsolete.

I don't know if I'll put a temp sensor back inside the enclosure or not. It's useless for weather applications.

I removed 4 (of the 35!) LEDs just to give myself a little room to work. I may remove all of them. That will free up 6 I/O pins. Maybe I'll leave a couple as a warning to low flying birds or squirrels. :slight_smile:

...very slightly simplifies displaying the wind...

So, if i don't get a match, I display "---"? That's a good idea. I think it's physically impossible to not have one of those patterns though. That would signal a problem with the circuit.

Idea... interpolating (guessing) the wind direction... By tracking the wind direction versus time, it is possible for the application to provide a guess at the exact wind direction.

That's an interesting idea. That would be helpful for displaying trends also. I'll work on that. I'll probably average wind speed over some period also.

Sophomore humor. Got to love it. Hmm, I think I'll watch Shaun the Sheep tonight...

Sometimes you get tired of meaningful function names and have to go with a little smile. :slight_smile: Makes life a treat!